Follow Jesus. Lead the church. Change the world.
When we were in Washington D.C. for the GBCS seminar last month, we met with a staffer in Senator Robert Casey’s office who, on a particular issue, said it was good to receive our input because they “hear so much noise,” much of it negative. This idea has stuck with me. The noise describes all … Read more
Desperate preachers pray. Desperate preachers pray a lot. But what do desperate preachers pray? I once posed a question in an online pastor’s forum/community, asking what they tended to pray in the minutes/hours before preaching. I don’t remember getting a lot of response, so perhaps this topic only interests me. 🙂 But it’s an opportunity … Read more
Acouple days ago, we gave Ethan a treat after lunch (a little bit of Easter candy). Ethan doesn’t eat much junk food so he doesn’t get much sugar, normally. But after his treat, he was too wound up to take his normal 2+ hour nap. He stayed in his room (mostly in his bed, although … Read more
The use of preaching notes is a more technical aspect of preaching, and I thought it’d be interesting to reflect on how my use of notes has developed over the years. Of course, preaching notes are tied to one’s preaching approach. Some use manuscripts. Some use detailed outlines. Others use little or no notes. But … Read more
I am writing a series of posts on preaching. This is the third one, and a follow-up to the last one, The Preaching Process. The first one is The Preaching Challenge. In the last post, I began writing about sermon preparation and mentioned that I have developed five words to help guide me through my … Read more
I will post my “5 Stages of Sermon Preparation” tomorrow, but I want to interrupt my series of posts on preaching with a thought from today’s sermon. We looked at Mark 15.1-15. In Mark 15, Jesus is brought to Pilate by the religious leaders with a charge of high treason (as opposed to blasphemy, which … Read more
This post (and the next one) should probably come with the warning label, “Under construction.” And while I hope this process is well thought out, it doesn’t necessarily always play out so smoothly! So, with that out of the way … Sermon preparation must be understood as a process. But the challenge is that every … Read more
I have been planning to write more about preaching for a while. In fact, it’s been around 2.5 years or so since I wrote One Point Preaching (a review and interaction with Stanley and Jones’ book, Communicating for a Change) and StoryMapping (two of the most popular posts on the blog). So, I am going … Read more
There’s sort of a common joke among church leaders that pastors write many Monday morning letters of resignation. Along these lines, I once heard Rob Bell use the term “pastor’s hangover” in a sermon, and it’s stuck with me ever since. Perhaps it’s because I know what it feels like (although, mine are normally mild). … Read more
New Year’s is one of my favorite times of the year, and the week between Christmas and New Year’s — the last week of the calendar year — tends to be a time of reflection (looking back) and refocusing (looking ahead). And the fact that it’s our first week back after family leaves, makes it … Read more