Preachers should be eager to present biblical narratives, as they comprise about 40% of the pages of Scripture and are presented in a storytelling form that is universally interesting. They also have the appeal of being less direct—that is, less “preachy”—which appeals to many younger hearers. Narratives, though, are also hard to interpret. They do…

This is a guest post Scott Magdalein, the founder of TrainedUp and a pastor in Jacksonville, Florida We all trust in things every day. We trust that a chair will hold us or that our car will start. We trust a spouse to wake us up from a nap on time or a friend to pick…

Perhaps in your preaching ministry, you have been working your way through a book of the Bible or preaching from a lectionary, and the next passage you come to isn’t as exciting, interesting, or easily applicable as other passages of Scripture. You may not come across these sorts of texts often—but when you do, they…

I was recently asked if preaching is just another way of saying “teaching.” Implicit in this question is a deeper matter pointing to the content, character, and purpose of proclamation in the life and mission of the church. In conversations around this topic, I am often told by others that their church doesn’t have “sermons”…

Have you heard the joke about the stuttering Bible salesman? (The punchline: He sells so many by asking his clients, “Do you want to buy a Bible, or should I read it to you?”) I have—and it is cringe-worthy. One time, I even heard a preacher tell the joke to open his message. Though there…

As a teenager, I once sat through a conference session in which the primary speaker stressed how it was better to be an unrepentant, sin-loving pagan of a person than to be a Christian who waffled back and forth between pursuing holiness and imbibing worldliness. His justification for this stance was the letter to Laodicea…

Articles on preaching blogs like this one commonly focus on how to develop meaningful content that your parishioners or audience will benefit from learning. Once you have developed theologically sound content, though, you face a different set of choices about how to deliver that content—and one of those choices that often gets overlooked is that…

In his letter to Timothy, Paul admonishes his young mentee to give his life to “rightly handling the word of truth” (2 Tim 2:15, ESV). There are surely many layers and nuances to what Paul means by this phrase, but one point is clear: this “word of truth” must be read and presented with clarity. Rightly…

There’s something ancient about preaching. As preachers, the centerpiece of our work is a 2000-year-old book. But there’s also something about preaching that’s undeniably contemporary. We lead people marked by 21st-century tensions. The preacher’s task is therefore doubly daunting: Faithfully handle an ancient text, and then teach it in a way that’s accessible to a…

Sermonary has a simple goal: We want to help preachers write sermons more effectively and efficiently. One way we’re doing this is through our brand new web platform, which we created as a handy resource for sermon construction, delivery, and storage. It’s clean. It’s customizable. It’s intuitive. And it’s designed by preachers, with preachers in…