Five Advantages for Planning and Preaching Message Series
Legendary golf coach Harvey Penick encouraged his students to “take the advantage” of gripping the club a certain way. The psychology behind the suggestion is that there is an advantage to taking a certain approach and one wouldn’t want to miss out on the benefits of the technique. Bivocational pastors are hard pressed for quality study and message preparation times. As a bivocational pastor, a technique I have taken advantage of is planning and preaching in series of three to six messages at a time.
Here are five advantages I’ve taken:
1. More efficient use of study time within a given text.
When preaching several messages from a chapter or book, once the historical setting and
context is determined, that setting applies to all the messages in the series. By keeping several messages within a given biblical time and place, new settings need not be discovered each week. Exegetical work for a series may take longer than for a single message, but the dovetailing effect will multiply the preparer’s efforts.
2. Value of repetition
A series brings with it the benefit of being able to preview upcoming messages and review past ones. The theme of the series is repeated several times thus increasing the hearers’ potential for reception and retention.
3. Narrowing of categories for anecdotes and illustration searches
A pastor who knows what is coming next is always closer to finding compelling metaphors and stories to illustrate his text than one who is preparing to preach week to week. This approach also lessens the chances of finding a good illustration and building a message around it as it is thematically driven rather than deadline driven.
4. Ease of use for long-range sermon planning
Since message series are now the focus of preparation rather than individual messages, it is easier to forecast for the next quarter and year with seven to twelve themes or texts rather than planning down to the day what is needed. Special events, vacations, holidays become punctuations and pauses between message series.
5. Integration with materials for small group discussion and devotional experiences
LifeWay Christian Resources has a number of several session small group studies that would coincide well with a message series:
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Gripped by the Greatness of God (attributes of God)
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Putting on the Armor: Equipped and Deployed for Spiritual Warfare, (spiritual warfare)
The series has the potential to be a shared journey or an event for the congregation. The pastor’s sermon may be planned as a lead in for additional interaction in small group studies and personal reflection in daily quiet times
This fall, I’ll be preaching from Ecclesiastes, the Sermon on the Mount, and Romans 6-8. Armed with this advantage, I am already collecting the commentaries, articles and illustrations needed to use my precious study time to its fullest and to make the maximum impact for life change in my audience.
Clint Calvert is the Church Health Director for the Minnesota-Wisconsin Baptist Convention in Rochester, Minnesota.
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