Church Ministry

Wanted: Expository Preaching Advocates

/ Peter Mead / Leave a comment

Expository preaching is a label that comes with baggage in many churches. And yet it is exactly what our churches need for health. And healthy Bible-preaching churches are what our culture needs for the gospel to spread. Personally I don’t care whether the label is used or not, but I care deeply whether expository preaching happens or not. And if you are willing to take on a role without a label for your LinkedIn profile, consider being an Expository Preaching Advocate.

1. It helps to understand the source of the negativity. A lot of people who are critical of expository preaching have never actually experienced a good example of it. Just like children who refuse something they’ve never tasted, they can be quite determined in their negativity. Especially when they are convinced that they have tried it before. They may be thinking of irrelevant historical lectures they heard in the past. Or perhaps tedious verse-by-verse explanations from a more studious visiting preacher. Whatever the source of negativity in their particular experience, it will help you to know what the issue is in your specific situation. Is it past experience, or present? Is it the perceived irrelevance, or the boredom of predictability, or a feeling of intellectualism?

2. It really helps to know what you are promoting. Expository preaching is not a specific style of preaching. It is not about length of passage, number of points, type of structure, or even tone of preaching. It is really a set of controlling values and commitments. It starts with recognising that God is a wonderfully effective communicator. It is built on the foundational thought that no matter how well you can communicate or how clever you are, you cannot make the Bible say something better than God made it say. Expository preaching is about a commitment to the effective communication of the true meaning and contemporary relevance of biblical text or texts.

If the label “expository preaching” carries too much baggage, why not switch over to “biblical preaching” – Haddon Robinson made that label switch, and I have tended to follow that same path.

3. It also helps to know to whom you are promoting it. Is there a general resistance in the congregation that can be won over by some effective preaching? Or is there a key person resisting change and maintaining the status quo? Maybe that resister is the current senior pastor, or perhaps it is a powerful and wealthy person of influence. You need to think carefully and pray much when you want to bring change to a church.

4. Prayerfully formulate a promotion plan. What goes into a plan to promote change in a church? Lots of prayer. You might think enthusiasm for your subject and in a sense, yes that is important. But many a good plan has been derailed by passion for a soapbox. Make sure you add in submission to those in authority, love and encouragement for those who preach, support for the wider ministry of the church, good example, etc. And then prayerfully consider the seeds you can plant: a carefully chosen book given as a gift, or recommended; a suggestion of a podcast; an invitation to attend a conference together; or a fully prayed through gracious suggestion, etc.

5. Be patient, but promote positively. Self-appointed church changers often blow their influence by pushing too hard and too fast. Don’t be negative. Criticism and complaining are easy, but they don’t fix things. Patiently and prayerfully implement a God-honouring plan. If you preach, humbly offer the very best example that you can. Look for opportunities to mentor and multiply others. Whether you preach or not, seek to promote biblical preaching – not a certain type of preaching, but a set of values and commitments that are desperately needed in our churches and in our world today.

What have you found helpful in promoting Biblical Preaching?

Before The Sermon

/ Peter Mead / 2 Comments

One of the challenges of the pandemic has been preaching to a camera without people present. Thankfully we are currently able to meet, but there have been many Sundays of just preaching to a camera. When there is an actual gathering of people, and you are preaching, there are lots of things to be aware of between the beginning of the service and the sermon itself.

1. The Time – this is number one for a reason. Sometimes delays happen. End of service still needs to arrive on time. Maybe the announcements take too long, song introductions become mini-sermons, a technical hitch slows things down. What is the result? Well, you need to preach shorter. Be aware of where you can trim time from your message (an illustration that can go, a shortcut through the introduction, removing the review of the series so far), and be careful not to edit out important elements (the major points, the key transitions, etc.) Pray that you will not be annoyed by the adjustment. People can read people and at least some of your listeners will sense it.

2. The Pre-Message Messages – between the announcements, any interviews, prayers, songs, etc., there is usually quite a bit said before you get to preach. Listen to it and maybe you can integrate elements into the message. Especially if someone has done something nerve-wracking like a testimony, be sure to acknowledge and thank them. However, you have a sermon to preach, so make sure an engaging opening (or a terrible one) doesn’t distract you and weaken the message. (And if you are like me, there are sometimes quite amusing comments that come to mind in relation to what has happened earlier in the service. These are often better left behind when it comes time to preach!)

3. The Speaker Introduction – especially if you are a guest speaker, you don’t know what they are going to say about you right before you preach. Generally just say thank you and get on with it. Clever retorts made without time to evaluate can really backfire. (A note to those introducing a speaker. Please only say what is helpful. Too much praise, too much humour, or too much time all make it harder to preach effectively!)

4. The Service Mood – sometimes a congregation is laughing after you’ve been introduced, sometimes they are in a deep and sombre moment. Perhaps they have been bored to death already, or maybe they are distracted by the crying infant. It is helpful to read the congregation and launch accordingly. Adapt your introductory comments as appropriate.

5. The Congregation – as well as evaluating the mood of the congregation, it doesn’t hurt to be aware of the people. If you are not in a position where observing would be awkward, observe and pray for your congregation. This sermon is not about you preaching it, it is about them hearing it. Pray for their hearts to be open and for yours to be beating with Christ’s heart for them.

6. The Journey – minor detail, until you make a mistake. Be sure to check your journey from where you are sat to where you will preach. Any steps? Any microphone cables? I remember one church where I had to climb a literal staircase to get to the pulpit. I was thankful for those extra moments when my introduction came far earlier than expected (and my end time was pre-determined by being a live radio broadcast – I did a lot of thinking and praying on my way up those stairs!)

7. The Focus of the Preacher – it is good to be aware of all these things and probably other things too. At the same time you are thinking about the message. In the midst of it all, remember to pray. You want to preach focused rather than distracted or distressed.

Anything else you would add to this list?

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Great Movies & Great Sermons

/ Peter Mead / Leave a comment

Last night we had an impromptu discussion at the dinner table about movies. What makes a movie great? We probably weren’t at the level of discussing every aspect of script, characters, acting, timing, sound, visuals, etc. But it did strike me that there may be some elements of a good movie that might teach us a thing or two about good preaching. I know, a sermon and a movie have massive differences (budget, labour hours, purpose, etc.), but still, it might be worth chasing this a little.

For me, a good movie includes the following:

  1. It is believable. I don’t mean the story has to be true to life, even though I tend to prefer those that are. But the visuals, the acting, the props, etc., should all reinforce the world created by the movie. If the acting is wooden, or the set wobbles, or the knight on horseback is wearing a watch, then I consciously know I am watching people trying to make a movie and it loses its impact. I wonder in what ways we might lose believability as we preach – lack of genuineness of preacher, lack of passion for content, excessive reliance on notes, unfortunate pauses and uncertainty?
  2. It is engaging. A movie could be completely believable, but inherently dull. I have seen a few. Somehow the plot tension needs to combine with the character development to engage me. It is not enough to be well-made, it needs to make me care about the story. I think the same is true in preaching. We can present solid truth well, but it can still be dull to our listeners. As preachers we need to make sure we engage with our listeners both in content and delivery so that they care to listen.
  3. It appropriately blends surprise with satisfaction. When a movie is predictable from the opening scene, it is going to struggle. There needs to be surprise. However, some predictable movies are still much loved. Everyone knows Rocky will win the final fight, so how does that kind of film succeed? (It came up in our conversation.) Along with sufficient plot twists and added challenges along the way, there is also something to be said for the satisfaction that comes when a plot’s tension resolves. That is what keeps children returning to the same bedtime story request night after night. They know what will happen, but they want to feel it again. Preaching is not dissimilar. If we are merely predictable, then our congregations will grow tired. But we can’t generate surprises at every turn in every sermon – after all, our listeners tend to have our passage open in front of them! Somehow good preaching blends some surprise with a more predictable, but satisfying, resolution to the tension. Preaching reminds people of truths they know they need to hear again.

This is all true, but then we also thought about one more aspect of the discussion. What takes a good movie and makes it a great movie?

4. Lingering Impact. A lot of movies are enjoyable escapism. They create a bubble for us to enter for a couple of hours. Then when the story ends, we move back into normal life. Great movies make more impact. There is a lingering affect on our lives. (This is why Hollywood is such a powerful political tool!) Some movies, although probably not as many as overly emotional actor interviews suggest – some movies actually shape the way people think and change the way they live. In a similar way it is possible for a sermon to be good, in itself. Maybe it engages its listeners for the time it is being delivered, and technically it ticks all the boxes. But when it ends, do the listeners just step back into “real life” again? Maybe they are grateful, but essentially unmoved? When we preach we should be praying for, and planning for, a lingering and life-changing impact. By God’s grace, sometimes it happens!

What would you add? Any more helpful links between movie-making and effective preaching?

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Please check out Cor Deo on YouTube for helpful resources – https://www.youtube.com/c/CorDeo

How Long to Prepare a Sermon?

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

A good sermon should leave people thinking about God rather than how long it took you to prepare it, but still, the question does arise. Some people have a very definite view on how long sermon preparation should take: a certain number of hours for a certain length of sermon. In reality, life is not so simple. Here are several factors to keep in mind:

A. A shorter sermon may take longer to prepare. We can’t just say it takes an hour for every minute of sermon, or whatever. In reality I can preach an hour long sermon fairly easily, but a twelve minute sermon takes much more effort to craft.

B. Every sermon is different. One passage may be effectively new ground for me to study, while another passage may be very familiar from previous teaching and preaching ministry. One congregation may feel straightforward, while another, or the same one on another week, may feel like a minefield of potential traps to carefully navigate.

C. It is impossible to measure the pre-study. I might take however many hours to work on a message for this Sunday. But what about the time I took on the same passage some years ago? What about the years of life experience and study of other related passages? What about the years I spent in the classroom laying a foundation of understanding? There really is a lifetime feeding into any sermon.

D. No preacher lives in a vacuum. Real life happens, which means preparation is never predictable. Even if you plan well, the realities and crises of church, family and home have a habit of crowding in anyway. There will be times when we all have to stand and preach with a profound sense of preparation deficit (and that is not something that it generally helps to broadcast in your introduction).

I suppose it is worth asking the question: who is asking the question?

If a listener has appreciated the sermon and is interested, figure out how to accept the encouragement of their appreciation and turn the focus back onto the object of your sermon. Don’t let your ego jump into the conversation and hold centre stage. It really isn’t about you, is it?

If a church is asking the question because they want to know what is appropriate to give by way of reimbursement for time invested, then perhaps ponder these quick thoughts: (1) Preaching has cost the preacher, so reimburse generously. (2) If you are unable to reimburse generously, rest assured that all good preachers are motivated by serving God rather than gaining income (but it might be kind to be honest with them ahead of time – they do have bills to pay too). (3) If the preacher is asking about how much they will receive, or setting a fee, usually this indicates something is not right. Be wary. (4) If you are worried about being too generous, remember that the preacher can always give excess funds away (and if you don’t trust them to be good stewards of money, why are you letting them near the pulpit anyway?) You probably don’t withhold business from an optometrist, a plumber, or a surgeon in case they end up with too much, so why hesitate to be generous with a preacher?

If a preacher is asking the question about time, then I am hesitant to give a definitive answer. What if he simply can’t dedicate the time that I can? What if he needs to dedicate longer to be ready? Here is a simple two-part answer:

1. As much time as it takes – to prayerfully select a passage, study the passage in context, determine passage purpose and idea, then evaluate congregation, define message purpose, craft the message idea, design the preaching strategy (outline) and fill in the details, then also prayerfully preach through the message a few times.  Realistically that could add up to quite a bit of time.

2. As much time as you have – You must take into account the reality of life: ministry pressures, other responsibilities, leaking pipes, family illnesses, hospital visits with your injured child, late night crisis counseling with dear friends in marital meltdown, and so on.  God knows about these things and perhaps sometimes allows them to keep us from trusting in our preparation routine.  If you procrastinate preparation and only take a couple of hours, that’s between you and the Lord (in which case, repent and get things right before moving forward!)  But if life hits and you honestly only have limited time, God surely knows and will carry you through.

One thing that I know from many thousands of hours of sermon preparation over the years. It may be a struggle, even a battle at times, but every moment is a privilege.

8 Variations of Selfish Preaching

/ Peter Mead / 2 Comments

We all minister with mixed motives.  It is important to be aware of that, and to prayerfully stay before the only One who can really know what is going on inside of us.  Sometimes it can be helpful to delineate some of the unhelpful or sinful motivations that can sabotage a ministry.  It is not possible to avoid every negative motive all the time, but we must beware lest any of these start to fester within and then characterise our ministry.

1. Preaching to impress.  The inner child may not be as gone as we think, and it can so easily creep out and we then start to show off.

Selfish

2. Preaching to be liked.  The insecure self can manifest in public ministry and we can start to crave affirmation.

3. Preaching to be needed.  The shepherds of a flock do make a difference to the lives of the sheep, but something is off if the need to be needed starts to grow.  You are replaceable.

4. Preaching to validate our worth.  The unsettled soul can seek validation for our education, our calling, our sense of identity, etc., through the medium of ministry.  If your worth is not firmly rooted in Christ (as just you, minus all trappings of ministry position), then you have a problem and you may well become a problem.

5. Preaching to control behaviour.  This may be more common than we think.  Instead of patient ministry trusting God’s Word and God’s Spirit, we can shortcut the process and start to pressure conformity in our listeners.  Quite simply, our life is easier if they will just behave like Christians.

6. Preaching to build a mini-kingdom.  Again, too common to count, and probably involves a combination of the above issues … but it happens when we preach in order to have a little empire where our influence, our voice, our significance, and our ego get propped up.

7. Preaching to be paid.  It is absolutely appropriate that churches recompense preachers and do so properly.  It is shocking the way some churches do not care for their preachers.  However, if I am preaching in order to get the paycheck, then my ministry motivation is broken.

8. Preaching because it is all I can do.  The fires within will not always burn bright in perpetual personal revival.  At the same time, if the fire has really gone out, please don’t just preach because you have no option.  You do.  Trust God, ask others for help, and choose not to preach until you can stand with a fire for Him again.  By faith hold back from doing damage and trust God to carry you through it.

There are plenty of other mis-motives that could be listed.  What have you seen in others (no names please), or in yourself?

Neil Todman on Psalms and Grief

/ Peter Mead / Leave a comment

This Friday we will be releasing an interview with Neil Todman, pastor of Headley Park Church in Bristol. Neil’s first wife, Elaine, died a few years ago and in the full interview Neil tells the story of those years, of God’s faithfulness, and of navigating such challenging years as a pastor. Along the way he also talks about the book of Psalms including the challenges and blessings of preaching from Psalms every year. In this post I want to give you a taste of the interview by sharing two clips with you.

The full interview will be available from Friday afternoon for everyone on the Cor Deo Online mailing list (we send typically one email per month with exclusive free resources). Here is the link to join the mailing list.

And one more clip for you. Neil talks about how to help someone who is grieving – such helpful pastoral insight:

6 Questions About Illustrations – part 2

/ Peter Mead / 2 Comments

Yesterday I gave four questions to get us thinking purposefully about what we are doing with an illustration and where we are getting it from.

Here are two more questions that we need to consider:

5. Even if it is a good illustration, is it self-destructive? You might have a great idea for an illustration, but beware of some that self-destruct. Here are some to watch out for:

  • The Overpowering Illustration. If the emotional impact is too great, then people won’t hear the point, or even the sermon. (Details of your car crash, your surgery, your pet dog’s death, etc.)
  • The Morally Questionable Illustration. If the morality of your illustration raises concerns, then people won’t hear your point, or even the sermon. (It doesn’t have to be sinful to trigger this outcome – referencing some movies, or hobbies, etc., might trigger a “sin!” reflex in some of your listeners.)
  • The Complicated to Explain Illustration. If the backstory or complexity is such that it takes too much effort, then people might forget your actual point. (Many movie illustrations trigger this outcome – unless literally everyone knows the film, or the set-up can be really swift, it may be worth looking for something else.)
  • The Tribal Illustration. If the story elevates a sports team where the listeners may be tribal (some don’t like that team), or where some listeners are tired of sports illustrations, or if you push a political perspective or person (and some aren’t onboard with your perspective), then people will likely remember their reaction to this rather than the point you were making.

6. Are you missing the value of the non-illustration? Sometimes we can be so in the habit of finding illustrations for our preaching that we forget the value of the non-illustration. I don’t mean speaking in a monotonous complicated and academic lecture. I mean recognizing that sometimes the explanation of the context of a passage, or the presentation of the passage itself, can be so vivid and engaging that it feels like you are illustrating when actually you are not. Narratives tend to offer us the potential for powerful storytelling. Poetry tends to offer vivid imagery. Even the epistles sometimes offer illustrations built into the passage. Don’t rush to your illustration file before checking if the text can engage the listeners with a vivid presentation and a sense of resonating relevance.

Illustrating a sermon is not easy, but hopefully these questions might help. What else would you add?

Preparing to Preach in 2021

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

We don’t know what 2021 will bring, but we can guess. We can guess there will be more to the COVID story. We can guess there will be further political and social tensions in various parts of the world. We can guess that it won’t feel like preaching during a honeymoon period of stability and global contentment.

As we leave Christmas behind and start to move towards a new year that we know won’t be simple, what can we do to prepare? The simple answer would be to pray, but what should we pray about, specifically related to preaching? Here are seven things to pray about, just to get you started:

1. Love. Pray that your love for God and your love for your listeners will not be neglected in the coming months. Difficult times can helpfully toughen us, but they can also unhelpfully distract us from ultimate priorities. Pray for the love of God poured into your heart to flow out in devotion to Him, and Christlike selflessness towards others – including in your preaching.

2. Wisdom. Pray that your ministry will be marked by a profoundly biblical discernment in the coming months. We live in a swirl of contradictory information and sometimes the most affirmed realities are the most worthy of profound questioning. We cannot minister with our heads only in our Bibles, we also need to spend some time in the “newspapers” too – but be wary of simply parroting cultural values driven by the media of our time. It is easy to offer a slightly sanctified culture-shaped spin. Pray for wisdom to be able to know and speak God’s truth clearly in a time of great confusion.

3. Courage. Pray for courage in your ministry. It will be harder to speak the truth boldly in this decade than in the last. We may be able to anticipate where the pressures will be coming from, but we do not yet know how great those pressures will become. Your church does not need a bulldog in the pulpit, but neither does it need a wimp being pushed around by the increasingly brazen demands of the world. Pray for courage to speak God’s truth incisively in the coming year.

4. Patience. Pray for patience in your ministry. Someone said we can easily over-estimate what can be achieved in a single sermon, but should never under-estimate what can be achieved through a steady diet of solid biblical preaching. Pray for patience to keep on in your biblical ministry.

5. Endurance. Pray for the endurance that you will need in your preaching in the next year. This year has been draining. Take COVID – it is tiring to minister during uncertainty, with continual changes of government rules and guidelines, with uncertainty hanging over everyone, with different perspectives on the situation throughout the congregation, with the need to continually adapt and re-create church momentum, etc. Take a deep breath. Acknowledge that 2020 was difficult and tiring. And pray for endurance as we head into 2021.

6. Growth. Of course we should pray for the growth of our listeners, but pray for your own growth too. Pray for God to help you grow in your handling of Scripture, your theological insight, your pastoral sensitivity, your communicative ability, etc. Pray that you will become a better preacher this year.

7. Fruit. Don’t forget to pray for fruit. It would be easy to allow global events, national lockdowns, family struggles or even personal issues to distract you from the obvious. Pray for fruit in your ministry. Pray that people will come to faith in Christ this year. Pray that believers will grow closer to Christ this year. Pray for marriages to be healed this year. Pray for lives to be transformed deeper and further this year. Fruit doesn’t ultimately depend on your love, your wisdom, your courage, your patience or even your growth. Fruit depends on God’s kindness, so pray for Him to be powerfully at work whether you are “preaching well” or not, whether your church is meeting in person or not, whether your country is falling apart or not.

What would you add to the list?

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Christmas Wonder

/ Peter Mead / 2 Comments

One of the greatest dangers we face in ministry is losing the wonder of what we speak about. The demands of ministry are always high, and this year, maybe even higher. There are the expectations of people, the burden of creativity (only two pairs of Gospel chapters to preach from!), the pastoral concerns that don’t lessen in the dark days of December, extra responsibilities and expectations at home, and so on. How easy it is to lose the wonder of Christmas!

I don’t want to try to prescribe how to keep the wonder of it all this Christmas. I just want to suggest that we do. What will it take? Time with family – proper time? Extra guarded time alone with God? Is there music that triggers your awe at the Incarnation? Or a good book? Whatever it takes.

As we head into this unusual Christmas season, there are definitely pressures building on us. Let’s look to be captured by the grace of God as he chose to step into our messy world. Let’s look to be gripped by the hope held out in the Christmas story for a dark hurting world full of sinners – sinners ruled by sinners, threatened by death, worried about issues local and global (true then as it is true now!) Let’s look to be stirred afresh by the history-hinge of the Incarnation.

Ponder the first Christmas in all its gritty reality. Ponder the Incarnation in all its theological wonder. Ponder the questions raised for the first characters as they watched it unfold. Ponder the answers given to any willing to probe the truths of biblical revelation. Ponder the journey Jesus took from Bethlehem to the Cross. Ponder the everlasting nature of Christ taking on flesh. Ponder the hope that we have of seeing him one day for ourselves. Ponder. Ignite the wonder. Whatever it takes.

3 Likely Outcomes of Bible-Lite Preaching

/ Peter Mead / Leave a comment

You can save a lot of sermon time if you simply summarize the passage, or only briefly touch on the text.  It allows you so many more precious minutes for application and relevance.   But at what cost?  What is lost by eliminating any extended explanation or retelling of narratives?  What is the cost to listeners of not really entering into the world of the passage being preached?  Here are 3 likely outcomes of Bible-lite preaching:

1. Biblical immaturity.  People shaped by Bible-lite preaching will not grow towards the kind of biblical maturity that they will need to thrive in this complex and difficult world.  Knowing a few popular proof texts and surface truths liberally mixed with applicational anecdotes and motivational missives will not be enough to weather the storms of life in this world.  To be mature believers they need the soul-reinforcement that comes from deep biblical-rootedness.

2.  Anemic Devotions.  For half an hour on Sunday our people observe a “mature Christian” handling the Bible.  They will copy what they see.  If you skim the surface in order to share superficial suggestions for life that aren’t deeply rooted in the Word, then guess what they will learn for the rest of the week?  Superficial engagement with the Bible on a personal level.  In fact, they are more likely to make some good worship music on the way to work their daily devotional content and leave the Bible on the shelf.  Why? Because your sermons don’t demonstrate that the Bible has any real weight, personal significance, genuine relevance or divine authority.

3. Godless Christianity.  What is Godless Christianity?  I don’t know, it is an oxymoron.  But I do know, sadly.  It is the kind of christian culture that reinforces itself week after week in many churches – the kind of nice and encouraging sub-culture that has a thin veneer of christian labeling attached to a set of behaviours and attitudes like a set of post-its … that is, not very solid under the slightest wind of difficulty or purposeful inspection.  Bible-lite preaching may encourage people to try to live out the Christian life, but without drawing them deeper into the source of that life – relationship with the Trinity.

As preachers we have a double-duty, or even a double delight: to enable people to encounter the God of the Bible as they enter into His Word, and to be changed by that encounter.  These two go together.  But don’t short-change the first by skipping to the second.  As the world seems to spin further and further away from the anchors of Biblical truth, people need to be more biblically literate and mature, not less.  Today, people need to have more exposure to God’s self-revelation in the Bible, not less.