Preaching

I am currently writing a sermon for Sunday. Its got me thinking. In the early church it doesn't seem to say that anyone ever prepared a sermon, and when I look i see that some of the best sermons, like Peters at Pentecost, Steve just before he got stoned etc were not prepared sermons! They didn't spend hours sitting around working out what they were going to say.

In fact Paul said "My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit's power!" And he says if you ever get into boiling water then trust God and He will give you the words to say...

Then I see at uni, bible college, training college etc that preaching has to do with methods. It has to do with saying the right thing, being theologically correct.

it doesn't seem right to me. If good preaching is from a Spirit filled person, someone full of the power of God, then why don't our preaching classes look more like Pentecost and less like a boring uni class? Are we setting ourselves up for failure? i mean, who really listens to many sermons and remembers them during the week? How many "theologically correct university prepared" sermons have seen thousands of people saved compared to those who live in the Spirit? What are we aiming for? What are we expecting?

So, I believe that we do need good theology. We learn that, but when it comes to preaching I think we need to rely less on our methods and more on the power of God... As for me, I'm going back to write my sermon...