Erm... well, for the first time in years I've finished preparing for Sunday already. I finished last night (Wed night) at about 2am. It's partly because I'm not doing a standard sermon this Sunday but more of a seminar/Bible study.
This post is a mix of stuff that generally come up toward the end of preparation...
Worldview
I always want to be shifting worldviews when I preach. I don't want to give people a list of things to do because that is moralising and leads to a works based religion. I'd rather preach grace and to do that I need to show them how God makes a difference to their fundamental worldview.
For Isaiah 40, the original readers were having their worldview challenged by threat of foreign nations. The Israelites thought God had promised them land and blessing but foreign powers were taking their land. Isaiah comes along and says, "Comfort, comfort my people, says your God" and that God himself is going to come and bring this comfort. Their worldviews are being re-aligned to trust God again.
For readers today, this same message of comfort comes to us and ultimately God himself came as Jesus. An example of a worldview shift that Isaiah 40 might bring for modern readers is: to someone who thinks their sins are beyond forgiveness (in spiritual exile) - Isaiah 40 says Comfort, your sins are paid for (now by Jesus). I could preach "trust God more" but that would just make people feel burdened and lead to people viewing trust as a good deed.
Blank moment
Pretty much every time I prepare a sermon I have a "blank moment". It's not really a blank moment, but rather a "I don't like what I've prepared so far so I'm going to scrap it and start all over again." Yep. I scrap everything and start again.
I find this one of the hardest things because it usually happens on a Thursday night. So I'm left with one proper day of preparation to come up with something. Anyhow, it helps me toss out all the peripheral things I might say and keep the important things. It also makes me pray. Real hard.
Defeater belief
This is a Tim Keller thing that Sam Chan got me onto. I hope I got them right. The idea is that every person who is not yet a Christian has certain beliefs that stop them from accepting Jesus. These beliefs "defeat" any hearing of the gospel, they stop people from listening. Defeater beliefs would include questions like "If God is good why is there evil?" and "Don't Christians have a bad record in history?". So in every sermon you chip away at these defeater beliefs by showing that the defeater belief doesn't necessarily hold. This gives Christians ways to approach their friends and it also gives those who are not yet Christian something to think about. And in the long run, your congregation will want to invite their friends because it speaks to their friends.
Outlines
Sermon outlines. Some people start the writing of their sermon with an outline. And this outline is something you can include in a bulletin to help people follow what you're saying. I find that when I prepare an outline, it is more about flow and timing rather than a logical grid. I guess I use a more oral approach than literate approach to preaching.
So I don't really have outlines. Instead I have different basic structures which I use for different genres. I have a rough structure for narrative, for prose, for topics, etc. Behind all these is an even more basic structure: I begin in our world (and surface a human problem), then I go to the world of the Bible (and show how the Bible solves our problem), then I go back into our world (and think about how Biblical principles work out in real life). Our world -> Bible -> our world.
There is one genre which I don't seem to have a structure which I would use - poetry. I have nothing for poetry. Isaiah 40 is poetry. Hmm... the only thing I can think of is that poetry works by engaging your sense. So if I preach poetry, I just want to reiterate the main picture/message of the voice of the poet. Isaiah itself says the same thing over and over... and kind of how poetry works - it works over the same ideas in different ways. (Think Lamentations and the many Psalms having similar themes and sounding similar). There's a certain richness in exploring a simple message in different contexts.
Friday, February 03, 2012
Monday, January 30, 2012
Praying
I'm actually like posting about my sermon preparation process because it's forcing me to think about all the things that I want/should/could be doing - many of which I often forget to do until later. One thing that I often forget is to pray.
Praying might seem like a simple thing to do, but I just find myself "doing" the sermon but forgetting that I'm meant to be preaching God's word. Asking God for some help just falls by the way side.
So... if I do forget to pray, I think God finds a way to make me pray. Usually I get stuck or something and I'm just so desparate that I'm forced into remembering to pray. It also forces me into thinking about what God is saying to me personally.
All the things that you get told about preparing any Bible teaching just seems so easy to forget.
I think my forgetting to pray and lack of reliance on God to proclaim His word is what makes my sermon preparation time irregular. Even if I do pray, it's as if God is wanting to show me that he's the one in control of the whole process. So... I'm quite ok with not knowing how long it will take for me to finish a sermon because that in itself reminds me to pray.
Like MC Hammer said, "We got to pray just to make it today."
Commentaries
I'm now at the stage where I feel like I have a good idea of what Isaiah 40:1-11 is about. I've done the English, done the Hebrew and now I want to look at commentaries to answer any questions I have about the text.
I usually like commentaries in the following series:
The Bible Speaks Today (BST)
Focus on the Bible
NIV Application
New International Commentary of the Old Testament/New Testament (NICOT/NICNT)
Word Biblical Commentary (WBC)
The first three are more easy to read. The latter two are harder and helps if you have Greek/Hebrew (often called 'technical commentaries').
I like BST because it's easy to read and explains the passage in chunks. NIV Application commentaries are generally an easy read too. NICOT/NICNT ones are also generally easy reading but go in more detail. WBC I find useful for Greek/Hebrew.
But I'd usually look at commentaries based on the book. That is, no one series has a great commentary on every book of the Bible.
So for Isaiah, I'm mostly looking at Kirk Patston's commentary on Isaiah subtitled 'Surprising Salvation'. This is mostly because I sat in Kirk's lectures so I can understand what he's writing about.
If I read a bit in a commentary and I don't understand it, I try to read it again. If I don't think the second reading is getting me anywhere I just leave it behind. Either the author is being too obtuse or I'm not smart enough. Neither of those things are going to change this week.
All in all... I find that commentaries are answering questions I'm not asking, so they're only helpful for me if I'm looking specifically for certain information. Oh and introductions in commentaries are often helpful to give all the background and overall information about a book too. But even so, I'd only want to engage that material after I've read the text myself.
I'm actually like posting about my sermon preparation process because it's forcing me to think about all the things that I want/should/could be doing - many of which I often forget to do until later. One thing that I often forget is to pray.
Praying might seem like a simple thing to do, but I just find myself "doing" the sermon but forgetting that I'm meant to be preaching God's word. Asking God for some help just falls by the way side.
So... if I do forget to pray, I think God finds a way to make me pray. Usually I get stuck or something and I'm just so desparate that I'm forced into remembering to pray. It also forces me into thinking about what God is saying to me personally.
All the things that you get told about preparing any Bible teaching just seems so easy to forget.
I think my forgetting to pray and lack of reliance on God to proclaim His word is what makes my sermon preparation time irregular. Even if I do pray, it's as if God is wanting to show me that he's the one in control of the whole process. So... I'm quite ok with not knowing how long it will take for me to finish a sermon because that in itself reminds me to pray.
Like MC Hammer said, "We got to pray just to make it today."
Commentaries
I'm now at the stage where I feel like I have a good idea of what Isaiah 40:1-11 is about. I've done the English, done the Hebrew and now I want to look at commentaries to answer any questions I have about the text.
I usually like commentaries in the following series:
The Bible Speaks Today (BST)
Focus on the Bible
NIV Application
New International Commentary of the Old Testament/New Testament (NICOT/NICNT)
Word Biblical Commentary (WBC)
The first three are more easy to read. The latter two are harder and helps if you have Greek/Hebrew (often called 'technical commentaries').
I like BST because it's easy to read and explains the passage in chunks. NIV Application commentaries are generally an easy read too. NICOT/NICNT ones are also generally easy reading but go in more detail. WBC I find useful for Greek/Hebrew.
But I'd usually look at commentaries based on the book. That is, no one series has a great commentary on every book of the Bible.
So for Isaiah, I'm mostly looking at Kirk Patston's commentary on Isaiah subtitled 'Surprising Salvation'. This is mostly because I sat in Kirk's lectures so I can understand what he's writing about.
If I read a bit in a commentary and I don't understand it, I try to read it again. If I don't think the second reading is getting me anywhere I just leave it behind. Either the author is being too obtuse or I'm not smart enough. Neither of those things are going to change this week.
All in all... I find that commentaries are answering questions I'm not asking, so they're only helpful for me if I'm looking specifically for certain information. Oh and introductions in commentaries are often helpful to give all the background and overall information about a book too. But even so, I'd only want to engage that material after I've read the text myself.
Friday, January 27, 2012
Greek/Hebrew
I'm now reading and reading and reading Isaiah 40 in preparation to preach it on 5 Feb.
I usually work off the NIV but at some stage I'll look at other English versions and also the original language. The Bible is originally in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. We studied Hebrew and Greek at Bible college.
That this means is I have no Aramaic and very little Hebrew and Greek.
Usually, one every 3 or 4 sermons I'll try to translate the whole passage. The others I'll just 'refer' to the Hebrew/Greek. Isaiah is in Hebrew and I didn't have time to translate, so I'm gonna just refer to the Hebrew.
When doing translations and referring to the Hebrew/Greek I'll look at the New American Standard Bible (NASB) and Holman's Christian Standard Bible (HCSB).
I like the HCSB because it captures a lot of the original language meaning in readable English.
I like the NASB for translation because it is very literal. So much so that I find reading it really hard. I don't use the English Standard Version (ESV) beause the NASB is more literal and the ESV comes from the Revised Version line of translations anyway.
(Side note: many English translations are derivative, and so there is the Revised Version, Revised Standard Version (RSV), NASB, ESV line... they read similarly although have different philosophies and theologies behind them.)
So for Isaiah 40:1-11, from looking at the Hebrew, I've noticed a few things. Many of the important things to notice are readily presented in good commentaries. That means you don't need Greek or Hebrew (or Aramaic). It's good that we have people write commentaries so we can dig into the text more and be blessed with its riches.
I'm paying attention to the fact that Isaiah 40 is poetry, so the use of words is important and rhythm is important.
In the first couple of verses...
v1 The word for 'comfort' is nhm. It can also be translated 'repent'. So... I now I want to see if there's anything to that.
v2 "speak tenderly" is literally "speak to the heart". How nice.
v2 "hard service" has military connotations - ie. it's very much about exile and war.
v2 The first instance of 'sin' has a sense of iniquity/guilt. This guilt is done with.
v2 The second isntance of 'sin' is a different word and is more about something done against someone.
Maybe the different words for 'sin' emphasises different aspects to sin?
Now, some of these observations are not that significant and some may not be valid (I'm not that great at Hebrew!), so I'll check with commentaries to see if they notice these things too. I certainly don't want to make big what is not. I find it annoying when preachers make a big deal out of one word when really there's nothing to it.
I remember a lecturer from college say that you can't build theology on one word. Theology is in sentences and paragraphs and chapters. I like that.
So yep. That's my text work so far. Another 9 verses to go.
Short attention spans
I have a really short attention span.
Really short.
I find it really hard to listen to sermons.
I tune out after about 20 seconds.
If I try hard, I stay with it for about 2 minutes.
At SMBC, we had preaching groups called 'Expounding Scripture'. We had to take turns preaching and give feedback. It's so hard giving feedback when you're constantly daydreaming!
Yeah ermm... some people say my sermons are short. In my defensive defence, I'd like to say that my sermons vary in length and having a look back, they average just over 20 minutes. Some are 10 minutes. Some are 30 minutes.
Anyhow, if I tend toward shorter sermons it's because I myself have a short attention span. I want to preach so that everyone can hear and will hear and will want to hear. If I can't even pay attention for that long, why would I expect someone else to? It would be bad if I got bored of my own sermon while I was preaching it.
Yup. That's it for this post.
I'm now reading and reading and reading Isaiah 40 in preparation to preach it on 5 Feb.
I usually work off the NIV but at some stage I'll look at other English versions and also the original language. The Bible is originally in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. We studied Hebrew and Greek at Bible college.
That this means is I have no Aramaic and very little Hebrew and Greek.
Usually, one every 3 or 4 sermons I'll try to translate the whole passage. The others I'll just 'refer' to the Hebrew/Greek. Isaiah is in Hebrew and I didn't have time to translate, so I'm gonna just refer to the Hebrew.
When doing translations and referring to the Hebrew/Greek I'll look at the New American Standard Bible (NASB) and Holman's Christian Standard Bible (HCSB).
I like the HCSB because it captures a lot of the original language meaning in readable English.
I like the NASB for translation because it is very literal. So much so that I find reading it really hard. I don't use the English Standard Version (ESV) beause the NASB is more literal and the ESV comes from the Revised Version line of translations anyway.
(Side note: many English translations are derivative, and so there is the Revised Version, Revised Standard Version (RSV), NASB, ESV line... they read similarly although have different philosophies and theologies behind them.)
So for Isaiah 40:1-11, from looking at the Hebrew, I've noticed a few things. Many of the important things to notice are readily presented in good commentaries. That means you don't need Greek or Hebrew (or Aramaic). It's good that we have people write commentaries so we can dig into the text more and be blessed with its riches.
I'm paying attention to the fact that Isaiah 40 is poetry, so the use of words is important and rhythm is important.
In the first couple of verses...
v1 The word for 'comfort' is nhm. It can also be translated 'repent'. So... I now I want to see if there's anything to that.
v2 "speak tenderly" is literally "speak to the heart". How nice.
v2 "hard service" has military connotations - ie. it's very much about exile and war.
v2 The first instance of 'sin' has a sense of iniquity/guilt. This guilt is done with.
v2 The second isntance of 'sin' is a different word and is more about something done against someone.
Maybe the different words for 'sin' emphasises different aspects to sin?
Now, some of these observations are not that significant and some may not be valid (I'm not that great at Hebrew!), so I'll check with commentaries to see if they notice these things too. I certainly don't want to make big what is not. I find it annoying when preachers make a big deal out of one word when really there's nothing to it.
I remember a lecturer from college say that you can't build theology on one word. Theology is in sentences and paragraphs and chapters. I like that.
So yep. That's my text work so far. Another 9 verses to go.
Short attention spans
I have a really short attention span.
Really short.
I find it really hard to listen to sermons.
I tune out after about 20 seconds.
If I try hard, I stay with it for about 2 minutes.
At SMBC, we had preaching groups called 'Expounding Scripture'. We had to take turns preaching and give feedback. It's so hard giving feedback when you're constantly daydreaming!
Yeah ermm... some people say my sermons are short. In my defensive defence, I'd like to say that my sermons vary in length and having a look back, they average just over 20 minutes. Some are 10 minutes. Some are 30 minutes.
Anyhow, if I tend toward shorter sermons it's because I myself have a short attention span. I want to preach so that everyone can hear and will hear and will want to hear. If I can't even pay attention for that long, why would I expect someone else to? It would be bad if I got bored of my own sermon while I was preaching it.
Yup. That's it for this post.
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Ok, so I'm now up to reading and gathering thoughts for my sermon on Isaiah 40:1-11 on Sun 5 Feb.
Reading really involves reading the Bible only. I've been reading bits of Isaiah and more so the immediately preceding and following chapters of the passage I'm preaching on. So since I'm preaching Isaiah 40:1-11, I've read in more detail Isaiah 36 onwards and I'll probably read to about Isaiah 46.
Ideally, I'd read all of Isaiah... but it's huge and I'll probably only be able to skim most bits. I'll have to rely on my memory of Isaiah for major themes. If we were going through the entire book of Isaiah, then that might make life easier in terms of reading the whole book.
And then, I'll gather my thoughts and make some notes.
Then I'll read Isaiah 40 again. And revise/refine/throw away my notes.
Then I'll read the passage (and surrounding passages) again... until I think I understand what it's going on about.
I'll probably also start writing down any questions I have - these I'll try to find answers from commentaries and lexicons.
Oh and when I take notes, I don't take notes in a word processor. I used to, but one day I was sitting behind Trevor Hodge in class and he was using a mind mapping program. I thought, "Wow, that's cool. Taking notes in a non-linear fashion. I want to do that too!" But he's a Mac user... so I had to look for a PC one. There's quite a lot out there, but I settled on Freemind. Google it.
So, here's my rather bare mind map of my thoughts so far.
Here's a mind map from a sermon I have already preached. It usually ends up something like this.
So... basically... this part of the sermon preparation isn't all that different to any other Bible teaching session/seminar/workshop/et cetera. I'm really just trying to understand the Bible.
Reading really involves reading the Bible only. I've been reading bits of Isaiah and more so the immediately preceding and following chapters of the passage I'm preaching on. So since I'm preaching Isaiah 40:1-11, I've read in more detail Isaiah 36 onwards and I'll probably read to about Isaiah 46.
Ideally, I'd read all of Isaiah... but it's huge and I'll probably only be able to skim most bits. I'll have to rely on my memory of Isaiah for major themes. If we were going through the entire book of Isaiah, then that might make life easier in terms of reading the whole book.
And then, I'll gather my thoughts and make some notes.
Then I'll read Isaiah 40 again. And revise/refine/throw away my notes.
Then I'll read the passage (and surrounding passages) again... until I think I understand what it's going on about.
I'll probably also start writing down any questions I have - these I'll try to find answers from commentaries and lexicons.
Oh and when I take notes, I don't take notes in a word processor. I used to, but one day I was sitting behind Trevor Hodge in class and he was using a mind mapping program. I thought, "Wow, that's cool. Taking notes in a non-linear fashion. I want to do that too!" But he's a Mac user... so I had to look for a PC one. There's quite a lot out there, but I settled on Freemind. Google it.
So, here's my rather bare mind map of my thoughts so far.
Here's a mind map from a sermon I have already preached. It usually ends up something like this.
So... basically... this part of the sermon preparation isn't all that different to any other Bible teaching session/seminar/workshop/et cetera. I'm really just trying to understand the Bible.
Occasionally, people ask me, "How long does it take to prepare a sermon?"
I usually respond in a manner akin to this: "I usually start reading the passage about a month before. Then about 2 weeks before I'll try to gather my thoughts about the passage. Then near the end I might read some commentaries. And then on the Thursday (if I'm preaching on Sunday) I'll start writing... and at some stage it finishes."
This is of course just the process part. All along the way I either pray or God forces me into prayer. Over the years, God has dramatically changed the way I prepare for sermons. He forced me into it. It's like I have no choice now.
I used to be able to put aside say 10-15 hours and by the end of it I'd pretty much have a talk of some sort. But then my process became more complex as I put more thought into the people in my congregation and how Jesus might make the message simpler and compelling for them.
And now, I basically have no control over whether a sermon is prepared in time. Some times it just finishes itself on Thursday or Friday. Some times it's 1am on Saturday night/Sunday morning. I don't really time myself, but I guess preparation could be anywhere between 10 and 50 hours. I don't know how to explain myself to other preachers who prepare with more efficiency or consistency. Some times I feel stupid for not being able to "finish a sermon".
Anyhow, the next sermon I'm preaching is on Sunday 5th February at church in the morning. It's on Isaiah 40:1-11. It's also the first sermon on a series on Isaiah so I'm thinking about doing a mini-seminar on Isaiah as a whole before preaching.
So where am I in this process?
It's less than 2 weeks to go, but I'm really only in the "reading" part. This is largely because I've been preaching every fortnight the past two months so I'm not quite with it. I'm also starting to gether thoughts.
I thought I'd have some fun and try to post how I'm going with this sermon preparation. Hopefully these posts will make the message clearer. Along the way I'll probably also talk about "methods" and "tools" I use... just for fun. Part of the inspiration for these posts is from some dude who collected sermon transcripts from some well known preachers. It was fascinating just seeing the notes they used.
So... anyone care to offer how they go about preparing for sermons?
I usually respond in a manner akin to this: "I usually start reading the passage about a month before. Then about 2 weeks before I'll try to gather my thoughts about the passage. Then near the end I might read some commentaries. And then on the Thursday (if I'm preaching on Sunday) I'll start writing... and at some stage it finishes."
This is of course just the process part. All along the way I either pray or God forces me into prayer. Over the years, God has dramatically changed the way I prepare for sermons. He forced me into it. It's like I have no choice now.
I used to be able to put aside say 10-15 hours and by the end of it I'd pretty much have a talk of some sort. But then my process became more complex as I put more thought into the people in my congregation and how Jesus might make the message simpler and compelling for them.
And now, I basically have no control over whether a sermon is prepared in time. Some times it just finishes itself on Thursday or Friday. Some times it's 1am on Saturday night/Sunday morning. I don't really time myself, but I guess preparation could be anywhere between 10 and 50 hours. I don't know how to explain myself to other preachers who prepare with more efficiency or consistency. Some times I feel stupid for not being able to "finish a sermon".
Anyhow, the next sermon I'm preaching is on Sunday 5th February at church in the morning. It's on Isaiah 40:1-11. It's also the first sermon on a series on Isaiah so I'm thinking about doing a mini-seminar on Isaiah as a whole before preaching.
So where am I in this process?
It's less than 2 weeks to go, but I'm really only in the "reading" part. This is largely because I've been preaching every fortnight the past two months so I'm not quite with it. I'm also starting to gether thoughts.
I thought I'd have some fun and try to post how I'm going with this sermon preparation. Hopefully these posts will make the message clearer. Along the way I'll probably also talk about "methods" and "tools" I use... just for fun. Part of the inspiration for these posts is from some dude who collected sermon transcripts from some well known preachers. It was fascinating just seeing the notes they used.
So... anyone care to offer how they go about preparing for sermons?
Thursday, September 29, 2011
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
My kids annoy me some times.
Mostly when their emotions explode onto their siblings. Or they are simply not content with the soft toy in their current possession. Or if they won't go to sleep.
As a father, I have many good reasons to curb their behaviour.
1. Learning to control their emotions will help them discern what is worth getting worked up about and what isn't.
2. We should be content with what God has provided for us and be thankful that others can enjoy toy vacuum cleaners too.
3. Sleep. You need sleep to be awake and function. God gave us rest. Rest.
But perhaps behind my desire to impart a way of life happy under God is my desire to come home to peace. Maybe in the moment, I care more about my own comfort than for my children to grow up loving Jesus.
Jesus said something about following him and being uncomfortable in the same sentence.
Maybe I need to learn that being put in a position of discomfort to reconcile grumpy children is a good thing. And the more it happens, the more both I and my children grow in maturity in Jesus. If in twenty years time my children love Jesus and are willing to do anything for him, then I would thank God for the smile on my face. That would be a fun moment.
Often people ask me what it's like to have three kids.
I say, "It's hard work but it's a lot of fun."
Mostly when their emotions explode onto their siblings. Or they are simply not content with the soft toy in their current possession. Or if they won't go to sleep.
As a father, I have many good reasons to curb their behaviour.
1. Learning to control their emotions will help them discern what is worth getting worked up about and what isn't.
2. We should be content with what God has provided for us and be thankful that others can enjoy toy vacuum cleaners too.
3. Sleep. You need sleep to be awake and function. God gave us rest. Rest.
But perhaps behind my desire to impart a way of life happy under God is my desire to come home to peace. Maybe in the moment, I care more about my own comfort than for my children to grow up loving Jesus.
Jesus said something about following him and being uncomfortable in the same sentence.
Maybe I need to learn that being put in a position of discomfort to reconcile grumpy children is a good thing. And the more it happens, the more both I and my children grow in maturity in Jesus. If in twenty years time my children love Jesus and are willing to do anything for him, then I would thank God for the smile on my face. That would be a fun moment.
Often people ask me what it's like to have three kids.
I say, "It's hard work but it's a lot of fun."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
