Top Five Tuesday — Top Five Sermon Starters

We preachers spend a lot of time crafting the opening moments of our sermons. Or, if we don't, we should. Because it is in those moments that you either capture your listeners' attention or lose it.  In the opening you either establish common ground with the...

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To Illustrate? Or Animate?

We preachers spend a lot of time and energy trying to bring life to our sermons through what have historically been called illustrations. Donald Grey Barnhouse, longtime pastor of Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, compiled the most famous collection of such...

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Podcasting With Seedbed On Building Good Sermon Series

At the 2015 New Room Conference, hosted by Seedbed Ministries, I led a seminar called Series That Pop And Sermons That Stick. So the Seedbed folks recently asked me if I'd do a podcast on the same topic. The result is below, with my friend and Methodist pastor...

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Why I Write Sermon Manuscripts

As a lot of you know, I write a sermon manuscript virtually every week. I am able to work several weeks ahead, so while I write one almost every week, it’s not the one I’ll deliver that coming Sunday.  That one, of course, has been written several weeks earlier. But...

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The “How To Prevent Daddy Issues” Sermon Rewind

Yesterday's message was one of moderating and not moderating. For example, I originally had a bottom line that contrasted "diapers" and "Disney."  But over the last week, Disney became known for the alligator who snatched the two year old boy, and so it just didn't...

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When A Church Has Horsepower

Do you remember those scenes in old Western movies in which a stagecoach raced across the American plain?   While we are grateful for the modern system of interstate highways, the stagecoach's image is nevertheless one of romance, energy, and alignment.  All that...

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