Some months ago the Correspondence section of this magazine carried a letter on the subject of sermon preparation and touched on such questions as: How long should a preacher spend on his preparation of the sermon? and, How does a young pastor go about this vital aspect of his work? It is evident from the response to that letter that there is widespread interest in the subject. We propose, therefore, not without some misgivings, to take up the theme now, especially with a view to offering some guidance to younger men in the work.

The preparing and delivering of sermons is the first and greatest public duty of the Christian minister. Consequently it must occupy the first place in his list of priorities. Many who read these pages will require no advice from us on the subject but will have long since developed a good working method of their own, which it would be no wish of ours to interfere with. However, even the experienced preacher will not resent a discussion of the subject because he, above all others, knows that it is an area where fresh ideas are always welcome and a theme on which the last word can never be said.

Something to Say⤒🔗

The first difficulty the preacher encounters — normally at the beginning of the week — is to find something to say. The itinerant preacher, or the occasional preacher, is under less pressure in this respect than the pastor of a congregation. The occasional preacher can always repeat what he has preached elsewhere. He can take his 'best' sermons with him as he goes round from place to place. But the settled pastor is under the continual constraint of having to prepare two or three fresh sermons each week. This is a highly exacting task and, especially in the early years of a man's ministry, it makes severe demands upon his mental and spiritual resources.

It might seem absurd to suggest that there is any difficulty for the preacher in finding something to say. After all, the whole compass of Scripture and theology is before him. Can he not simply select a theme more or less at random from the rich treasures of truth in God's Word? Certainly he can. But there are important limits upon the preacher's freedom to select his theme. For one thing, he must bear in mind the capacity, age, knowledge, maturity and spiritual condition of his hearers. If he does not do so, he will run the risk of being irrelevant. Then again, he must find some portion of truth which he is able to handle so that the souls of his people, and not merely their minds, are fed. Again, he must avoid being repetitive, dull or heavy. Good sermons are fresh as well as sound. They not only edify but also delight the hearer.

Finding 'something to say' is not automatically solved by adopting the method of consecutive exposition. The preacher who is preaching a series on Romans, let us say, or on the Psalms, is faced, just as other preachers are, with the need to transform the mass of possible comments on a portion of Scripture into a unified message which brings light and comfort to God's people today. It is at this point that the powers of a preacher's soul and mind are brought into fullest exercise. The agony of sermon preparation is the agony of getting the truth of a text into a form which the preacher can preach with excitement and which the people can grasp with delight. This phase of sermon composition makes immense demands on every faculty of the preacher. How he carries this part of his work off will be the index to his true strength and show whether he is exceptional, good or only ordinary. All that we can do to improve, therefore, at this level will repay rich dividends.

The theme of the sermon may come to the preacher in a great variety of ways. Normally it will come to his mind in the study or while engaged in theological reading. But it may also come, at least on occasion, at other times. It may be given to him while in prayer, while relaxing out of doors or even while he is asleep. Spurgeon somewhere speaks of this experience and compares it to a firm handshake. Scores of ideas pass through the mind and dozens of possible texts pass through the sieve of one's thoughts. But then one idea or one text grips the mind and it seizes the preacher like the handshake of a friend. That illustrates the experience perfectly. Once the seed-thought is present in his mind, the preacher may cry 'Eureka' and he must rush into the study to capture the main points at once on paper.

The preacher should never waste or let slip any important seed-thought or sermon-theme but should be in the habit of imprisoning it on paper like a fly in amber. He must, in this respect, learn from the great musicians and artists, who kept notebooks by their bed or in their coat for themes which occurred to them at random moments. Such themes can be developed in detail later.

The Sermon Outline←⤒🔗

Once the theme is determined on, the preacher's task now passes into a different phase. The search for a subject is over and a new inquiry begins: How is the theme to be opened out, developed and applied? In other words, the form of the sermon must now be decided on. As we stated earlier, this part of the work calls forth all a man's energies and gifts. It is probably at this stage that the preacher's mental concentration is at its greatest, since he is in the process of carrying out a piece of creative writing, of which virtually he and he alone is the author.

Men vary greatly in the way they go about this task of putting the theme into its form and structure as a sermon. Some will first consult commentaries; others go into a reverie of meditation; still others attempt to write the sermon down more or less as they hope to preach it in the pulpit. We suggest to brethren who still require guidance in the matter that they should try to find by experience the method which suits them best.

We are of the opinion that this period of mental gestation is the critical one and that the preacher must not normally allow himself to be interrupted at this stage, nor must he succumb to any temptation to relax his mind till at least the outline — though probably not the whole sermon — is safely down on paper. This task may not take longer than an hour. But it is a time in which mind and pen move with furious energy. When the outline is done, and the main ideas are sketched in, it is best to relax completely for a while before attempting to do any further mental work. It is not unusual for the preacher to feel quite drained, or even exhausted, as a result of his exertions at this stage. Creative work is exhilarating but it is also enervating.

In our opinion, the preacher should not feel obliged always to consult many books in the preparation of any particular sermon. There will, of course, be many times when he will have piles of volumes all round him on the study floor, each throwing some ray of light on the general subject which forms the subject of the sermon. But there will be other times when the preparation of the sermon makes less of a demand on the immediate and formal study of our books. No hard and fast rule in the matter can be laid down. All that we stress here is that no young preacher need feel qualms of conscience if he does not find he needs to consult a mountain of books in the course of preparing all his sermons.

It is assumed that the preacher we speak of is making a daily study of the Word of God and is in the regular habit of reading good theological books. Where these are the regular, disciplined habits of a man, it will often happen that his mind will be opened without any further assistance to see light in a text of Scripture and to perceive the various applications of the text for a particular pastoral situation. Such a man has his 'senses exercised to discern both good and evil' (Hebrews 5:14) and is 'a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth' (2 Timothy 2:15).

He will want to reassure himself, however, that he has understood the text correctly. But he need not necessarily feel obliged to read copiously on his general theme — at least, not while composing his own thoughts. One reason why he will not always make an exhaustive use of his library at this point is that his own ideas may be still only partly formed, and to consult another author would be to risk losing the originality of his own ideas.

The freshness of our own thoughts is spoiled if we become over­dependent on books at the creative period of our sermonising. Sermons may be cudgeled to death by the powerful minds of other writers whose comments run in different channels from our own. What we end up with may become no longer our own work but a dull sermon which 'smells of the lamp'. Allusions to the great writers of the past in our sermons may spoil their spontaneity and give them a 'second-hand' appearance. What we need, always assuming soundness of doctrine, is freshness and unction — what M'Cheyne terms 'beaten oil for the lamps of the sanctuary'. Perhaps no preacher has exceeded M'Cheyne in this respect.

The final product of this phase of our sermon preparation will be an outline or skeleton. This will consist of a small number of major headings, each one of which is further worked out into its appropriate sub-divisions, involving explanation, illustration and application. Doctrine must precede application and exhortation. Exhortation depends upon the point of doctrine being handled and is an aspect of its outworking in men's lives.

Too many preachers are content to state the doctrine in their text without applying it forcefully and directly to the minds of their hearers. The pronoun to use normally in exhortation is 'you' and not 'we', although the young preacher would do well to avoid adopting an Olympian tone, especially if his hearers are of maturer years. It is absurd for the pulpit novice to pretend to the level of authority which a Latimer or a Spurgeon had over men's minds. Even so, the preacher need not apologise for his boldness since he speaks in the Name of his Master and acts the part of Christ's ambassador.

The Content of the Sermon←⤒🔗

The substance of a sermon is applied theology or divinity. A sermon is not a lecture, which is an academic discourse addressed to men's minds. Nor is it a running commentary, which explains the sense of a passage of Scripture. Again, it is not a tirade, which consists of a sustained declamation or harangue. The sermon will contain elements of some, or all, of these forms of address. But its distinct form is different from them. It is a structured discourse by which truth is opened out in its proper sense and due application, in order to move men to God.

The sermon will present some point of doctrine but, in our considered judgment, the sermon should not attempt to teach theology simply. It should teach theology in its particular relevance and application to those who hear it. To take an example will help. The writer sadly remembers preaching a poor sermon many years ago on 'angels'. It went no further than to explain the various orders of the angels. That was a mistake. It was not a sermon at all but only a short lecture. To become a sermon, it needed to say how the angels minister to the people of God, how they have a place in redemption and how they are a source of encouragement and help to believers by their ministry. A good sermon does not simply state points of truth but it goes on to explain how truth relates to us here and now, and how it should therefore transform our present attitudes and our entire behaviour. Sermons must, however, contain doctrine and not degenerate into vague religious sentiment. It is strong doctrine which makes strong Christians and vibrant congregations. The Word of God presents us with a core of exalted theology. This theology must be implicit in all our preaching. However, it may not be always explicit in every sermon.

It is necessary to state that a sermon can only deal, as a rule, with one main subject if it is to have a forceful effect upon the minds of the hearers. A sermon is a unit of thought in which all the divisions, like the branches of a tree, come out of one central stem. The divisions must therefore consist of related aspects of the general theme. Most weak sermons are diffuse in their structure and range over a variety of subjects. A good discipline is to select the precise aspect of the text which one proposes to handle and to develop the subordinate parts of the skeleton to give particular thrust to the selected emphasis. The impact is therefore cumulative as the sermon is delivered.

Young preachers are apt to be unduly scrupulous about the degree to which they amplify and expand the main headings of a sermon. Every text of Scripture has many legitimate implications and inferences which it is not improper to touch on in the course of the sermon. A ready example is the text: 'Our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ' (1 John 1:3). The sermon will attempt to say what fellowship with God involves and how the soul has a distinct fellowship with each Person of the Godhead. There is no direct reference in this text to the Holy Spirit, but there is implied a distinct fellowship with Him also. This inference is proved to be correct by reference to 2 Corinthians 13:14: 'The communion of the Holy Ghost be with you'. In our view, it would not be desirable to attempt to preach from 1 John 1:3 without at least a brief reference to the believer's fellowship with the Holy Spirit. Exegetical scrupulosity is an unwelcome bondage to speaker and hearer alike.

A good sermon needs to have richness and fulness. It should be meaty and, in over-all effect, profound. At the same time it must be presented simply so that the uneducated hearer can understand it. Good sermons make good listeners, and among the best listeners to good sermons are always those who have no formal education but are spiritual, and so value the 'deep things of God.'

It is better that the preacher should preach a sermon which is 'too good' rather than too menial. A spiritual congregation especially will value sermons which stretch the mind and soul rather than sermons which are well beneath its capacity. But that is not the same as saying we should ever preach over people's heads. A great sermon lifts the hearer from earth to heaven. It makes time seem short and eternity long. It makes this world small and God big. It makes unbelief and sin appear criminal and faith in Christ all-important.

The Delivery of the Sermon←⤒🔗

Though this aspect of our theme takes us rather beyond our title, it would be absurd to say nothing about it as, in a sense, it is all that matters. After all, the most perfectly outlined sermon is nothing till it is made alive by the voice, soul and personality of the preacher. It remains a sheet of written notes till the conviction and the passion of the living speaker give it audible existence and articulation.

It is assumed that the speaker will study to be clear and interesting, that he will present his ideas in an orderly manner and that he will come prayerfully and with deep seriousness into the pulpit. But something more is required. The delivery of a sermon appears to us to demand a special action, force and energy on the preacher's part. This is not an act which he 'puts on', but is the natural overflowing of the sanctified passion and earnestness which he feels towards the subject of his sermon and also towards the spiritual good of his hearers.

Whilst this earnestness and energy cannot be 'put on', it can be and ought to be the subject of careful attention by the preacher. All his previous preparations in secret are like the winding up of the mainspring in a clock. Once the sermon is under way, all his inward powers are called into play and they express themselves in a vigorous delivery of the substance of his prepared address. There must be no dullness or dreariness. Let the preacher stir himself up and 'lift up his voice like a trumpet' (Isaiah 58:1). In Baxter's immortal phrase, he is to 'preach as a dying man to dying men.'

There is nothing so glorious on earth as the preacher's work. Who can say what would happen if we all improved?