How to Make Your Sermon Stick: 4 Tips for a Memorable Message
Want your sermon to be remembered beyond the end of the service? Check out these four tips you can implement this week to make your sermon stick.
Summer Preaching Reboot: How to take the stess, Tedium, & Procrastination out of your Preaching life
What if you knew you'd find new insights in the Scripture, even on your hundredth reading?
What if you knew what needed to be done each day to ensure your sermon was written by Friday?
What if you had a process and schedule you could count on every week to take the stress, tedium, and procrastination out of your sermon prep?
What if sermon prep became a joy—even a respite—rather than a weight hanging over your head all week?
An Easter Reflection for Preachers
Thank you, Preachers, for sharing the Good News of Easter.
From all of us at Backstory Preaching,
Micah, Cathie, Shaundra, Mary, Jessica, Taira, & Lisa
Breathe: An Easter Prayer & Survival Guide for Preachers
Ask the Spirit what one thing you are to do right now.
- If it's to work on your sermon, work on your sermon and your sermon alone.
- If it's to proofread bulletins, then focus on each line, each word, each number, one...at...a...time.
- If it's to stand in the pulpit and preach, then preach with your whole being.
Do the one thing you are to do. And find the peace of Christ waiting for you therein.
Pray Your Easter Sermon Into Being: A Sermon Prep Resource for Less Stress
Discerning a message and prepping a sermon amidst the other demands of preaching is a challenge.
That's why we're offering this free guide to a process that will transform your sermon prep from work to respite—all while helping you discern a transformative message for your listeners.
Last week, we introduced BsP's lectio divina sermon prep process in the post "What if You Never Had to Search for a Sermon Message Again?"
In this guide, we go deeper to help you implement each step of the 5-day process.
What if You Never Had to Look for a Sermon Message Again?
Even the most experienced preachers sometimes wonder how to pull another message out of too-familiar lessons.
Sermons driven by fear—or avoidance of embarrassment—may get the job done, but not pleasantly.
What if there were another way? A better way?
What if we never had to look for a sermon message again? And no, I don't mean looking to the internet to "borrow" someone else's sermon.
I mean, what if we didn't have to look for the message at all?
What Are You Asking of Your Listeners? A Good Sermon Counts the Cost
Why does it seem like a good sermon isn't enough to cause hearts to be changed?
If the Holy Spirit is really at work and the Gospel is preached with clarity and conviction, how come as soon as we hear the Good News we don't we embrace it and change course immediately?
How to Keep Sermon Listeners on the Edge of their Seats: Why You Should Build Tension into Every Sermon
Tension keeps us reading, watching, or listening.
Think about any book or movie that kept your attention.
- There's a need... a desire, wish, want, hope
- that's blocked... thwarted, redirected, obstructed, obscured
- which creates a question. If? Who? How? When?
- Questions create tension...suspense, anticipation, dissonance, uncertainty
- that we need resolved....settled, resolved, determined, answered
which keeps us on the edge of our seats
Ten Tips for Keeping Your Sermon Prep Out of Your Weekend
Don't want to do sermon prep on the weekends? You don't have to!
Here are ten ways to reclaim your weekends.
You spoke right to me! How did you know?
A relevant sermon connects our listeners to our message in a way that helps them find God in the midst of their lives. Lent, this season of remembrance and anticipation, is a prime time to address our listeners' challenges and questions directly.
To help listeners feel as though we're speaking right to them, we need to understand their context, their struggles, and their hopes that they'll be OK.
The sermon 52 Framework
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Live Lectio for Sermon Prep (Free!)
Get an early start on your sermon prep by joining us live on Facebook (Mondays at noon Central) as we prayerfully discuss the coming week's gospel passage (RCL & NL).
I participated in the Lectio study today with a complicated and double-speak Gospel (John 17:6-19) and WOW! I received so much great insight and am headed in a direction I feel really good about. Thank you to all my colleagues! If you are wondering if this is worth it, wonder no more. It is.
—Donna G.
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Your go-to community for preaching support and long-term growth. Weekly sermon prep resources, monthly master classes with leaders in the field, seasonal planning sessions, and community for the day-to-day work of preaching—all online so you can participate from anywhere.
Craft an Effective Sermon by Friday
This downloadable eCourse teaches you effective techniques you can apply immediately to craft soul-filled sermons that connect with your audience.
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The Gospel People Don't Want to Hear: Preaching Challenging Messages was written to aid preacher’s in understanding what’s at stake for their listeners so they can craft sermons their audience can receive, even if they challenge cherished beliefs.
I just have to say WOW. I'm so grateful that I made the investment and joined The Collective. These Thursday [workshops] are a game-changer for me.
—Andrea M.