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Adequate sermon preparation
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Walter Burghardt, noted Catholic theologian, stated: 'It takes me sixty or seventy hours to shape a fifteen-minute homily. But, I assure you, the results outstrip the price.'
While I don't doubt that 60-70 hours in sermon preparation pay off, I've never had that much time to spend in preparing a sermon. Do you? That's nearly two full-time jobs when you consider a 40 hour work week. That's a lot of time.
I know a lot of pastors, and I can't think of one off the top of my head who could realistically put that much time into preparing a message one to three times a week. Pastors have many other responsibilities besides preaching. I do sometimes wonder, though, if we're putting enough time into preparing for our messages. Too many sermons we hear sound shallow and cheap.
After all, when a minister called of God preaches, she or he is delivering a message from the Lord to His people. As such, it's imperative that we study His Word to see what He has said about the topic. And for the topic to be real to us, so we can make it real to others, we must spend time with Him in prayer as well.
While we may not feel able to devote as much time to sermon preparation as we'd like to because of other time commitments, we do need to give enough time to the task to ensure that God's word is faithfully and coherently delivered. I'm sure it's your goal as well as mine to study to show yourself approved as a worker who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth. (2 Timothy 2:15)
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