Hom Helps
6 Tips for Preaching a New Structure
I forgot how uncomfortable it can be to test-drive a sermon structure you’ve never used before. Before you buckle up and take a new design out for a spin, here are some tips to get you–and your hearers–home safely. 1. Keep Your Goal in Mind I find the best way to use sermon structures effectively […]
My Prodigal Father: A Story to Upset the World
by Michael Zeigler, Pastor, Epiphany Lutheran Church, St. Louis, MO In Luke 15 Jesus tells the story of a prodigious, extravagant, reckless, and—in the eyes of some—wasteful father. Of course, the story itself is fictitious; as Jesus was inclined to do, the Lord just made it up. Nevertheless, this story has the ring of truth. […]
Avoiding The Lutheran Meat Grinder
By Justin Rossow The proper division of Law and Gospel is one of the essential elements of Lutheran theology, and therefore of Lutheran preaching. But when good theology gets turned into rote practice, the result can be hazardous to your spiritual health. You can get a handle on the definitions of Law and Gospel relatively […]
Retooling Your Sermon Development
By Justin Rossow Introduction: Retooling Your Preaching, Part 1 This fall I got to spend a couple of days at beautiful Camp Arcadia with deacons in the Michigan District for their annual retreat. We had a great time talking about preaching and exploring different tools that serve faithful proclamation. This blog series on Retooling Your Preaching is […]
The 7 Tools for Development in Action
By Justin Rossow When we preach, we make decision about how we are going to spend our time in the pulpit. Consciously or not, we choose how we are going to help the hearer create meaning out of the sermon. If you would like to be more intentional about how you shape the “moments of meditation” […]
How Speaking of Jesus Changed My Preaching
Speaking of Jesus: The Art of NOT Evangelism isn’t intended to be a book on preaching. It’s a book about the primary ways we interact with people who don’t know Jesus. So it’s a book about evangelism, or, as the subtitle suggests, a book about NOT doing evangelism the way we used to. As I read […]
How Metaphor Theory can Structure a Sermon
1) Explore the Source Domain Metaphor works by mapping relationships, characteristics, and inference patterns from the Source Domain to the Target Domain. By introducing elements of the Source Domain at the beginning of the sermon, the preacher does two things. First, evoking some key features of the Source Domain causes the hearers to bring […]
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