Tag Archives: preaching

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The Weight & Joy of Being a Pastor: Communicating God’s Word

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One of the best parts of being a pastor (or a Christian for that matter) is seeing God use you. There is nothing like using the gifts God has given to you.

Recently I’ve been sharing some of the weights and joys of being a pastor to help people who attend church understand what it is like to be a pastor and how they can support their pastor and his family, but also to encourage pastors to keep going and not give up, as so many do.

Being a pastor is unique. It isn’t harder than another job, just different.

If you’ve missed any of the weights or joys I’ve covered, you can see them here: Preaching God’s word every week, You can’t change people, God’s call on your life, Seeing life change, People under you are counting on you, God using you and What God thinks of you.

Joy #4: Communicating God’s Word

While this is a weight that pastors carry, this is also a joy.

To have the ability to open God’s Word and share it with others is a huge joy. To have people come to hear what God is saying through his Word and you is unbelievable. It is humbling, holy and scary all at the same time. For me, because teaching is one of my top gifts, I love being able to preach every week.

I love to see the way God chooses to use the work that I have put in and the time I have labored on a talk. It is something that is difficult to describe. It goes back to God using us.

For me, a sermon starts about six to eight months before I preach it. I lay out where I feel God is taking our church over the coming year and begin meditating on those passages, researching, finding articles, books and commentaries to see what others have to say on those topics. By the time I get up to preach something, I have been sitting with that topic for quite some time. To see more of how I prep a sermon, you can read that process here.

I am always blown away at how, even though we plan in advance, our church seems to be in the place where what I’m preaching on is what they need. Countless times God has shown up where we are going through what I’m preaching on. I used to be surprised.

By far this is more work, but at the same time it is so worth it. To be a part of God’s work in the world in this way makes what I do worth it.

Too many pastors, while they enjoy preaching, get lazy at it. They don’t plan ahead, they are trying to figure out Saturday night what to say instead of getting a good night’s sleep. They simply download someone else’s ideas instead of doing the hard work of figuring out what God wants to say to the church they serve. Or, they get up and say too many things instead of doing the hard work of editing.

Preaching is a weight, and according to the New Testament something you will get judged twice for. So if you preach, it is a joy as well as a weight. If it is not a joy, do something else in your church, or ask God to make preaching a joy to you.

When you see this task as a joyful weight, you finally get it. In that moment, a lot changes as a communicator. You are humbled by the opportunity, how God works but also that God will move through your prayers, confession and study. Those are never wasted in this weighty joy.

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When You’re Stuck in Sermon Prep

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sermon prep

At some point in writing a sermon you will get stuck. This also happens when it comes to writing a book. Every pastor and author knows this feeling. We dread it. We pray against it. We do whatever we can to avoid it, and yet on a regular basis, it comes.

We sit in front of a computer watching a blank screen and a cursor that doesn’t move. We look at our Bible and commentaries, read blogs and listen to podcasts in hopes of any inspiration.

Ever feel stuck during sermon prep?

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And…

Nothing.

So what do you do when you’re stuck?

6 things to do when you’re stuck in sermon prep.

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1. Pray. While you would think every pastor is doing this all throughout their sermon prep, I can say from personal experience we don’t pray as much as we should. There are times when you work from your own ability and ingenuity. So stop and pray. Ask God, plead with God for what He wants to say through the passage. What is He saying to you personally? Not just to your church. A sermon is for the pastor first, then the church.

A sermon is for the pastor first, then the church.

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2. Confess sin. You may have some sin in your heart that is preventing God from speaking to you clearly. Confess that. Think through your heart, your motivations, your desires, your innermost thoughts. Bring those before your Savior. He already knows. Often when I can’t see things clearly in the Bible, whether for sermon prep or my daily devotions, it is because of unconfessed sin.

After working through the heart issues, you can try something else, but don’t skip to #3.

3. Read the passage in different versions. Most pastors preach from a certain version. I preach from the ESV and love it. Reading the passage through in the NIV or The Message always brings out something I didn’t see before or triggers an idea that I couldn’t think of. Simply changing it up brings a new perspective.

4. Do something active. While doing sermon prep, I get up and walk around every 52 minutes. That simple break gets my blood moving, helps me feel better, and the fresh air brings new energy and ideas. I also have some of my best blog and sermon ideas while doing Crossfit. When I run I’ll have great sermon ideas as well. Doing something active helps reinvigorate an idea. This is also a great time to go back to #1 and pray.

5. Talk to someone else about it. Another thing that is helpful is to talk through the passage with someone else. Katie will often read what I am preaching through and give me her ideas on it. I’m also thinking through how to better include younger communicators and other pastors in what I’m preaching and working through the passage as a team. I have a friend that meets every Wednesday with four other men in his church to talk through the passage he’s preaching on. This brings all kinds of perspectives and ideas you didn’t have before.

6. Just preach what you have. Finally, you might be done with your sermon prep. Yes, I know, a sermon is never done. You could spend 80 hours on a sermon. You could also have all that you need, and reading one more commentary, looking for one more thing might not be what you need. You might just need to preach what you have and say, “God, I did the best that I could; You do the rest.”

6 things that will help with this week’s sermon.

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How we Distort the Gospel & God’s Love for Us

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gospel

I shared this on Sunday in my sermon on Romans 5:3 – 11 from The Whole Christ: Legalism, Antinomianism, and Gospel Assurance—Why the Marrow Controversy Still Matters by Sinclair Ferguson:

Why did Jesus die?

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This comes to expression when the gospel is preached in these terms: God loves you because Christ died for you!

How do those words distort the gospel? They imply that the death of Christ is the reason for the love of God for me.

By contrast the Scriptures affirm that the love of God for us is the reason for the death of Christ. That is the emphasis of John 3:16. God (i.e. the Father, since here “God” is the antecedent of “his…Son”) so loved the world that he gave his Son for us. The Son does not need to do anything to persuade the Father to love us; he already does!

The subtle danger here should be obvious: if we speak of the cross of Christ as the cause of the love of the Father, we imply that behind the cross and apart from it he may not actually love us at all. He needs to be “paid” a ransom price in order to love us. But if it has required the death of Christ to persuade him to love us (“Father, if I die, will you begin to love them?”), how can we ever be sure the Father himself loves us – “deep down” with an everlasting love? True, the Father does not love us because we are sinners; but he does love us even though we are sinners. He loved us before Christ died for us. It is because he loves us that Christ died for us!

How do I know God loves me?

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How to Recover from Preaching

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preaching

If I got to rank what I love about my job, preaching would be in the top two. I love the prep, working through a passage, a series, thinking through how to best present an idea, and praying about those who will be there, that God would work in their lives and draw them to Himself through my meager attempts at presenting His Word.

There is a downside to this love. It is what happens after preaching. The recovery.

I remember when Katie and I met with a doctor to talk about how to handle the adrenaline that goes with preaching, the emotional, relational and spiritual drain that it can be. (I’ve heard of pastors who sleep for days after preaching because their bodies can’t handle the adrenaline.) The doctor asked, “Is it like teaching a class?” It’s different for one reason – eternities hang in the balance. I heard one pastor describe preaching as “reaching into the road to hell and pulling people back.” (I realize there are some possible theological problems with that, but you get the point.)

The crash a pastor experiences the day after preaching can be brutal. Your whole body aches, your eyes hurt, you feel as low as you have felt all week. For me, I am often so stiff that I can’t bend down to pick something up off the floor after preaching.

So what do you do?

5 ways to recover from preaching.

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  1. Manage stress. Keep the day before and after preaching as stress free as possible. Don’t have meetings; stay focused on preaching and recovering.
  2. Recharge. I do something that recharges me. Hiking, running, playing with my kids, reading a book, drinking coffee with Katie. Read something that recharges you or takes your mind off church. This can be a novel or a spiritual book that challenges your own heart and soul as a human.
  3. Encouragement. Have some people who call/text to encourage you afterward. Have elders or friends check in with you to ask how they can pray for you, encourage you and let you know that they are lifting you and your family up in prayer.
  4. Eating. Most pastors are notoriously poor eaters. What you eat before and after preaching is incredibly important. What you eat will make it easier or harder to preach, to sleep, to recover. Make sure you also drink enough water to stay hydrated.
  5. Move forward. As quickly as possible, move on to next week. Regardless of how your weekend went, good or bad, the next weekend is coming very quickly. So move on. Don’t dwell on what happened (especially if it was bad). Celebrate what God did, learn from what you did poorly, but move on.
5 things to do this Monday if you are a pastor.

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How to Not Have a Big Day at Church

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big day

Big days are crucial in the life of any church. They are a launching pad to something new. Whether that is a new ministry season, a new sermon series, sign-ups for small groups, classes, VBS, starting a new church, or moving to a new location, all of these are opportunities for a big day and creating new momentum.

That’s what a big day does. It starts something new. It creates or sustains momentum.

Big days don’t just happen. They must be planned for. If you aren’t careful, though, you can miss these crucial opportunities.

Yes, the Holy Spirit brings momentum that you can’t create and can’t explain. Yes, the Holy Spirit wants your church to grow and reach people who don’t know Jesus. This means there are things you can and should do to work with the Holy Spirit to have a big day. You can also do things to make sure you don’t have a big day.

Here are six ways to not have a big day:

6 ways to not have a big day at your church.

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1. Don’t tell anyone. If you want to have a big day, if something new is happening at your church, tell people. Their lives are busy, they aren’t always thinking about church, the new series, new program or new opportunity. Many times this is how things happen in a church. New sermon series, no one knows. New groups are getting started, there isn’t a clear path to them.

If you don’t tell anyone about your church, no one will know you exist.

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2. Don’t preach on a felt need topic. If you want to create a big day around your Sunday service, you need to preach on a felt need topic. This doesn’t mean you go gospel light or don’t preach from a book of the Bible. You can launch a series on Romans and make it a big day, but you have to be creative with it. People don’t show up to your church because you are starting a series called “Romans.” Think through: When the people from my church invite someone, what will they say?

What you preach on is a crucial reason people show up to your church.

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3. Create zero buzz. Big days and buzz go hand in hand. This might be having a photo booth, a giveaway, food trucks, a baptism, anything that is different from a normal week to create a “this is special” feeling.

4. Just expect people to find your church. If you look at most church websites, it can take awhile for you to find where they meet. In fact, I knew of one church that moved into a new facility, and yet the front page of their website had their old address for several months as where they met, after they moved into their new facility. Most churches simply expect people to come looking for them. That rarely happens. Most people aren’t choosing church; they are choosing football, hiking, skiing, the lake, sleeping in or running errands.

Want your church to die? Expect people to just find it on their own.

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5. Don’t give anyone in your church a reason to invite someone. The reason your people aren’t inviting anyone to your church is because you haven’t given them a reason to invite someone. I know you have told them, maybe guilted them, but people invite their friends to something worthwhile. If you can’t remember the last time someone invited someone to your church, or you can’t remember the last time you did it, ask why not? What is keeping them from taking that step? Are you doing something wrong as a church? Do your people feel weird about inviting people to your church?

If you don’t give people a reason to invite people to church, they won’t.

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6. Don’t pray for it. New people, momentum, people beginning a relationship with Jesus, marriages being saved, and the chains of addiction being broken come from the Holy Spirit. If you don’t pray for it, a big day will pass you by. You can plan, be creative, give away a car and nothing will change.

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How to Make Your Next Sermon Great

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sermon

When it comes to anything in life, whether it is marriage, parenting, leadership, or work, someone pays the price.

In marriage you can either pay the price at the beginning, working through all the junk you brought into your marriage; or you can pay it later when you are unhappy and married or divorced.

As a single you can pay the price to stay pure and wait until you get married to have sex. Or you can pay the price after you get married as you work through what it meant to give your body away before you got married. Or your spouse will have to deal with that thought.

The same is true for preaching.

Either the pastor pays the price in preparation, studying, praying, planning, reading, and listening to God; or his church pays the price when they have to listen to him stand up there completely unprepared, unsure of what his big idea is, as he wanders through his sermon aimlessly like the nation of Israel did on their way to the Promised Land.

Too many pastors make their church pay the price.

I was talking with a few pastors the other day who told me, “It’s Wednesday, I’ve got a title.” If all you have on Wednesday is a title, you are not paying the price for your sermon.

In preaching, someone pays a price, the church for listening or the pastor in prep.

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Paying the price means you plan a preaching calendar, you think through where you are going as a church. You study, you pray through the text asking God to reveal to you what it is about, what your church needs to hear. You read commentaries and other books, you look into the context to better communicate the text.

Preaching every week is easily the biggest weight I carry and the biggest joy I experience.

On Saturday night I lie in bed thinking through my talk and the text for Sunday. At this point in my preparation I almost have the text I’m preaching on memorized and have thought through the ins and outs. I am now thinking more about who will be there, how I will communicate it. I begin praying for those I think of and those whom I don’t know, those who are coming to Revolution as a last ditch effort on God. This is the weight of preaching. If you do not feel this, I don’t think you should preach. Why? When you stand up to preach you are literally reaching into Hell and pulling people who are on the path to Hell (Matthew 7:13 – 14). I realize that is a paraphrase, but that is the spiritual battle of preaching. That is what’s at stake.

Sunday night I lie awake worrying if I said everything I should’ve said. Did God want me to say something else? Was I clear? I pray for those who made decisions, whether to get baptized, start following Jesus, or any number of next steps we talk through on a Sunday. I pray for the spiritual protection of those who made decisions. I know that night will be a very difficult night as Satan and his angels will be going to work on those individuals.

Pastors, do you pray for those who are coming and for those who make decisions? This is the price of preaching. This is the price of pastoring.

If you are not willing to pay it, then do something else. Lives are at stake. Souls are at stake. Marriages are at stake. Families are at stake. Eternities are at stake.

Pay the price.

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Why a Pastor Should Work Ahead (And How to do It)

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Work Ahead

Most pastors, because of all that is on their plates have this revolving conversation in their head: It is Monday, they are tired and worn down and they don’t know what they are going to preach on this coming Sunday.

They start scouring the internet to see what their favorite megachurch pastor is preaching on or they read a book in hopes of finding some kind of inspiration or story to steal, or they read their Bible in hopes that God will speak to them and show them their sermon.

Not all pastors are like this, but sadly, many are.

There is another way: work ahead. 

Why a Pastor Should Work Ahead on a Sermon (And How to do It)

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By working ahead, you are prepared for what is coming up, your sermons are not last minute. In fact, I just had two pastors tell me they spend 8 hours Saturday night working on their sermons. 8 hours! That’s crazy.

Every pastor wants to work ahead and when we hear pastors say that they have their next 3 sermons written, a part of seethes in anger.

While I don’t work like that, I write the sermon I’m going to preach on Sunday leading up to Sunday, I can tell you what I am planning to preach on for the next 12 months.

One of the biggest benefits to this is how it helps you to research. By knowing the topics I will cover over the coming year, when I read a blog or article that connects with that, I’m able to save it into Evernote.

But how do you work ahead? How do you know what you are going to preach on for the next 12 months? Here are some ways I’ve learned to do it:

  1. Write out books of the Bible or topics you’d like to cover. Don’t underestimate your passion for a topic or books of the Bible. Often, the next series you should do is one you are passionate about. What is God saying to you right now? How are you growing personally? Can you make that into a series? Is there a book of the Bible speaking to you right now?
  2. Ask your church, staff, and elders for suggestions. On a yearly basis, I ask for input. Granted some people give me input throughout the year and when they do, I add it to my growing list. A pastor should always have a running list of possible series or sermons they are thinking about. Often, the questions that come up in counseling or conversations lead to great sermon series as well.
  3. Get away for some solitude. When I finally decide what I’m going to preach on, I get away. I pray through the books that have been on my heart, topics that are bouncing around in my head and things others have said to me. I often do this in the summer time to lay out the following year. So, this past summer I was laying out 2015.
  4. Map out the series for 12 months. To effectively work ahead on prep, research, and creativity, I find a year a good standard to be working from. I am always amazed when I am reading a book that has nothing to do with a sermon topic and I find a great quote that I can use in 8 months. This saves so much time the week I work on the actual sermon. In fact, just this past week I landed on my big idea for a sermon I’ll preach in 9 months.
  5. Create Evernote folders. Evernote is something every pastor should know and use often. If you are unfamiliar with it, here are two resources I’d recommend: Evernote Essentials: The Definitive Guide for New Evernote Users and A Guide to Evernote for Pastors. I have a folder for different topics: leadership, gay marriage, marriage, dating, eating, health, divorce, parenting, schedule, pace, etc. I also have one for each book of the Bible, whether I am planning to preach through it soon or not. When I’m reading a blog or article online I simply use the Evernote shortcut for Chrome and send it to the correct folder.
Stop waiting til the last minute on your sermon

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I can’t tell you the benefits of this. I am never wondering “what am I going to say this coming week” which drastically lowers my stress level and raises the quality of a sermon because whenever I preach, it has been in preparation for a year.

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Finding God in the Storm

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book

As I’m preaching through Habakkuk I’ve been overwhelmed by how hard it is to trust God.

I know that might sound weird to hear from a pastor, but it can be hard.

When life is going well I often have the feeling I don’t have to trust God because I’m tempted to think I don’t need God. Then, when life is hard or painful, I wonder why God is has left me or if he is angry at me.

Habakkuk begins by asking, “God, how do you sit idly by and do nothing about this?” If you are so powerful God, why don’t you lift a finger? Why do you allow this?

At the heart of God’s answer is God’s character. The way we answer that in our minds reveals what we believe about God.

It is easy when the clouds of life roll into to wonder why God hasn’t given us an umbrella, but He has.

God could’ve chosen any prophet to give this message to. Any number of them were available to carry this message. But God chose a man named Habakkuk, whose name means “Embrace.” I think this is one of the most crucial pieces of the book of Habakkuk and shows us God’s heart. It shows us where God is when the storms of life roll in. He is with us, embracing us. He is not far off. He is not taking a day off or having forgotten us.

Over and over in Scripture, from Joseph, to the Exodus, to David in the Psalms, Jesus in the gospels (particularly in John 11), God’s anger at the pain, death and hurt in our world.

One of the things I’ve been challenged with personally and was a challenge I gave to my church is that in a storm, to stop asking why something is happening and to begin looking for Jesus in the storm. It changes my heart and my perspective because I am asking something different of God and when I ask something different of God, I’m able to see things more clearly.

In this, I’m able to see that God is not oblivious. God is broken with us. God is embracing us.

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Why People Attend Church

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church

There is power in identity. When we create the right kind of identity, we can say things to the world around us that they don’t actually believe makes sense. We can get them to do things that they don’t think they can do. -Carmine Gallo, Talk Like TED: The 9 Public-Speaking Secrets of the World’s Top Minds

Wrapped up in this quote is a key to preaching the works: helping people see the possibilities of a sermon on their future. 

Many sermons seem to miss this component, helping people imagine the changes that would come to their life if a change was made.

Think for a minute, what if someone began reading their bible? What if someone actually let go of a past hurt and forgave someone? What if a married couple began investing in their relationship as much as they do a hobby or their kids? What if someone actually began to see the impact of seeing God as father would make in their life?

Often, sermons tend to stay in the intellectual side of things or we focus on getting to the emotions (possibly manipulating them).

What about motivation?

I know many can cringe at this because it makes them feel like a salesman, pushy, or that they are simply being a motivational speaker who is creating rah-rah cheers in their church.

This question gets at something every pastor should answer before they get up to preach: why should anybody care about what I’m about to say?

The answer is not because it is in the Bible, most of our culture does not care what is in the Bible. The answer is not because it is true, most people in our culture do not believe the Bible is truer than some other book.

It gets at why most people show up at church on a given week.

Hope. 

Most people walk through doors of a church looking for hope.

They might be lost, they might be aimless, they may have tried other things, they may be at the end of their rope or halfway to the end.

But they are looking for hope, for possibilities.

A sermon, through the power of the gospel should show them that hope.

This is one thing I say almost every week as we get ready to take communion. We are reminded in communion that when Jesus walked out of the tomb, we have hope. Hope that one day all the wrongs of our world will be righted. Hope that we can conquer all things through the power of Jesus. Hope that we can live the life God has called us.

Hope.

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How to Put Your Sin to Death

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sin

We all struggle with something.

We all commit some sin or have some emotion we wished that we didn’t have.

Throughout Scripture (Romans 8:13; Galatians 5:24; Colossians 3:5) we are told to crucify our sin, to put it to death.

But what does that look like?

Right before vs. 24, Paul has two lists: a list of sins (vs. 19 – 21) and a list called the fruit of the Spirit (vs. 22 – 23).

In vs. 19 – 21 there are sexual immorality (which is all sex outside of the bounds of marriage between a man and a woman), impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies and things like these.

What is interesting about this list is that Paul seems to put them all on the same level and says, “living in these will keep you from God” (see the end of vs. 21). While I’ve seen “Christians” holding signs that say “Gay people go to hell.” I’ve never seen one hold a sign that says, “Jealous people go to hell.” (But that’s a different post)

What Paul says though, is these are not occasional sins. In vs. 16 – 17, he describes these as overwhelming, all-encompassing desires that you cannot control the longing of. They are your identity. This is where it becomes broken for us, “I’m a gay man. I can’t control my anger. I’m a fighter. I have to win at all costs.”

For each person, vs. 19 – 21 is where the battle happens.

But how do you put them to death?

This is where the fruit of the Spirit comes in in vs. 22 – 23 of Galatians 5.

I love that Paul calls them fruit. It gives this picture of a farmer, of gradual growth, that is done by a farmer, not the fruit. The fruit doesn’t make itself grow, God does. Fruit does grow. Not always at the rate we would expect or think it should, but it grows.

The question for a follower of Jesus then, do you see growth in your life in the areas of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control? Do you see how God is working on your heart in those areas?

If the answer is no, I would say the Holy Spirit is not living in you because a follower of Jesus should be growing in all these areas at some point. We never stop, we never reach the pinnacle.

Now, as we take the fruit of the Spirit and put our sin to death from vs. 19 – 21.

This becomes a daily thing.

Crucifixion in vs. 24 carries this idea that it will be a death. It will be painful, hard, difficult. Freedom always involves a war.

Freedom always involves a war.

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One of the best ways to walk this road is through confession. Our family practices confession at the end of the day. We each confess to each other areas where we sinned or hurt someone. We’ve told our kids, whatever they say in this moment they will get grace. This is a way we teach them to confess their sins, but also what grace means. This can be dicey as a parent.

One thing I’ve learned about God’s grace is that, many times, the reason we don’t experience God’s grace and freedom in Jesus is because we won’t allow ourselves to.