PreacherMan's "Aha!" Moment

Today's big project was to outline and write a draft of my sermon for this coming Sunday.  My text is John 5:1-9, and being the first Sunday in September it marks the beginning of my sixth year as a preacher. There is someone here in town who knows me a bit. I don’t know if he knows my name, because he always calls me PreacherMan, but I don’t mind, as it makes for what I think to be an honorable nickname.

Five full years in the pulpit means something on the order of 250+ sermons. I'm supposed to get four Sunday's off a year, so that would make a bit fewer than 250, but I've also done 52 funerals, and so that increases the number. There is a saying that it takes 100 sermons for a person to figure out what they are doing in the pulpit, and I think in my case it was quite a bit more than that.

Preaching is a task that I approach with a method, although my method is not static and is continually being adjusted.  Some of those adjustments come in a moment of insight, and some come more deliberately, as I read preaching books and magazines, attend preaching workshops, and learn from a variety of online resources.

All of which is to say that today, while I was pretty far along on next Sunday's sermon, I had an "Aha!" moment. In that moment it occurred to me that Pastor Brad, aka PreacherMan, has a basic sermon, which is this:

• ·         People are sinners
• ·         There is a Savior
• ·         Know this Savior as your savior

Things vary a bit at this point, depending on the text and/or circumstances, generally being either:

• ·         Serve this Savior, or
• ·         Find comfort and peace in this Savior

So, there you have it. Not saying that your preacher should pass through the same places I do time after time, but as I think about it and think of what some of the really outstanding preachers I've had the chance to learn from over the past five years consistently and persistently do, I'll take it. And may God be glorified in the proclamation of His word.

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.