09 Goals Check In

At the end of 08 I set 9 goals for 2009. It’s time to grade myself on how I did:

Encourage Other Leaders More: B
I think I have improved here but there is still plenty of room for growth.

Finish 1st Toastmasters Level: C-
I did get some of my speeches done but no where close to the 10 required to finish the first level. Frankly I don’t care. I’m not sure that part of the program is of significant benefit to me.

Regular Prayer Times: B+
This has been an area of significant improvement for me. I haven’t hit the regular rhythm and consistency I’m striving for but this has been a solid area of growth for me this year.

Journal More: A
Not that I have journaled every day but I think I have gotten the full benefit available to me from journaling.

Unplug From Tech and Media More: B
I haven’t become Amish or anything but I have taken some significant steps in this area. Still have room to grow but have become less technology dependant particularly in the area of TV.

Search For Mentor: A
Not because I found a mentor but because I think I was faithful to keep on the lookout for one and because I did foster some relationships with some folks who can help fill some of this gap.

Less Extra-Curricular Church Stuff, More Community Stuff: B-
I have done well at not jumping on every ministry opportunity just because it was there but I haven’t found as many ways to get involved in the community as I would like to. Not sure there is a way to make that happen though and I have been keeping my head up for them.

Blog Differently: B+
This blog still has some randomness to it but I feel like I’m hitting a stride and that there is some sense of what it’s about. You may disagree.

Be More Friendly: D
Not sure I have made any really significant improvement in this area aside from a few basic efforts and a growing awareness.

Preaching Pet Peeves

Preaching is like marriage: a wonderful thing that can go horribly wrong. There are all sorts of deep and theological missteps a preacher can take that render the sermon anything from shallow to heretical. I’m not going to talk about those today. Today I would like to talk about some of the minor (compared to heresy) but stuff significant (because they are super distracting) mistakes that new preachers often make (yeah, just new preachers…). These are not about content or prep so much as they are about delivery. Here goes:

Webster Preaching
A lot of new preachers will quote a dictionary definition for an important word. Don’t. It’s awkward and mechanical to start with. Second why are you using a word we don’t understand? Unless of course it’s absolutely central to the text in which case use the text to explain it. We came for Bible not Webster. If you absolutely must define it then just go ahead and do it but don’t give us your bibliography. Just say “atonement means…” or better yet “atonement is when…” And at all costs avoid reading scripture and then preaching the dictionary. The word means what it means in the context of the passage not in the vacuum of Webster. Not every possible definition of a word is appropriate in a given context. If this were not so the Amplified wouldn’t be the favorite choice of heretics.

X-Ray Preaching
The old guys have this metaphor for preparing a sermon where they talk about the bones (the outline) and then putting some meat on the bones (the explanation, illustration, application). Every sermon, whether heavily structured or more conversational, should have a structure but just like your skeleton you should never see it. In simplest terms this means don’t start by saying “to start off…” because we all know you are starting. If you are giving points don’t say “My first point is that God loves you” just say “God loves you.” You will get more milage out of repetition to solidify your point in the minds of your hearers than you will out of giving numbers or letters. Don’t say “in conclusion” because we will know you are done when you stop talking and you don’t want people checking out before the end. Have an outline but don’t tell us all about it.

VH-1 Behind the Preaching
You prepared, we all get that. You read some stuff and studied some stuff and thought about some stuff. That’s assumed. Don’t tell us “I came across this story when I was preparing” just tell the story. Don’t say “I was thinking about this last week and I realized…” just tell us what you realized. Like X-Ray preaching we know it’s there (your prep, your outline, etc) but you don’t have to beat us over the head with it.

Buffering Preaching
One of the most distracting things you can do when you preach is constantly um or ah. It’s like we are listening to you online and our connection is slow and it keeps buffering. At first we want to listen, then we lose patience and tune out. It’s distracting. It makes it sound like you haven’t put much thought into how to say what you are saying. Now you and I know this isn’t true but they don’t, so work on it. Some people will tell you the solution is a manuscript. Others will tell you it’s the problem. I’ll tell you the key is practice. You have to know what you are going to say and you have to know how to say it but you also have to actually do it, maybe several times. Practice it. Say it out loud over and over until it flows through your brain easily. If it’s flowing through your brain it will flow out your mouth and won’t have to buffer with um and ah.

The True Meaning of Boxing Day

Years ago in England there was a family that had two sons. There sons were close in age and grew up as best friends. As they hit their later teen years they began to get competitive with each other and often got into fights and squabbles, particularly around Christmas. They didn’t know how to properly deal with their disagreements and so they would often go long periods of time without talking to each other.

One Christmas, after the brothers had been refusing to have anything to do with each other for several months, their father pleaded with them both to put aside their grudges and come home for Christmas. As they arrived things were a little tense but they managed to get through most of the day until at dinner something was said, no one remembers what, and the brothers refused to speak to each other for the rest of the day and first thing the next morning they went their separate ways and didn’t speak to each other until next Christmas.

Again the father compelled the boys to come home, again things were tense, again something was said, again it went unresolved, and again they want a full year without talking to each other. This became a pattern year after year.

Finally the father was fed up. He invited the boys home for Christmas and things progressed as usual. The morning after just as the boys were getting up early to leave the father grabbed them both and dragged them out in the backyard and said “I’m sick of this! It breaks my old heart to hear you yelling at each other and using such hurtful words. They say ‘sticks and stone may break my bones but words will never hurt me’ but that’s just not true. The words you have said to each other have caused wounds that will take far longer to heal than any cut, bruise, or scrape. So here are some boxing gloves, go at it and get it over with”

The brothers put on the gloves and pounded the ever loving tar out of each other. They beat each other mercilessly for what seemed like hours unleashing years of pent up hurt and frustration. Eventually, their fury exhausted and their hurt released, they fell to the blood soaked snow and hugged each other, forgave each other, and became the best of friends again.

Things carried on great for a year. The next Christmas as they were getting ready to leave their fathers home he took them out in the back yard and said. “Boys it’s been a wonderful year. You guys have gotten along well, and it has blessed my old heart. But I also know that over the course of a year things can be said and done, even unintentionally, that cause tension and strife in a relationship. Don’t take those hurts and pains into the new year. This year I’m handing you the gloves again so you can deal with those issues but this year it’s different, this year you will beat the slop out of each other not out of hate, but out of love and for the good of your relationship.

The boys threw down again that year and every year thereafter on the day after Christmas – Boxing Day. Some years it was just good natured sparing, other years it was a good old fashioned donnybrook, but they always dealt with their stuff, never held a grudge, never let anything come between them again, and lived the rest of their lives as the best of friends.

So this year, in the spirit of Boxing Day, take someone out in the backyard and lay a vicious beating on them because you love them and because that’s the true meaning of Boxing Day.

What’s new?

Well…

No More TV: We have canceled our cable service. We find that pretty much everything we watch is available on the networks websites with reduced commercials and we can watch it anywhere and usually anytime from the day after – two weeks later. We also find that this means we watch less TV and better TV because it makes us intentional about certain shows rather than just sitting down and channel surfing and the next thing you know it’s 3 hours of celebrity gossip and countdown shows later. As for the boys they are onto DVD’s from the library. This means we know exactly what they are watching and they aren’t subjected to advertising.

No More Home Phone: This hasn’t taken effect yet but we are getting rid of our land line and Kelly will be getting a cell phone (in fact she is on her way to the phone store as I type). We aren’t phone people… at all… and a cell is more convenient and just as cheap so why not have a mobile and why have both.

Classical Music: I have trying to get all cultured by listening to some classical music. I like some of it. I find a lot of it to be very stressful frankly. I think it gives me the same feeling my parents got the first time they heard loud guitar music. I absolutely hate opera. It gives me an immediate physiological stress reaction, increased heart rate, shallow breathing, the whole deal. I think singing opera is like getting a bunch of facial piercings. I respect the pain it took to get there but I have no clue what possessed you to want to do something like that in the first place. I like stuff with a lot of strings but not just busy high pitched violins. It’s like the classical equivalent of guitar shredding. (See above comment on opera singing.) I like stuff with strong melody and find stuff with a recurring theme to be really interesting. Mozart isn’t doing it for me but Bach and Beethoven have their good points, Handle is solid, and Elgar’s “Pomp and Circumstance” is just awesome.

Mondays Off: I have blogged about this recently so this is just an update to say so far I like it and I’m going to move it to an indefinite although not yet permanent status.

Christmas Eve Fluffernutters: Kelly and I want the boys to grow up with some christmas traditions that are unique to our family. I don’t mean that no one else anywhere does them but stuff more special than “we put up a tree.” The first one we introduced was the Christmas morning Epic Breakfast. Bacon, eggs, hash-browns, omelets, grapefruit, sausage, cereal, the whole deal. It’s awesome. This year we are introducing Christmas Eve Fluffernutters. Mmmmmmm fluffernutters!!!

So what’s new with you?

10 Thoughts on Preaching

1.) There are three kind of preachers, long, short, and good.

2.) You will either preach from passion or obligation. It’s very hard to preach well from obligation but if you are passionate you can always find a way to be good.

3.) Preaching in series allows you to be comprehensive and comprehensible. Cramming everything into one sermon makes you exhausting rather than exhaustive.

4.) When preparing a sermon on a topic phrase the topic in the form of a question. FInd a text you can ask that question to and then preach the answer it gives.

5.) Illustrating scripture with scripture teaches people more of the Word and helps them to see the truth as a theme throughout the Bible not just an anomaly in a particular passage.

6.) Preaching, like any other great venture, requires you to be both prepared in advance and focused in the moment. Past preparation without current focus is useless and current focus without past preparation is hollow. Make deliberate time for both.

7.) No matter what your text is preach it.

8.) To preach a passage clearly you have to understand it at a deeper level than you explain it.

9.) Preaching is leadership.

10.) Preaching is a big, weighty, and powerful thing. It’s also a lot of fun and that’s ok.