Sermon Preparation Check List
From Expository Preaching, Pastor Alex Montoya Jay Wegter, Editor
Preaching is holy persuasion. It is not the recitation of a running commentary on the text. Therefore, it is advisable to run a check during your sermon preparation to ensure that you are employing the elements of persuasion.
- Persuasion
is essential if we are preaching to change lives. Craft your message as if a court is listening; as if the listeners have their arms crossed while their minds are silently saying, “Why should I change?”
Show them why they are wrong. Make it clear why they should stop doing certain behaviors and begin doing what God requires. To assist in writing so as to persuade, make a table. On the left side, list what the Word of God requires. On the right side, list the resistances to obedience (excuses, consequences, lost benefits). Use your own heart as a reference for the table! (Your message will resonate with authenticity as a result.)
You are to challenge people to abandon existing beliefs, values, and systems, and adopt new ones. In order to persuade effectively, you must begin with the presupposition that every man has the defect addressed in your text, and that he needs this passage to overcome it.
The less biblical your listeners are, the more persuasion they will need. Utilize variety in your message, plan to pull your audience back numerous times to the truth you are unfolding. If your presentation is too smooth and unvaried, it gives the listener an excuse to drift. Stop and tell a personal story that demonstrates the truth being preached. Provide an illustration that drives your point home with humor. Ask a question, dramatize, insert a poignant pause. These provide the needed variety that will extend your listener’s attention span.
- Personalize
your
proposition
in order to drive home the
relevancy of your text. Frame the proposition as a form of counseling (all preaching is counseling). Ask yourself, “What problem is being solved by means of the sermon?”
Your job is to pull in your listeners. “Today we will look at three critical areas of obedience which God requires of every believer. The benefits are . . . . When you begin to view obedience in this way, it will revolutionize your walk with the Lord.”
The truth you are unfolding has a precise ethical responsibility that is annexed to it. You must design your proposition so that the obedience God requires is seen to be inseparable from the truth. What is the expected change in the listener? You must be able to answer that question, BEFORE you write your sermon.
Your introduction ought to whet the appetite of the listeners for the spiritual meal you are about to serve. The introduction resembles an appetizer that precedes that whole meal. In the introduction, you will establish the need for what you are about to preach. By the time you finish preaching your introduction and proposition, your audience ought to be saying to themselves, “This sermon is exactly what I need.”
- Application
must address the mind, the heart, and the will. When you preach for change, you must address the whole man; seek to reach all of his cognitive faculties. There is a logical progression that terminates in an act of the will. Notice the facets of the inner man that are engaged prior to an act of the will: reason, conscience, imagination, emotions, will. Our temptation is to “leapfrog” into the sermon without carefully laying the groundwork of how we will appeal to the mind, the heart, and then the will.
Your listeners are far more likely to internalize the message and act upon it if you realistically lay out the demands and difficulties of obeying the truth communicated. Anticipate the inner areas of resistance to the obedience enjoined. Disarm their objections by preaching upon the benefits and consequences of obedience and disobedience.
You must address their thinking before you attempt to direct their steps. Biblical action calls for biblical thinking. The intent and direction of the passage contains the divine logic for obedience. Don’t underestimate the value of the reasoning of the biblical author – the biblical logic for obedience will be recalled by the listener when it comes time to obey.
The inspired logic in the text is an essential part of the believer’s motivation to obey. Without employing the logic for obedience found in the context, we are left with bare principles, the preaching of which seldom rises above “be good” sermons.
When planning application, unpack the “hot” words found in the text. Not only will this enrich the sermon, but it also heightens the listener’s perception of the infallibility of Scripture. God’s authority comes through in our preaching when we display the reasoning of the biblical authors in their precise choice of words. “When God chose this word, this is exactly what He wanted to say to you.”
When making application, remember that man’s heart is incurably legalistic. God preempts legal working and excuses for disobedience by stressing that the believer’s acceptance before God rests solely upon Christ’s imputed righteousness. (Those who attempt to justify their lack of effort by saying that they can never measure up need to hear the message of grace in Christ. Those who seek to win God’s favor by obedience also need to hear the word of justification by grace as well.)
- Passion is essential in your conclusion if it is to be biblical. Our task is to reorient the mental patterns of our listeners so that they form habits of thinking biblically. The conclusion of the sermon must be as powerful and memorable as the introduction. As Al Martin notes, the preacher must fasten the truth in the hearer’s mind like Sisera’s skull was nailed to the ground – with a tent peg through both temples.
The minister’s own experience with the truth he is preaching is absolutely essential to passion. Bring your message as God has “wired you.” In other words, deliver your soul. In order to preach for change, you have to be authentic and compelling, not witty or contrived.
Your conclusion ought to make good use of emotion and imagery. Illustrations that reach the heart serve as “emotional Velcro” to fasten the truth to the mind of the hearer.
It is a sinful disservice to unfold the truth but withhold the burden of obedience found in the text. We must preach the burden of the text. What do you want your hearers to think? Do? Change? Consider? Remember, the purpose of knowledge is conduct.
As a consequence, there should be an appeal directed at your listeners. The appeal should be vested with the preceptive will of God for your listeners. In the appeal, you should make them know that they
are accountable to God for what they have heard.
Your passion is in keeping with the fact that you have not preached your opinion, insights, or views, but you have exposited the Word of God. Therefore, the sermon is not for casual consideration, nor is it presenting an optional opinion. The sermon is nothing less than confrontation with Almighty God. It is a crossroads or turning point in the life of the hearer. The response cannot be neutral – it is repentance and obedience, or impenitence.
- Exaltation
of God as the Author of the truth you are preaching is indispensable if you are to be theocentric in your preaching. God Almighty is the “Hero” of every text. All ethical responsibility must be anchored in God and His truth. In our haste to make principles clear and compelling, we must not fail in connecting the burden of the text to the character of God.
The challenge of obedience always comes back to “God’s way versus my way.” We must impress upon our listeners that they are to know and worship Him as the God who guards them, perfects them, and makes them happy by means of His holiness imputed and imparted.
To the degree that we love, revere and trust God, we will obey Him. When we call our listeners to repent and obey, we are literally exhorting our listeners to love and trust God more than they do themselves.
Our Creator and Redeemer is infinitely wise and caring when He sets before us His commands, promises, and warnings. As the book of Deuteronomy reiterates, “For it is not an idle word for you; indeed it is your life . . .” (Deut 32:47a). “I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live, you and your descendants, by loving the Lord your God, by obeying His voice, and by holding fast to Him. . .” (Deut 30:19, 20a).