Heres something that may come as no surprise, preaching is really hard work. If you have ever preached a sermon you will know the hours of preparation that go into those 20-60 minutes, and how painful it can be to work through the message in your own life.<\/p>\n
I am by nature quite a lazy person, and I relish the thought of taking shortcuts and doing everything at the last minute. This very rarely pays off, and has in the past resulting in some very disappointing exam results among other things! This is something that does not work at all in preaching, because the message needs time to work itself out in the preacher’s life, in their heart and mind not just in the words they write.<\/p>\n
Figuring out what the passage is all about takes time and care, and once you have that sussed it takes even more time and care to work out what that means for yourself and for the congregation. It then takes even more time to condense that idea, the meaning, into a short (and yes, even 60 minutes often feels like a short time to speak on a passage for) sermon which includes meaningful application.<\/p>\n
Preaching is an exhausting exercise, the preparation takes all week (or longer), and delivering the sermon is a draining experience. That is thenusually followed by numerous conversations with members of the congregation which sap you even further. This whole process is a joy, but there is very little about preaching which could be called easy.<\/p>\n
If you preach, well done for enduring, and may you long continue in Gods strength. If you do not, spare a thought for the guy up at the front on Sunday, it wasnt easy for him to get there.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Heres something that may come as no surprise, preaching is really hard work. If you have ever preached a sermon you will know the hours of preparation that go into those 20-60 minutes, and how painful it can be to … Continue reading