The following is a guest post by J.T. Bean, Lead Pastor at Trinity United Methodist Church in Swanton, Ohio. J.T. is part of a unique 12-member team of pastors that oversees seven UMC churches in northwest Ohio. The team website is www.umcteam1.org. There is one action that has the potential to improve your preaching skills more…
What is the most distracting thing that has ever happened to you while preaching? For me it was when I was a youth pastor at a church in New Mexico. I was preaching to a group of high school students. In the middle of my message, a boy stood up, jumped onto his chair and…
“A prepared messenger is more important than a prepared message.” – Robert Munger This preaching quote hits home. How many times have I worked my tail off to prepare a message, but failed to prepare myself? Before we ever prepare our sermons, we need to look in the mirror and make sure we are prepared…
I am a preacher. I am a messenger of the most high God – an ambassador of the Lord Jesus Christ. (2 Corinthians 5:20) I am a herald of the greatest story ever told and the best news ever received. (1 Corinthians 15:1-4) I am a sinner, saved by grace – not through my works,…
Like it or not, preaching is affected by far more than just your words. The best preachers don’t just preach with their lips, but with their whole body. A study by Dr. Albert Mehrabian, author of Nonverbal Communication, found that 55% of communication is body language. This means that when a speaker’s words and body…
Ouch! This quote hurts. “If Jesus preached the same message ministers preach today, He would never have been crucified.” –Leonard Ravenhill Do you agree? This is certainly not true for every pastor. However, I’m afraid this may be true with a lot of the self-help, prosperity preaching today. If Jesus never said anything controversial, if…
The pretty pink princess, my four-year-old daughter, was playing on the living room floor. In meticulous fashion, she was placing her dolls in her doll house, each in a different room for the big imaginary party. But then came little brother. My 11 month-old boy, who we affectionately call “the bruiser,” came barreling in like…
I love this quote from The Preacher: His Life and Work by J.H. Jowett “I have a conviction that no sermon is ready for preaching, not ready for writing out, until we can express its theme in a short, pregnant sentence as clear as a crystal. I find the getting of that sentence is the…
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