Our daughters, heavily influenced by Disney films are currently fascinated by the idea of knowing your true love. Sometimes they will ask me who my first girlfriend was. Then they will nod wisely and say “but mummy is your true love.” And they are right. 2 Corinthians 11:1-15 is all about discovering and staying faithful… Continue reading Staying true to your true love
Category: Preaching and Teaching
Until he comes (The last days and the last supper)
Sometimes accidental admin errors can be our best help in seeing what God might have to say to us. Through a bit of an admin error on my part in terms of planning out teaching I managed to give myself two whole chapters of Luke that I wouldn’t have naturally put together. Yet here we… Continue reading Until he comes (The last days and the last supper)
A walk through Exodus
Here’s something I put together giving an overview of the book of Exodus.
What has the last supper got to do with the last days?
This is my talk for church today. I should have been preaching in person but bad weather with snow and ice means that the school we use is unable to open. The sermon is an exposition of Luke 21-22
Home for Christmas Dinner
You can’t talk about “Home for Christmas” without talking about food can you? I associated Christmas growing up with home baking. Mum always protested that shop bought mince pies tasted too sweet whereas she could control the amount of filling that went into the ones she made. So home made mince pies were a tradition,… Continue reading Home for Christmas Dinner
Why that Christmas talk may have been more expository than you think
The other day I talked about breaking the Conservative Evangelical rule that every sermon has to be expository. Here is the paradox, you may have ended up being at least as if not more expository by relaxing the rule. I say potentially more expository first, because what happens when we try to force fit an… Continue reading Why that Christmas talk may have been more expository than you think
The forgotten objective of preaching and why it matters
I recently shared some notes setting out what I’m looking for from a preacher.. I suggested that we are looking for, in terms of content: I would suggest that in recent years, the emphasis has tended to be more and more on the first of these with a nod to the second. That to some… Continue reading The forgotten objective of preaching and why it matters
Preparing to preach at Christmas? … First break all the rules
Or at least two of them… One of my favourite books is by Marcus Buckingham and it’s called First Break All the Rules. It’s about how leaders are taught a whole load of conventions or rules but truly successful ones break those rules. In effect Buckingham is seeking to discover a better set of leadership… Continue reading Preparing to preach at Christmas? … First break all the rules
What am I looking out for when assessing preachers
One of my priorities is to train people for preaching and teaching. This also means that I get involved in assessing and offering feedback. Here’s what I’m looking out for. A. What the preacher knows Notes B. What the preacher communicates I’m focusing specifically on expository preaching. We need to remember that many people may… Continue reading What am I looking out for when assessing preachers
Make it visual
How do you engage visual learners and help them to remember what you have said in a sermon. Well, one obvious way is to use visual aids. That might be as simple as including some powerpoint slides with images. Generally speaking, I’m not a fan of PowerPoint in preaching. It risks asking people to dual… Continue reading Make it visual
Faithroots 