It’s inevitable. That 8 week sermon series seems like it’s going to go on forever from the perspective of that first week. But sooner or later that seventh week is upon you and you realize you only have one week of cushion before you are forced to do something new.
I am usually pretty good about knowing where I’m going next when it comes to my preaching. Typically I map out the year starting with major events on the calendar such as Easter, Christmas, perhaps Mother’s Day and Father’s Day, vacation, and so on. Then I try to fill in the gaps with series.
For some reason I think in terms of 8 week blocks. I’m not bound to it; sometimes it’s a couple more, sometime a few less. Even when I’m preaching through longer books of the Bible I try to stick to those 8 week blocks even if it means having a few sets of 8 broken up by something unique.
The hardest part isn’t the mapping process, it’s the selection process. Will this next series focus on a theme? Is it time we return to the Gospels, or the OT, or do we need to dive into an Epistle? What if I choose X and my people are in need of hearing from Y?
Here’s what I’ve learned so far in the 5 short years I’ve been preaching:
It’s not so much about what you preach as it is about what you preach.
What I mean is that most of the time finding the perfect topic or the perfect series isn’t really all that important. What is important is that God’s Word is being handled correctly and is being expounded faithfully. Since I have zero control over who happens to be in the chairs on a particular Sunday morning, why should I think for a moment the series that I designed is guaranteed to accomplish what I set out for it to do?
It’s funny how many times I’ve planned a series, often times preaching through a book of the Bible, and on a particular Sunday which I had mapped out months prior, the sermon I preach happens to be the exact thing needed to be said at the right time. I had no way of predicting the future or knowing what would need to be said months later. Under God’s mysterious, sovereign direction that sermon just came together at the right time.
Of course I plan, and of course I prayerfully ask the question “what next?” But in the end the right choice simply seems to be to just preach it.
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_u21_ofIwMn7kGCJ5Lp2KR-_6vfS59iK9r4e6Ox3_52jya5bzqqjTAl2xU4a2hbWgEc12iOEOHmQeQDMwwHUjx7DCOlZhqEJ2qlbXa7Yl_ZKLG5mbjxEFJdiKhAkZRUyH8qJ5RbEX0O2lwRGYy8W73O=s0-d)
No comments:
Post a Comment