Preaching

 

I'm teaching a CLM course for the Conference.  Our most recent topic was preaching.  The class read From Pew to Pulpit, and I additionally read Preaching Grace.  Callahan, who wrote Preaching Grace, advises readers to find the method of preparing a sermon that works for you, and use that.  That was an interesting suggestion in the light of Willimon's book, Guthrie's book, the module, and our guest presenter (Mike Estep, who did a wonderful job talking about preparing to preach).  All of them provided ways to prepare a sermon (all of which were helpful), and Callahan's statement lifted some of the guilt of having all of these methods for sermon preparation and not always following them.

How do I prepare a sermon?  What works for me?

Ideally:

1. Read the lectionary readings at the beginning of the week.  Let them bop around in my head for a day or two.
2. Read the lectionary readings again in a Study Bible with notes, to enhance my understanding of the scripture.  At this point, I hope I'm narrowing down to the actual scripture I'll use as the basis of the sermon.
3. Read Commentary.  This helps me to see more clearly how I can bring these words to life in a sermon.
4. Intentionally pray - somewhere else if I can.
5. Outline my thoughts - short outline - what is the focus? How will I develop it?  If I can do that, I feel I "have" the sermon.  I have direction and know where I'm going.
6. Start writing.  I might not start at the beginning, though.  I usually start a sermon with a story because I think it is engaging.  I might not have that story at the beginning of the writing.
7. I write and write. 
8. I let it sit and bop around.
9. I pick up pieces of the sermon that don't belong and move them to the end.  This feels better than deleting them.
10. Read it through and refine it.  Delete those extra pieces at the end.
11. If possible, ask someone else to read it
12. Read it out loud. Time myself.  Fix the bumpy bits.
13. Print it, if I haven't already.  

I do preach from a manuscript.  I hope I don't read it - I hope I preach it.  But I do use a manuscript.  

And that's it.  Toss the manuscript, and move on.