It's a common feature in churches today. It goes like this: You do a series (usually 4 weeks) on a topic. The topic is often some contemporary felt need of the congregation, Marriage, Finances, Raising Kids etc.. Many church growth experts even advise pastors to select attractional topics durng key growth times of year like the Fall and the weeks after Easter. The topic is broken into four subsections, one for each week. Depending on your style, each subtopic has a text or several texts to back your point for that week.
Although it's a valid approach to preaching, and one I have utilized frequently over the years, I have always struggled with it. First of all, I suck at the contemporary-how-to-have-a-better-family-life sermon series. While useful, I am not entirely sure this type of sermon qualifies as the "preaching event" Craddock described. It seems more appropriate for a seminar setting. Anyway, my marriage advice to couples usually falls into the category of telling one or both parties to simply stop being an ass.
Whenever I have put together a sermon series around a topic, I sense that I am struggling against the message of the selected texts. It is almost as if I am twisting them and bending them to fit into the meta-topic of the series. Is it possible that this segmented category and sub-category is a modern structure that we are imposing on texts that have no such structure?
Furthermore, I have always been disappointed with my resulting sermons when I take this approach. They never quite seem to have the orignality or depth I was seeking. It seems I always get better feedback from my inner critic, as well as the community, when I start with the text and follow it to wherever it leads.
This month I'm preaching from Amos. A meta-theme may or may not emerge from the text. Chances are, I will probably think of it the last week and say, "Oh I should have called this series _______" In any case, I have made a commitment to let each week's theme organically emerge from Amos and not shoe-horn Amos into my own pre-determined categories.
We'll see how it goes. Following Amos, the first week will be about the consequences of violence. Should be interesting as we approach the increasingly violent imagery of Halloween.
Comments