Like most people on Facebook, I have many worlds colliding. I have friends from different circles of my life all in one space. I have friends who I have made since I’ve come to Christian faith and I have friends from before I came to Christian faith.
I was interested to find out what people from these different worlds thought of the royal wedding, especially what they thought about the role of the church in the wedding. (more…)
I love preaching and in pastoral ministry I gave myself to it. It is the primary sense of God’s call on my life. But having been out of weekly preaching for a little while, I’m now wondering aloud if preaching is bad for your health?
Preaching every week is a demanding calling. For me, despite my love for it, preaching was often bad for my health. At the worst of times it became a robber. I allowed it to rob me of health, sleep and sanity and I allowed it to rob my family of a husband and a dad. While some of the conspiring factors are unique to my own weaknesses, I think some of the conspiring factors are common to those engaged in weekly preaching.
My rhythms for preaching quickly became unhealthy because of my perfectionist tendencies and my need to please others. My rhythms for the preaching task fitted in around the rest of the busy ministry life. I was diligent in study during the week, giving my best time to sermon preparation. After all I had the responsibility to proclaim the Word of God. Also, preaching is a public setting, and who wants to fail in a public setting? I worked hard at exegesis. I worked hard at understanding deep culture and engaging the contemporary world in creative ways. I read widely and listened well. I was way too diligent. I love input, and was always looking for more. Books grew around me like a virus (piles found all over the house). I always thought, ‘just one more’ (book or journal article or online resource) would give me that magical insight.
By Friday I had a mountain of work I’d done on the sermon, but the clouds were always gathering. To put a spin on Campolo’s line – it might have been Friday but Sunday’s a-comin’. Saturdays were most often spent on sermons. If I wasn’t working on it, I was wishing that I could. I might have been playing with my children but I was thinking about my sermon. On the weekend I was present but not really present. We came to describe the weekend as always ‘overcast’ – the sermon hovered over my head and dominated the skyline. Out of anxiety, I’d work late into the night on Saturday tweaking, re-tweaking and re-re-tweaking (read – obsessing over it). On Sunday I’d get up early and get down to church, preach twice, linger around church until about 1pm, go home eat lunch and then the crash would come. By 2pm on Sunday afternoon the quaterzol, adrenaline and stress hormones would drop and I would hit the wall. Just when my family thought I would finally be available for them, I had to go to bed from exhaustion. I would emerge from bed by 4pm still exhausted but knowing that we needed to do something together (often attend a social church event). By now, I’d start to worry and feel guilty that I might have offended someone in my sermon – especially if someone had made a “helpful” comment. On Monday, my day off, I’d be starting to feel better (often I was still recovering) but my eldest daughter had to go to school. Then on Tuesday I’d go and do it all again.
Obviously I’m describing the worst of times, and obviously I had weaknesses to face. Nonetheless, without naming these things well and developing strategies, preaching can be hazardous to your health. I’d love to hear, has preaching been hazardous for your health? And, how do structure your preaching ministry to ensure that you care for those God has first given to you – God, self, your family and friends?
* * *
Andrew Picard is…
This blog, and the people connected to it, are rightly committed to biblical preaching. My question is what do we mean by ‘biblical preaching’? We all acknowledge that this means engaging seriously with scripture and allowing that engagement to shape the direction and contours of the sermon. However, is that all that constitutes biblical preaching? (more…)
Language is a slippery thing, often failing to capture exactly what we want to say. However, language does carry and make meaning. As I’ve preached in various churches lately, I’ve noticed a slippage in our language about preaching. We’ve become very nervous about using the word ‘preaching’. I’ve noticed more and more people speak about “talks” rather than preaching – “thank you for your talk”, “are you doing the talk today?” (more…)
