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The following 34 entries are posted in the "Person of the Preacher" category.
May 04, 2008 16:55
A few days ago I spoke to my denomination’s annual convention with respect to the importance of academic preparation. If you want to practice law there isn’t much question but that you’re going to have to go to law school. Med school is essential...
March 31, 2008 11:14
I just came across an interesting piece by Brian McLaren on the impact of technology and the video projection of preachers into alternate venues. Perhaps the most famous such preacher is Paul Yonggi Cho who is closed-circuit broadcast to hundreds of thousands of p...
February 19, 2008 13:02
Someone recently said to me, “preaching is boring because preachers are boring. They ought to get a life.”
Sounds harsh. You can decide how true it is of you or your ministry. Suffice it to say that preachers ought to be interesting because t...
November 19, 2007 14:47
One of the problems I have observed is that some of us think we preach better than we actually do. Truthfully, most of us probably suffer from that problem. If I’m honest, I’d probably have to admit that I have a higher sense of the effectiveness of my...
June 19, 2007 12:01
I just read an interesting little book by Jim Schmitmeyer describing the need for preachers to get their hands dirty, involving themselves in the real lives of the people that they preach to. Schmitmeyer is a Roman Catholic priest, so his sense of what preaching i...
June 12, 2007 12:34
Preachers need to have thick skin. Whenever a person gets up in front of a crowd to speak, people are going to evaluate what they have to say – which may be a mild way of describing the kind of scrutiny under which a preacher is placed. Roast Preacher is the...
May 30, 2007 11:03
This seems to be my week for exciting emails from former students. The following note arrived yesterday from Melissa Lane. It’s wonderful to see how God prepares us for his calling from our earliest days. We don’t always notice what he is doing unt...
May 28, 2007 12:51
I received this message from one of my former students, Shawn Barden, last week. Shawn is pastoring a great church in Fernie, BC. His message encouraged me and I thought it might encourage you as well.
Hey Kent
Just wanted to share a n...
May 24, 2007 10:51
I remember one of my old homiletics profs saying how he wished that he had a trap-door beneath the pulpit. He dreamed of a button he could push that would open an escape route out the back of the church so that he didn’t have to greet the people after preach...
May 15, 2007 12:35
I had another interesting conversation with one of our Doctor of Ministry students last week. Robert Campbell is a pastor from Corona, California and is working on the question of whether or not a pastor can have friends in the congregation.
Traditionali...
March 28, 2007 12:00
Yesterday, I concluded the latest installment of my preaching laboratory class. Toward the end of the class one of the male students mentioned that while he felt his preaching was improving he wasn’t yet up to the standard of one of his fellow students, who ...
March 08, 2007 14:51
From the Center for Creative Ministry some Barna research numbers indicating that “only 5% of Protestant pastors in America are women. Almost all pastors are married. While 13% have been divorced almost all of these are remarried.”
“The...
February 19, 2007 13:00
I know that there has been a debate about whether pastor/preachers should take Mondays as their day off or whether they should try to take another day mid-week. Monday is most convenient, of course. Churches gear up towards the weekend and after all the excitement...
February 13, 2007 11:38
Have you ever noticed how we sometimes use stories and illustrations as a way of redeeming ourselves through our preaching? I’m not just a preacher. I’m a human and as such, I find myself messing up in life. Most times these things are relatively minor...
February 08, 2007 09:26
Yesterday, the front page of my local newspaper displayed two stories that I found annoying. In one case, a government minister was fired because of an angry email that he sent to a constituent. In the other case, a woman with cancer had her travel privileges limi...
February 02, 2007 11:40
The following is an excerpt from Phillips Brooks’ classic, The Joy of Preaching. Brooks’famous definition of preaching still holds up, perhaps better today than when he first spoke it. I might argue that preaching is not communication by man to me...
January 22, 2007 12:45
An item from the Baptist Press suggests that pastors may be out of touch with their world. While this might not strike us as news, it might be of some concern if pastors are less tuned in to the surrounding culture than their people are.
“Research ...
January 09, 2007 11:47
I was pleased to see a two-page review of Choosing to Preach in the latest issue of Preaching magazine. The unnamed reviewer likes the book, and gives it a warm endorsement as well as a useful summary of its contents. The review also raises a small question about ...
December 13, 2006 12:59
Every now and then I troll my junk email box in order to see whether something has gone astray. Yesterday morning I found a message offering a link to a website that is questioning whether the “position” of “preacher” is biblically mandated...
November 27, 2006 13:51
Yesterday was the final Sunday at our church for my friend and pastor David Horita. The day became even more memorable than it would have been due to a surprise snowstorm which cut our electric power about 10 minutes into the service. We ended up bringing out the ...
November 24, 2006 09:58
I’ve found it interesting this week to contrast two of my students whose preaching (and personal) style is very different. One of the guys is energetic, passionate – the kind of guy who makes his presence felt wherever he is. Everybody likes him. The o...
November 08, 2006 11:54
A few weeks ago I raised the question as to when “authenticity” became the new fruit of the spirit. Last night a couple of young pastor friends and I discussed the question a little more. For a lot of people, authenticity is a license to dump all their...
November 06, 2006 11:17
What is one to say about the news of yet another public evangelical leader’s hypocrisy. I have no doubt that Ted Haggard’s claims are true, that this has been a long dark struggle of the soul and that he is a sinner in need of forgiveness just like any...
September 20, 2006 11:32
I had an interesting online conversation with some of my students this week about the growing appreciation for authenticity as a personal value. I made the off-hand comment that I didn’t recall seeing authenticity as one of the fruits of the Spirit in Galati...
August 28, 2006 14:18
Yesterday I preached about one of my favorite Bible characters, the father of the demon-possessed son in Mark 9. His statement in verse 24 is one of the greatest affirmations of faith I know.
You may recall that Jesus seems a little exasperated. “U...
August 12, 2006 12:47
Listening to the speakers at this week’s Willow Creek Leadership Summit I have been struck by just how funny everybody is. Patrick Lencioni, Jim Collins, and even Bill Hybels all used humor to great effect. Andy Stanley was hilarious. Not that anybo...
August 10, 2006 15:25
“Perfect love drives out fear.” 1 John 4:18
Anytime anyone has ever done a survey as to things people are afraid of, “public speaking” leads the list. Apparently we terrify each other. The prospect of standing in front of...
August 10, 2006 15:21
Read through the classic literature on biblical preaching and you will find a variety of forms and methods. The common denominator will be the preacher’s dependence upon prayer. The work of the preacher is the work of prayer.
We are talking about s...
August 10, 2006 15:19
How can they call in the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful a...
August 10, 2006 15:18
I noticed the following quote in a novel I was reading recently and I just had to share it. Yes it was written in 1857, but I imagine most 21st century postmodern types would affirm the sentiment. The only difference is that unlike the good citizens of Barchester ...
August 10, 2006 15:04
I did something a few years ago that I had never done before. I preached in sock feet, standing on a pillow. No, this was not because I wanted to be more comfortable. This was no new seeker sensitive technique aimed at helping listeners feel more comfortable. I wa...
August 10, 2006 14:57
A friend told me about a website last week, a treasure trove of preaching, with links to more than 8,000 sermons – 8,000! There’s got to be a few good ones in there. Most of us only need forty or fifty in a year (unless we are Korean wherein we would h...
August 10, 2006 14:57
I recently heard a preacher apply his teaching of the ten commandments, particularly the prohibition against stealing. He did a good job with his explanation of the text. His presentation was engaging. The piece that got my attention, however, was his application....
August 10, 2006 14:55
“Have you heard about the Royal Rumble?”
“What’s the Royal Rumble?”
“You haven’t heard about the Royal Rumble???”
I was listening to my son respond to his eight year old friend in the ba...