On an introductory page of our hymnal Evangelical Lutheran Worship is this comment: Preaching brings God’s word of law and gospel into our time and place to awaken and nourish faith.  Recently I have spent a lot of time thinking about that.

During my annual February continuing education sessions at Stetson University in Florida, one of the four presenters always is a noted Protestant preacher.  Each speaks not only of her/her method for sermon-writing, but also of the more general issues of preaching: applicability, faithfulness to the text, and timeliness.  These are matters which preachers do – or ought to – address on a weekly basis.

Like you, I’ve heard great sermons and gross ones; I surely have delivered some of each.  My brother’s Baptist pastor always started the Sunday sermon with a joke; unfortunately, that usually is the only thing the hearers remembered a few hours later, and that’s probably just as well.  Having heard Brother Bob preach, I wish he would have stopped at the joke because the God whom he subsequently described seldom was the one in whom I believe.

When I’m not preaching but actively listening to another person preach, I work at not second-guessing how the preacher is handling the text [avoiding the I would have done it this way and it would have been better! mentality] and try instead to appreciate what is being proclaimed about God who is love.

While reading the book Gilead for the ROPES Book Club gathering on April 18, I came across this passage which drew me to read it repeatedly:

A good sermon is one side of a passionate conversation.  It has to be heard in that way.  There are three parties to it… the self that yields the thought, the self that acknowledges and in some ways responds to the thought, and the Lord.  That is a remarkable thing to consider.

Do you think of the sermon as a conversation?  Do you feel it’s a lecture? Is it just some general guidance for daily living?  Does it stand alone or is it part of the whole service, along with the liturgy, the music, and the Eucharist?  These are important questions whose answers determine whether or not each of us “gets it” when the service ends.

Our hymnal provides this prayer for our use:

Almighty God, grant that your holy word which has been proclaimed this day may enter into our hearts through your grace, that it may produce in us the fruit of the Spirit for witness and service in the world and to the praise and honor of your name, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.  Amen

                                                                                                                                                                    Glen A. Sea, Senior Pastor

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