5 Steps to Improving Your Preaching Life
We're 7 Sundays from Labor Day weekend. How do you feel about heading into the next program year?
Are you excited and confident in your routines and processes? Or are you dreading the increase in activity, the weekly scramble to get it all done, the seemingly endless demands on your time and energy?
If you're dissatisfied with the way your sermon preparation and preaching went last year, the slower pace of summer is a great time for reflection and change.
A small investment of time over these next few weeks could transform your preaching life for the rest of the year. How do you make the most of the slower days of summer to make lasting change?
"WOW!": How to Enter the Fall with Renewed Energy for Preaching
BsP is receiving more and more feedback that our ecourse is truly transforming the sermon prep process for preachers. Craft an Effective Sermon by Friday helps preachers not only preach better sermons but enjoy the prep, revitalizing their own spirituality in the process.
Beyond Good Intentions: Schedule God
This isn't another guilt trip or admonition to prioritize God. Our problem is not in our intentions. Of course, we want to spend time with God.
The problem is in the execution, which often comes down to our planning—or failure to plan.
With competing demands, many of which are worthy and important, prioritizing this time of solitude with the invisible God can feel abstract and therefore less important.
We're tempted to think it doesn't really matter. But it does.
So how do we make this time happen?
The Myth of How to Save A Shrinking Church
“The Mainline Church is dying. Therefore, Preachers, you must do ______ to fix the problem.”
These stories suggest that “it” is simply waiting for each of us to imitate or discover. If only we find “it,” the congregation will revive. It’s up to us to keep looking for “it,” and if the church doors close in the meantime, we are responsible for not finding “it” in time.
Of course, pray a lot and rely on the Holy Spirit.
But in truth, most messages imply it’s really up to us.
Wow. That’s a lot of responsibility. But is it truly ours? What, exactly, is our responsibility here?
Thinking About Creating a Sermon Series? This Book Will Save You Time and Effort
hether you're new to creating a series or an old hand at it, A Preacher's Guide to Lectionary Sermon Series: Thematic Plans for Years A, B, and C * addresses these concerns, offering a thematic roadmap preachers can follow with little effort.
20 Tips to Increase Your Creativity Through Deadlines
It's a paradox.
Often, limits actually enhance creativity. Here are 20 tips to find and take advantage of your creativity/deadline "sweet spot."
Your Story: Does it Belong in the Pulpit?
Does telling your own story
in this sermon for these people
point listeners towards God
or towards you, the preacher?
It's a Day of Reflection, So Let's Reflect on your Preaching
In the spirit of reflection, we're sharing four of our most popular blog posts to help you think about your craft and process. May you find something to inspire your preaching and preaching life.
A Surprising Lesson from Nadia Bolz-Weber about Vulnerability in the Pulpit
"Preaching to preachers has to be about the most delicious thing I can think of."
That's roughly how Nadia began her sermon to 1700 preachers, some of whom are the brightest luminaries of our vocation.
That one word stopped me short: "Delicious?!"
If you or I were preaching to 1700 preachers, would we use the same adjective, "delicious"? A word that connotes a feast, an indulgent treat, a delightful experience to be savored?
Or would we be more likely to choose an adjective somewhere between nerve-wracking and paralyzing?
Or is that just me?
Imagine, though.
What would make preaching to so many colleagues "delicious"?
How to Preach Without Notes & Nail It
It took me ten years in the pulpit before I tried preaching without a manuscript.
I wish I'd known then what I know now because I wouldn't have been nearly so anxious.
Why was I anxious? Bad assumptions:
- I thought I still had to have the sermon fully written ahead of time.
- I thought I had to have the entire manuscript memorized. Since memorization has always been hard for me, I was terrified of forgetting carefully crafted words and phrases.
- I didn't realize that as long as I had a map and knew where I was headed, I was ready to bring others along for the ride.
It turns out my assumptions were wrong. Preaching without notes was much simpler than I had realized.