New Advent Series

September 25, 2013 by admin

As many of you know, my youngest son, Jeremy (41), came down with an aggressive case of lymphoma (cancer of the blood) on the 3rd of June. The majority of the intervening time, he has basically been in a large and exceptional hospital about an hour away, in Chicago.

His wife Angela has been amazing. She has kept her leadership job, which provides for the family hospitalization. She also oversees the care of their three small children, Eliana (5), Nehemiah (3) and Anelise (1). And she has been incredibly supportive of her husband.

My wife and I live about a mile away, so along with our deep concerns for our son, we obviously help Angela in every way we can. The journey has been a long one for us, and one that is always on our minds.

Several weeks ago, partly as a way to occupy my mind on other matters, I took up a project that in the past gave me great pleasure. Some of you who are older may recall various Advent preaching series I wrote or oversaw that were used by thousands of churches.

These included titles like:

The Christmas You Always Longed For
From Humbug to Hallelujah!
Seasoning the Season
The Amazing Emmanuel

Etc…

Well, I’ve started writing a new series called Born to Reign. I’ve been able to lose myself in the writing for several hours at a time. It’s been a therapy for me.

I’ll share more details next week. But I would appreciate your prayers as I continue in this creative effort. And if all goes as planned, the series will be available for ministers to use in the Advent season in 2014.

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Please click here to visit David Mains’ Sermon-Coach.com website.

You will also find a variety of resources for pastors and congregations at the Mainstay Ministries website. Please click here.

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Once Again, It’s Finally Arrived!

September 16, 2013 by admin

As I mentioned in an earlier blog post, the book Preaching That Matters, by Dr. Lori Carrell, has finally arrived. It is published by:

The Alban Institute
131 Elden Street, Suite 202
Herndon, Virginia, 20510
http://www.alban.org.

I highly recommend it.

Though Dr. Carrell words things differently than I do, she makes it clear that it is to everyone’s benefit when the preacher has a “clear, compelling, text-centered subject.” Getting that in mind at the beginning of the sermon-preparation process leads to more-focused research, reduced revision-time and more-focused content. This in turn enhances the whole communication process.

Once the subject has been established, the preacher should next come up with a high-expectation response aim. Again, determining this very early in the sermon-preparation process makes getting the rest of the material much easier. On top of that, it ensures that your sermons are not just informational, but transformational.

She asks her readers to look back at three or four recent sermons to see how well they did in the process. I find this to be a good exercise for all of us. I confess that my sermons don’t always make my subject and response as clear as they should.

Preaching That Matters is one of those rare books where I found myself time and again thinking, “This is really well-written. I’m so glad preachers have this resource available to them.”

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Please click here to visit David Mains’ Sermon-Coach.com website.

You will also find a variety of resources for pastors and congregations at the Mainstay Ministries website. Please click here.

Share and Enjoy

Fuzzy Talks

September 9, 2013 by admin

In late May and early June, I heard several graduation talks. Now I’m convinced that it’s not just ministers who need to start their message preparation by first figuring out (1) the subject of their talk and (2) the response they desire. These commencement speakers had a lot to say, and one was quite clever, but when they were finished it was next to impossible as a listener to figure out what they were actually talking about.

But let’s look at your sermon for next Sunday. After you deliver it, will your people be able to say, “The subject of our pastor’s sermon was clearly __________”?

If their response is, “He’s/she’s in a series on Romans and is in chapter nine”—that’s not adequate.

If they answer, “I’m not sure, but I liked the illustration about the __________” or “the joke about the __________ was really funny”—that’s still not adequate.

And let me add that if you as the speaker can’t answer what your subject was, for sure your congregation members won’t be able to.

Then what will be the specific response you will be calling for? “I want my hearers to…”

The answer has to be more specific than, “I want them to be more dedicated in their walk with the Lord.” There should be a way they can measure whether or not what you called for was accomplished.

If those two matters are fuzzy, your entire presentation will be as well. They sure were in terms of the speakers I heard this last week.

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Please click here to visit David Mains’ Sermon-Coach.com website.

You will also find a variety of resources for pastors and congregations at the Mainstay Ministries website. Please click here.