"How do you know what to preach about?"
Had a few people ask me that down through the years.
Some sermons are driven by the calendar - Christmas, Easter, etc.
But most (for me) come out of prayer. I'm praying that God would show me a need, or direct me to a particular book, passage, or topic that will be what He wants spoken. Granted, as Philip Brooks so eloquently said "preaching is truth through personality." So I'm a part of God's work and my experiences and context enter into what's said. But at the end of the day, I am only satisfied if two criteria are met:
First, was I faithful to the idea/topic/passage's meaning and to God's direction?
Second, did I prepare and execute it as well as I could for that day?
Notice I did not say "And people responded like crazy."Or "and revival broke out."
That is God's work. I'm (as Mother Teresa pointed out) a pencil in God's hands. When He decides to write a masterpiece or when He's preparing cliffnotes for later - that's up to him.
After two weeks of walking around with the message this morning and believing it was exactly what God wanted said, I will go back and listen to it later and see if I spoke clearly - if I carried the message through development to the point of decision.
And I'll pray for God to use what I said to draw people closer.
You just get so "expectant", as you pray through the process that at times it takes a debriefing like this to reset your heart's calibration.
So move along, nothing to see here. It may be Sunday, but Monday's coming. :)
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