You are preaching from the Joseph story in Genesis, and your desired response is that your hearers will be captured by a God-given dream like he was. Too many Christians live “dreamless lives.” They have nothing spiritual that drives them. They fill their days with trivial pursuits.
So you have clearly in mind both your church sermon subject and response. These are two of the four questions you need to get the answers to very early on in your sermon outline preparation.
Question number three involves the “how to” of what you’re talking about. Do your listeners know how to go about discovering a God-given dream? Probably not. So your message also needs to provide these answers.
Opening your heart to the needs of others can play a part. Knowing what you are passionate about is certainly helpful. Then dreams often come from exposure to highly motivated people. Concerted prayer almost always plays a part in the process as well. You will no doubt have other ideas.
A fourth key question that helps pull the initial thoughts of your Bible sermons together relates to the how long. Ministers tend to assume people act faster than they normally do. It’s like, “I told you what you need to know; why haven’t you instantly changed?”
