Reconsidering 7.20.2023

 This was a blisteringly busy week in my Study. I am getting ready for two consecutive weeks of camp and have been preparing for a funeral. I am approaching the seam between two brief sermon series and need to do the heavy lifting for a long, exegetical series that will end the year.  And this crosses my mind. Would reordering the year have had greater cumulative impact? If I had chosen to sequence things differently, would I have “redeemed more time” or would things have played out the same way?

    Improvement tends to be incremental. It would be nice if there was a way to usher in revolutionary changes in any area of life, much less our preaching. Preaching is anchored in our individuality and personality. You can learn lots of different skills, but you are you and I am me and that is something that won’t ever change. Thus, we are left trying to develop new habits and skills over longer periods of time, learning to accept the incremental changes that come with discipline. 

    I have preached two Old Testament series in a row over the course of nine weeks. The way my mind thinks, I am asking myself “Should I have done one 10-week series? Should I have been more focused? Did we learn what we needed to learn and catch a glimpse of the cross in every message?” That’s a lot of questions over 10 weeks of preaching. The first OT series was from the wisdom literature. The second is from the book of Ruth. In the Hebrew Canon Ruth is linked to the wisdom literature, while in the Greek and Christian, Canon Ruth is linked with the “historical books”. I could have done a six-week series on the “writings” with only one sermon from Ruth. Yet Ruth’s story is so compelling, and the work has been very satisfying. 

    As I come to the end of this long week all this reordering, reconsidering, and continual review may seem like a waste of time. I find it not only rewarding but refreshing. It is always good to take inventory of old sermons preached and the decisions which led to them. We are always rushing to meet the next deadline. It is tempting to just blast ahead through the next study session, crank out the coming sermon, then move on to whatever is next in line. Even while moving forward, the time looking back is important to make sure that we are making progress and not just going in a circle.

Reread 7.13.2023

    There are books I like to read on an annual basis. The contents never change. It will always be the same story. My context changes. It is 2023. I may have read this book last year, but the circumstances were different. Our context (horizon) to use the formal hermeneutical term is always shifting. The horizon of the text does not. 

    So, when we reread our own work, we are trying to evaluate how we merged the spiral from the Biblical horizon to the contemporary horizon. When we last preached that text we were immersed in the present. There was likely no other way for us to process the immediate circumstances around us. When time passes, when we have perspective, we are better able to assess the full hermeneutical process from exegesis, to exposition, to proclamation. 

    When re-reading fiction, we typically look for emotional reinforcement or the sheer literary joy of noticing nuance. When we read our own professional output, regardless of the amount of time that has passed since we preached a sermon or taught a lesson we are, by the nature of the endeavor, seeking to critically evaluate our past performance. It’s business, not personal, and we should be constantly striving for improvement. Consequently, there are a few perennial concepts that will take precedence. 

Vocabulary 

    Preaching is a word business. We study the Word of God to frame a message in contemporary language for our congregation. It is a word business. Preachers need to be critical readers of the words of others so that we may be better speakers of our words written to illuminate the words of God to others. And we must critically read our words written to ensure accuracy and quality. 

    For all of us, one of our first, formative educational experiences was learning vocabulary. In the beginning, they were called “spelling words”, but in learning to spell them we generally learned how to pronounce them and what they meant. If the form, sound, and meaning of words seems far too simple for you, an adult who speaks for a living, then you have a lot to learn. Language and how it is deployed is always changing and we must adapt to those changes. A workman who does not keep her tools sharp and her attention on available innovations will soon become obsolete. Painters know pigment. Carpenters know lumber. Preachers know words.

     Now I am not recommending that you find one or two new words every week and use them “in a sentence” as a part of your sermon. If you are reading as much as you should, across a broad spectrum of literature you will be improving your vocabulary and comprehension all the time. As we learn unfamiliar words or find new nuances and contexts for the ones, we already know we broaden our ability to communicate in our native language. 

    When we read our old work, when we sit in the study and read aloud from past sermons and lessons it should be a little bit like a high schooler looking back at those initial spelling words from 1st grade. We would expect growth, maturity, flexibility, and depth as a child moves through their education. The High Schooler should be able to plot their growth from cat to feline. The preacher who is not making similar progress over years of ministry will grow stale. It costs nothing to re-read our old material for the direct purpose of improving our current work. 

Editing

    It is amazing and a little bit disappointing how often we miss errors of both commission and omission in our own writing.  When we return to our own work either for review or revision the chronological space allows us to improve what we have written. I do not think that there is any written work that does not benefit from lying fallow for many months. The issue is deadlines. We can’t really wait for our writing to marinate before it is preached, taught, or submitted. Don’t forget your past work! Reviewing old work can provide a resource for new work. 

    The process of editing old work for new circumstances is an opportunity to extend, improve, and deepen the work that we have previously used. In this age of computerized word processing, there is no excuse for just printing out and preaching from a fresh, unrevised copy of an old sermon. Make a duplicate of the file, give it a new date and a revised title, and then go after that sucker with a “red pencil.”

     Because we are preachers the first thing that will catch our eye is the form. We will consider the outline and compare it with the underlying exegetical work. Don’t stop here! Beyond the form of the sermon consider the words you have chosen to bridge the gap from the Biblical context to the contemporary context. Did you use the right word(s) or did you hurry through, selecting good words but not the best words to convey your ideas? You have the material back before you. This is the time to improve it. 

Writing for the Ear

A final thought or two. The only person who is going to read your work from the page or the screen is you. We write for the ear. Until the advent of smartphones, most people did not have the ability to look up unfamiliar words during a sermon. The congregation is dependent on the preacher to explain anything unclear in a sermon.  A part of the preacher’s task is to choose her written words in such a way that they are easy to speak and easy to hear. Technical terms need to be explained. When obscure terms are/were necessary for understanding a truth grounded in the Biblical text, it should be defined and clarified. Explanations of difficult concepts needed to be framed in such a way that the congregation understood that we were giving them more information, important information for understanding Scripture. Now is the time to fix things. Now is the time to improve and freshen things up.

This is hard work, and we are under the constraints of a call from God. Passers-by may think you are crazy, but you need to read your work out loud. If you are going to preach it, teach it, or speechify it you need to say the words aloud. Listen for rhyme, assonance, juxtaposition of key terms, unnecessary adverbs (all or most of them), and imprudent modifiers. 

     You and I made the journey from “c-a-t” to feline, or from “d-o-g” to canine, a long time ago. It is time for us to make the journey from improvising to improving our preaching. That begins with rereading our work with a critical eye to improving our language. That will make you a better preacher.

Review 7.6.2023

 The Independence Day holiday is past. We are halfway through the calendar year. This is the 33rd week of my sermon calendar for 2023. Whether with the passing of the days or the preaching of the sermons, it is time for a little inventory. A little review. We don’t get report cards in the preaching ministry. And it is very rare for someone to be critical to our faces with respect to a sermon. Feedback can be helpful, practical feedback is rare. 

    It is up to each preacher o review his own work and submit samples for review to friends and colleagues who can provide valuable direction. Each of us should have a trusted reader or two that we use regularly to proofread our work and provide editorial guidance. If you trust no one else in this at least trust your wife. Beyond that, if you have kept your Elders and other interested leaders informed of your plan, they should be able to provide some valuable insight as to your progress through the year. 

    At this point in the year, there are several questions we need to ask ourselves. With our preaching plan open before us well as our daybook and task list, we can ask the right questions to determine the effectiveness of the plan so far, as well as any calibrations necessary to carry us to the end of the year. 

Did I stick to the plan?

    Question 1 is elementary. Did I actually do what I intended to do? Did I execute the plan I had prepared? This an elementary question but essential. This question speaks directly to the quality of our work both long-term and week by week. A plan that cannot be executed is a bad plan. 

    There will always be occasions when immediate needs and pressing emergencies require a change to the plan. Otherwise, we trust to the providence of God that our prayerful planning, guided by the Holy Spirit and familiarity with our past preaching will guide us through a year’s preaching plan. A plan that will lead, weed, and feed our flock.  If there is more necessary change than normal, then I have misread the situation or not thought through things thoroughly. 

Was the plan properly focused?

A     properly focused preaching plan has a unity of theme, and diversity of purpose, and comes from a variety of texts. This is challenging work. That is why a substantial portion of the universal Church outsources this task by using a lectionary system. That relieves the preacher of 1/3 of the planning burden. 

    You and I still must provide focus in a timely, creative manner. That is the real trick. My broad theme for the year is “beginnings”. One would think that there is a limited number of things you can say about “beginnings.” Therein lies the “work” part of this process. 

Did I Overreach?

    My most recently completed sermon series was from the wisdom literature of the Old Testament. The series title was Wisdom: Faith Begins to Work. Five book sermons, one each from Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon. As I went through the series, I concluded that it was perhaps an overreach in three ways. 1. The initial idea. 2. Book Sermon from Job. 3. Book Sermon from the Song of Solomon. Obviously points 2 and 3 follow from the real issue: it seemed, at times, like a bad idea. It looked great in October, but not so much in June.

    In retrospect, five challenging book sermons required more weekly study than was easily accommodated. I had to make some concessions to time. I may not have overreached, but I was certainly stretched thin. The book sermon from Job went surprisingly well, and we had someone respond to the invitation for baptism, so it’s a little hard to be overly critical. The message from the Song of Solomon ended up being practical advice for marriage and did not draw criticism even though I had to read some explicit text from the pulpit.

    I would not say that I went too far in this sermon series, but I definitely had to extend myself. That is fine for one series a year, or a particularly thorny problem that needs to be handled from the pulpit. Do that kind of work too often and you will wear out. 

Did I leave the ball short?

    Overreach is the result of ambition. Leaving the ball short is a result of an abundance of caution. Could I have done more? Did I leave something unclear, unsaid, or undisturbed? Should I have “gone for the pin?” 

    Preaching requires balancing the long-term growth of the congregation with pressing issues. The best approach is to incorporate emerging issues as they can be accommodated into the overall preaching plan for the year. Well-planned exegesis should always be bridging the gap between the world of the text and our contemporary situation. Sometimes the text will determine the shot, and sometimes our local circumstances. 

    The key is to always be aware that there are objective standards (the text) and more subjective circumstances which are the ingredients from which sound Biblical preaching is formed. On a golf course, one considers variable factors such as pin placement, wind, moisture, and temperature in deciding how to play a shot. The distance is always the same--many other things change. Similarly, what a text says is invariable. Everything else is, however, in flux. Effective preaching speaks to that flux from out of the text.

Middling Well

    Instructions about preaching quite often discuss beginning well and ending well. These elements of the sermon are essential to the enterprise and often the most difficult to master. Similarly, beginning the year well and ending it well help to focus the year's preaching and keep the congregation focused on understanding scripture and learning to apply it. All well. All good. Like the middle of a sermon, the exegetical body is essential for its effectiveness as a message. And the middle of the year is important for the preacher’s yearly plan. 

    Middling well, and thoroughly reviewing our work, helps ensure that the plan conceived, now some nine months ago, is still focused, and that the preacher is still excited about the plan. Review the year too early and we lack the data and information to fruitfully recalibrate. Review the year too late, and there is no time to reconsider.  

    This is the time.  July is the perfect season for reviewing our year's preaching. We’ve done enough work to determine the integrity of the plan and have enough time left to subtly change focus if necessary. Yet, making any alterations requires taking the time to review. Your preaching will be improved by taking a hard look at what you have done so that you can improve what is to come.