In anticipation of being assessed as a church planter, I wonder how I will respond if my “grade” on the assessment indicates that church planting isn’t the most appropriate ministry for how God has made me. Maybe I’m better suited to pastor or replant an existing church. I don’t know, but I’m definitely praying about it.  This post from Scott Thomas on the Acts 29 Network Blog provides helpful thoughts when Envisioning a Replant.

1. Envision what the worship gathering could be (Acts 2:42-47).
   • Attitude of body during worship
   • Music
   • Prayer
   • Teaching
   • Communion
   • Children
   • Exaltation of God
   • Incorporation of arts
2. Envision what the evangelism could be (Matt. 28:18-20; Acts 1:8).
   • Who can you reach immediately?
   • What attitudes toward evangelism need to change?
   • Where or how could you boldly make an impact with the gospel?
   • What steps of faith need to be taken to reach the unchurched and the unsaved?
   • How could your youth evangelize?
   • How could households evangelize together?
   • What worldwide impact could you make as a body (i.e. foreign missions)?
   • How are you going to be an eternal value to your community?
3. Envision how education and discipleship could be effective (Acts 2:42).
   • How will it become a passionate pursuit of the body (“continue steadfastly in the Apostles’ doctrine,” Acts 2:42)?
   • What resources (people, qualities, gifts) do you have in place to launch greater disciple-making?
   • How will the fathers and heads of households (single moms, etc.) be trained to be the priest and spiritual head of their homes?
   • How will the older men and women teach and interact with the younger men and women? (Titus 2)
   • Will the age groups be segregated (children, youth, singles, college, married, etc.) or will they be integrated into the body?
   • What role will small groups play?
   • What training will be needed to help develop disciples who are passionately pursuing Christ?
4. Envision an Acts 2 commitment to fellowship (Acts 2:44-45).
   • In what ways will the body seek to meet the needs of one another (spiritual, social, financial, physical)?
   • What attitudes need to change to be sacrificially generous with time, money and resources for the encouragement and edification of the body?
   • How will the body serve one another actively and responsively in an unprompted way?
   • What will the membership requirements be? How will it communicate a covenantal commitment?
5. Envision an effective youth and children’s ministry.
   • Will they be integrated into the church ministry? If so, how?
   • How will families be strengthened through the student ministry?
   • How will the youth be encouraged and trained to evangelize their friends?
   • What role will the heads of households play in the student ministry?
   • Who (person or groups) will lead the youth and children’s ministry?
   • What facility changes are needed to communicate the value of children and youth?
   • What other positions of leadership need to be filled to be effective?
   • What leadership development with the students will be put into place?
   • What programs or customs need to be extracted from the youth and children’s ministry to avoid distractions from the ministry goals?
6. Envision an equipping staff (Eph. 4:11-13).
   • What changes need to be made with the staff (paid or volunteer) to meet the church’s goals?
   • Are the staff members doing the ministry or leading people to do the ministry? If they are doing the bulk of the ministering, how will they develop the body to do the work of the ministry?
   • Are you over-staffed or under-staffed to meet both financial obligations and the development of lay people (taking responsibility for ministry)?
7. Envision a body not reacting to finances to determine God’s call (Matt. 6:24).
   • How will faith in God calling a body to reach out to the community and world be weighed against financial responsibility and stewardship?
   • If mortgages or debts exist, how will they be paid off in a realistic way over a reasonable time period?
   • What attitudes or practices about money and finances need to be changed?
   • Is a budget in place? Is it a true reflection of the church’s giving and spending (balanced budget)?
   • What expenses can be cut immediately to be redirected toward the church’s mission?
   • Is the body (especially the leadership) making decisions based on finances or on God’s calling?
   • What creative ways can you generate more income without sacrificing resources, biblical principles, or expending paid personnel?

This list of seven qualifications of a church planter is comparable to other lists, but serves as a reminder of all that church planters are called to do and be. This post was written by David Nicholas, the founder of The Church Planting Network.

1. Has a working knowledge of God’s Word.
2. Godly Character
3. Communication skills
4. Evangelistic fervor
5. Leadership abilities
6. A good fit for the area
7. Self-knowledge of personal giftedness and personality

Michael Mckinley recommends a booklet that helps people learn how to listen to sermons. It is written by Christopher Ash and is entitled Listen Up! A Practical Guide to Listening to Sermons.The fact that society has many fewer opportunities to listen to spoken word for long times almost necessitates a book like this be required reading for all church attendees.

Jesus tells us to be careful how we hear (Luke 8:18).  Yet many Christians approach the Sunday sermon with little to no game-plan for listening well.

To address that problem, Christopher Ash has written and outstanding booklet: Listen Up! A Practical Guide to Listening to Sermons.

The booklet is very accessible.  It is short (only 31 pages), well designed, and written in an informal, catchy style.  And the content is pure gold.

It is broken into several sections.  The first and longest part is devoted to seven ingredients for healthy sermon listening.  They are:

1. Expect God to speak.
2. Admit God knows better than you.
3. Check the preacher says what the passage says.
4. Hear the sermon in church (as opposed to solely listening to sermons on the internet).
5. Be there week by week.
6. Do what the Bible says.
7. Do what the Bible says today — and rejoice!

Each of these “ingredients” comes with practical examples and a list of “practical steps to take” at the end.

The second section deal with listening to “bad” sermons, particularly dull sermons, biblically inadequate sermons, and heretical sermons.

The final section reminds us that congregations often get the kind of preaching they tolerate and encourage, and then provides seven suggestions for encouraging good preaching,

I found this booklet very, very helpful.  If you are a preacher who wants to train your people to listen well to God’s Word, this is the booklet you want to use.  If you are a regular hearer of God’s Word, this booklet will give you a great perspective and a ton of practical strategies for improvement.

The process of preparing a sermon is fascinating, at least to me. Josh Harris did a series on his blog last year where he got sermon notes / manuscripts from Mark Dever, Mike Bullmore, C.J. Mahaney, Ray Ortlund, Jr., Tim Keller, Mark Driscoll, and his own. It’s a very interesting look into these men of God both pastorally and personally.

Mark Dever, Senior Pastor at Capital Hill Baptist Church in Washington, DC, recently posted the evolution of his outline for a message on Revelation 20. Seeing how his thoughts became clearer, and more concise, is helpful as I look toward a day of preaching regularly, Lord willing.

#1

20:1-3 The Binding of Satan
20:4-6 The Thousand Years—Christ Reigning with His Saints
20:7-10 The Final Defeat of Satan
20:11-15 The Final Judgment of the Dead

#2

20:1-3 God is Sovereign over Satan
20:4-6 Christians reign with God & Christ
20:7-10 Satan will appear to flourish but will be judged
20:11-15 The dead (and death!) are judged. Everyone will be judged

#3

Christians need not fear persecution 20:4-6
Christians need not fear Satan, 20:1-3, 7-10
Christians need not fear death, 20:11-15

#4

Christians need not be scared of Satan, 20:1-3, 7-10
Christians need not be scared of death, 20:4-6
Christians need not be scared of God, 20:11-15

#5

Don’t let threats intimidate you 20:4-6
Don’t let lies deceive you 20:1-3, 7-10
Don’t let death fool you 20:11-15

#6

Christians will be blessed 20:4-6
Satan will be defeated 20:1-3, 7-10
Everyone will be judged 20:11-15

#7

Common myths:
1) Christianity isn’t worth it. 20:4-6
2) Who’s to say? 20:1-3, 7-10
3) People get away with stuff 20:11-15

#8

Don’t worry 20:1-3, 7-10
Make sure 20:11-15
Praise God 20:4-10

From Colin Adams via PJ Tibyan.

“Preaching through Bible Books -  This is from a conference in 2003 called, “Katoomba Christian Conference Centenary (Sydney, Australia).”  D.A. Carson lectured on 12 points in preaching through a book of the Bible.  You can listen to the audio by downloading the message here (left-click).  This is taken from The Gospel Coalition website.

1. 1. (1:38 ) – Read and re-read and re-read and re-read and re-read the book. – It’s a mistake to read the book once and then start reading commentaries (Read it in English and the original language).(3:11) – Ideally start the process early. Give time to re-reading, meditation, and saturation.
   2. (4:58 ) – Eschew the division of head and heart.
   3. (6:14) – Early on attain sufficient grasp of the book that you can succinctly state
      1. what the book is about,
      2. what this book contributes to the canon that overlaps with what other books bring to the canon,
      3. what distinctive things this book brings to the canon. (All these things need to be thought about simultaneously. This is what brings clarity and precision). Scan biblical theologies on the book to get a large scale picture of the book.
   4. (11:10) – At roughly the same time determine
      1. the number of sermons you’ll devote to the book
      2. the large scale outline of the book insofar as it impinges on your text boundaries for each sermon (11:10).
   5. (19:27) – Start working on individual sermon preparation (either in advance or week by week). Ideally work on the text first.
      1. (23:26) – Ideally develop note taking techniques. This keeps your tools sharp and keeps your files for resources for future ministry (writing, preaching, evangelism, etc.);
      2. (29:32) – from these detailed exegetical notes (Note for young preachers: you must determine and discipline yourself to leave stuff out). You need to know what to leave out. The sermon is the best of the material and the highlights of what you learned. The aim is to think through what contributes to the burden of that text;
      3. Work on the text’s structure. Work on it so that it is fresh and appealing and helpful.
   6. (32:27) – Each sermon must simultaneously stand alone and constitute a part of the series.
   7. (33:34) – Remember the different contributions of a Paul House (corpus/book) biblical theology and a Charles Scobie (thematic) biblical theology.
   8. (38:11) – Recognize that there may be special study and focus necessary for certain books (historical, cultural, literary genre, etc).
   9. (42:32) – Ideally try to make your sermon material reflect in some way the genre of the book you are treating.
   10. (44:24) – Remember constantly that this is not an exercise in artistic creation. The sermon is not an end in itself, but it is a re-revelation of God to his people. This means that as you prepare you ought to be thinking about the people to whom you are ministering.
   11. (50:28 ) – ideally keep revising, praying, preparing so that it is not so much that you have mastered the material as that it has mastered you. There is a way of preaching that projects an image of being an expert and an image of being captured by the text.

Notes from Mark Driscoll’s talk on Jeremiah

1. What has God revealed to you ? (Nehemiah 1:1-11a)
2. What must you walk away from to pursue God’s calling? (Nehemiah 1:11b)
3. How will you communicate your vision to others? (Nehemiah 2:1-3)
4. Who must you ask for what resources? (Nehemiah 2:4-10)
5. Count the cost (Nehemiah 2:11-16)
6. Recruit strategic leaders first (Nehemiah 2:17 – 20)
7. What do we do first? Do it well (Nehemiah 3:1-32)
8. Where are the gates? Letting in those who want the Gospel, keeping out the wolves (Nehemiah 3:1-32)
   • Theological
   • Physical safety
9. How will you respond to critics? (Nehemiah 4:1-23)
   • Proximity of critic is painful
   • Have selective hearing
   • Turn critics into coaches
   • Don’t meet with critics in group
10. How to them show the gospel with mercy? (Nehemiah 5-1-19)
    • Criticism follows success
11. How to handle escalation opposition & threats (Nehemiah 6:1-14)
    • Sword and Trowel
12. What generational legacy are you building for? (Nehemiah 7:4-73)
13. How will you connect ground war (small groups, congregational care) and your air war (preaching and teaching) (Nehemiah 8:1-18)
14. Will you courageously call your people to repentance? (Nehemiah 9:1-38)
15. What are your terms for covenant membership? (Nehemiah 10:38-11:36)
    • Participation in small groups, tithing, attendance, etc
16. How will you track who God is bringing and assimilate them? (Nehemiah 11:1-36)
17. Who are your trustworthy priests who can work in the mission while you work on the mission? (Nehemiah 12:1-26)
18. How will you celebrate your wins? (Nehemiah 12:27-47)
    • Conversions
    • Babies
    • Baptisms
    • Building campaigns
19. How much will you demand of your men? (Nehemiah 13:1-22)
20. What closed-hand, practical life issues will you go to war for? (Nehemiah 13:23-31)

From Keith Mathison via Justin Taylor

OLD TESTAMENT:

• Genesis
• Exodus
• Leviticus
• Numbers
• Deuteronomy
• Joshua
• Judges
• Ruth
• 1 & 2 Samuel
• 1 & 2 Kings
• 1 & 2 Chronicles
• Ezra & Nehemiah
• Esther
• Job
• Psalms
• Proverbs
• Ecclesiastes
• Song of Songs
• Isaiah
• Jeremiah
• Lamentations
• Ezekiel
• Daniel
• Hosea
• Joel
• Amos
• Obadiah
• Jonah
• Micah
• Nahum
• Habakkuk
• Zephaniah
• Haggai
• Zechariah
• Malachi

NEW TESTAMENT:

• The Gospel of Matthew
• The Gospel of Mark
• The Gospel of Luke
• The Gospel of John
• Acts
• Romans
• 1 Corinthians
• 2 Corinthians
• Galatians
• Ephesians
• Philippians
• Colossians & Philemon
• 1 & 2 Thessalonians
• The Pastoral Epistles
• Hebrews
• James
• 1 Peter
• 2 Peter & Jude
• The Epistles of John
• Revelation

These are amazingly helpful thoughts from C.J. Mahaney on teaching Proverbs

As the book of Song of Solomon is a unique gift for married couples, the book of Proverbs is a unique gift for parents and children. For preachers looking to use the summer months to preach this unique book, here are a few tools that may be useful.

Preaching Proverbs in Calvary’s Shadow

It can be difficult to balance the call to obedience with the cross-centered life. Yet that is what William Arnot accomplishes in the final chapter of his old commentary on Proverbs, Laws from Heaven for Life on Earth (published in 1873). The final chapter, “Faith and Obedience—Work and Rest,” models this balance well and I commend it to you.

You can read or download the entire commentary for free online. But you can download the isolated chapter I mention as a PDF here (0.9MB).

Thematic Structures

Of importance to the preacher of Proverbs is getting a handle on a few recurring themes and character developments featured in the book (i.e. wisdom, folly, discernment, understanding, knowledge). Derek Kidner’s excellent commentary will certainly help here.

I also recommend a newer commentary on Proverbs by John A. Kitchen (Mentor, 2006). In the appendix of his commentary, Kitchen has written a very useful systemization and summary of the path of the righteous and the path of the fool (pp. 727–736). Kitchen uses three graphics to distinguish the two paths and the several steps along the way.

The explanations behind these charts are developed in the commentary appendix. And the editors of Christian Focus have granted us permission to post the entire appendix here as adownloadable PDF (2.4MB).

Summer Series Outline

Due to its structure, the book of Proverbs is difficult to preach expositionally from beginning to end. The book lends itself to topical exposition, a feature that makes it a suitable text for preaching during the summer months.

Sovereign Grace Church in Fairfax, Virginia, is using the summer to preach a ten-week series on Proverbs. The pastors have divided the first nine chapters by topic (I was honored to participate in the series by preaching the second message).

FEAR GOD (1:1-7)
LISTEN (1:20-33)
SEEK (2:4)
TRUST (3:5)
GUARD (4:23)
DRINK (5:15)
GO (6:6-8)
KEEP (7:1-2)
HEAR (8:1, 32)
CHOOSE (9:6)

The church printed full-color bookmarks to outline the series and, as you will see, to capture the series as an opportunity to encourage and equip the church to interpret the book of Proverbs for themselves. Here is the graphic they used for the series:

As presented by D. A. Carson via Colin Adams via Andy Naselli

Introduction

I have visited many parts of the world in which the challenges to the 21st-century pulpit look rather different. So part of the purpose of the rest of this essay is modest: to stimulate thinking that will help others flesh out this list and modify it for different cultural locations.

Six challenges that DAC fleshes out

1. Multiculturalism
2. Rising Biblical Illiteracy
3. Shifting Epistemology
4. Integration
5. Pace of Change
6. Modeling and Mentoring

Concluding Reflections

Preachers cannot responsibly ignore these things, for they stand between the speaking God and the listening people—people who are not empty ciphers but culturally located men and women who must be addressed where they are, even if our hope and prayer is that they will not remain where they are, but begin by God’s grace the march down the King’s highway, the narrow road that leads to life.

Our motivation to understand and address people in the 21st century is not to domesticate the gospel by constant appeal to cultural analysis, but to prove effective ambassadors of the Sovereign whose Word we announce. For one day the kingdom of this world will become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ, and He will reign for ever and ever (Rev. 11:15). It is precisely because we are anchored in eternity that we are so utterly resolved, like Paul, to address lost men and women who must one day meet their God.

Informative series at the 9Marks blog where the different contributors are sharing about how and why they do sermon introductions.

Kicked off by Deepak Raju

Mike Gilbart-Smith’s response

I have only one real desire for an introduction: that it will impress upon the congregation why we desperately need to hear the message of the particular passage of Scripture we are looking at together.

Of course, we ought to believe that just because it is in the bible. So, I’ll assume the more mature believer will listen anyway. So, I’ll particularly think about one central question that the passage addresses that will be of interest to the immature Christian and the Non Christian. I’ll then think about how to impress upon people the necessity of answering that question, perhaps raise up front the answers that other worldviews will give to that question and then launch into the text and its answer.

I aim to make it engaging, contemporary, transparently relevant, an opportunity to show that I understand that some people disagree with the bible’s answer, and trans-cultural(embracing high culture / low culture / multiple ethnicities). Above all, the question I raise must be answered by the text and be close to the central point of the text.

Mike McKinley’s response

Mike, I think you definitely have the “textbook” answer.  And I’m sure that you’re right. But I’ll admit that I am a bit ambivalent about introductions.  Maybe that’s just because I’m not very good at them.

I write an introduction to my sermon every week.  But 50% of the time I cut it out and just start by reading the text and giving a few words by way of context.  I want an introduction that is meaningful and is high impact.

I feel a little nervous about scrapping the intro altogether. 1) It presumes an interest in the bible that I don’t want to assume the visitor will have. 2) It has the danger of communicating to the Non-Christian that what is coming up is only of interest or relevance to the person who trusts the bible.

I have a default way of doing an intro when I can’t think of anything better to do. I guess I use it about one sermon in four.

I just look at a couple of quotations from different people giving different answers to the main issue we are looking at. So, I haven’t got any great ideas for an introduction for Jephthah for this week. (Judges 10-12).

So I’ll probably find a couple of quotes about ambition, before asking people to examine what they are ambitious for. How much would they sacrifice to see those ambitions come to fruition?

It’s not rocket science. I don’t think it’s insulting. It gets people asking questions about their lives.

It may not be high impact, but isn’t that better than no impact?

Mike Gilbart-Smith again

However, in most of those churches there isn’t a 40 minute sermon, and there isn’t an appetite for it. I do feel that it is kind to help people to see the relevance of what they are going to hear ahead of time, rather than wading into 5-10 minutes of exegesis before they begin to see the relevance of it for their lives.

4 ways in which an introduction can help people all people, however interested they are to listen:

1. An introduction gets people thinking about a topic that will be addressed in the sermon.
2. It helps people to think application from the very beginning.
3. In that way it helps to give shape to a sermon.
4. It disarms the sermon-biber who loves to hear sermons without putting it into practice. I know even from my own quiet times that I must force myself before reading the text to think ‘relevance’ rather than merely ‘comprehension’ before I start to read. An intro is a kind way to help the whole congregation to think that way.

My sermon on Sunday had a brief (3-4 minute) intro. It certainly wasn’t clever. But I think the sermon would have been poorer without it, as it was designed to get people thinking about how they set the whole direction of their life, and therefore people would come to the text with that question.

Thabiti Anyabwile’s weighs in

Now you guys have me thinking about introductions more than I normally do, which probably explains why I’m not that good at them.  Often my introductions are questions that point to the application or the main theme.  So, a couple Sundays ago, we were in Proverbs 5 and I asked questions related to the trajectory of marriage in the Cayman Islands.  The questions traded on the recent passage of a constitutional referendum defining marriage as between one man and one woman.  It was a victory, but the real work of marriage has to do with us heterosexual Christians really loving and serving our spouses as though revealing Christ and the gospel might somehow be connected to marriage.  For those with an hour, the sermon is here.

About the only time I’ve scrapped an introduction has been in response to something happening in the service… say the Lord using a song before the sermon in a particularly poignant or powerful way.  Then I might try to extemporaneously bridge what just took place in the singing with the beginning of the sermon.  Tried that here.  When that happens, it’s usually a gospel appeal of some sort.

But all this talk of introductions reminds me of two reasons for introductions that I don’t think anyone has said yet.  First, I, the preacher, need the introduction.  It helps me settle down into what I’m doing.  It brings me from the participation I’ve just been experiencing with the prayer or the singing to the participation I’m about the share with the word.  Not everyone would need that “lead time,” I’m sure.  But it focuses me in helpful ways.  Second, usually the introduction helps me to remember that I’m speaking to a people and that the sermon (though not a dialogue) has an audience I need to communicate with.  The sermon introduction reminds me of that.

So, I like them.  I don’t think I’m particularly good at them.  Could use even more help with conclusions, labeling the main points in short pithy statements, and illustrating.  Pretty much the whole shooting match.  But these exchanges have been helpful on the front end.  Fa’ rizzle.

Greg Gilbert continues the discussion

I think a good intro acts like the cast of a spear:  It directs the congregation’s mind in the direction you want it to go and sets the agenda for the sermon.  In other words, it puts the congregation’s minds on the ideas you want their minds on.  If you do it well, you can actually get your congregation thinking about, for example, whether a commitment to truth necessarily undercuts love, rather than whatever it was they were thinking about before they started listening to you.

I don’t think it’s useful, though, to use an introduction just to grab attention.  People try that all the time by telling a joke or something that has little or nothing to do with what they are about to preach.  Yes, that grabs attention, but only for as long as the joke is going on.  After the laugh, when you say, alright, let’s talk about love and truth, you lose them again immediately.

Ideally, I’d say, an intro will get your congregation thinking about a certain set of questions, and promise a thoughtful answer to those questions coming up in the rest of the sermon.