Symposium ‘06 3
From Kent Hendricks, cross-posted with his personal blog:
Some snippets from Mary Hulst’s session this morning at Symposium on preaching…
“Bring the stuff from the week into the pulpit. If you don’t, you’re not connecting your pastoring with your preaching. We can all preach sermons and we preach them as guests and we preach them at Symposium, but your congregation needs something that’s written for them, not something you can use at any church at any time you want. They need to hear that you’ve got their hearts and lives and minds in your heart and life and mind.”
“[Preaching] takes humility, it takes vulnerability, and these are things we preachers are not good at. We went into this profession knowing we would stand in front of hundreds of people who had to listen what we had to say. Humility is not our strength. We need to learn how to go to people and ask, How can I be a better preacher? Can you help me?”
“Pray about and for your parishoners during the sermon writing process. What do they need to hear? Think about seventh graders, think about young moms, think about the people in your office in the last few weeks. Be in prayer for them.”
“Weave the images of I-pods and Nintendo’s with AARP and aching joints so that everybody knows that this sermon is for them.”
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