Articles in Planning
H. Beecher Hicks in the second chapter of his book Preaching Through a Storm has a sermon entitled How to Silence a Preacher; or, Shut Your Mouth!. Rev. Hicks preached this sermon at the ordination …
Lowell Erdahl, in the book Best Advice for Preaching, quotes someone who said: “There are two kinds of preachers–those who have to say something and those who have something to say!” A preacher gains …
I will never forget my first homiletic class where the instructor told us to “analyze a sermon.” I had no idea where to begin and the whole idea seemed difficult. But I then …
Warren Stewart, in Interpreting God’s Word in Black Preaching, writes:
He or she who interprets and preaches the Word must identify with the Word in such a way that the Word will both support and challenge …
Many preachers have preached sermons that were not prepared from making use of sermon planning. Often the sermon lands us in Flunkersville and we resolve never to be in this position again. However, …
One preacher asked me if he should accept last minute invitations to preach. As an associate minister in a church where other preaching associates received most of the preaching opportunities, this preacher wondered about accepting such invitations.
Some of us are guilty of using the text. We have the idea we want, we find the text that appears to say what we want it to say. And then we quote it as …
There are multitudes of sermon outline sites. Some of them require you to pay for the outline, others are membership sites that give you access to thousands of outlines, and still others are completely free.
Preaching multiple texts can derail your sermon. It should be very clear to everyone who is listening what your main point and your main text is. If you have too many competing points or too many texts, the people will get lost and will simply choose one of the points to focus on, or check out and wait until you start whooping (or whatever kind of celebration you do) to check back in…
Use Other Texts Strategically
John Claypool, in Best Advice for Preaching said that when we use preaching to get something for ourselves, rather than to give as an act of love, then the sermon will have great tension. And I agree…
