The Preacher's Study Ezine Archive

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(Editor's note: The material in this Ezine is copyrighted. Reprint by author's permission only. You may forward it in its entirety to friends and associates. Please do not cut the articles out and paste them into other documents or publications.)
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PRESSED FOR SERMON PREPARATION TIME? Struggling with writer's block? Want to put some new energy into your preaching and improve your presentation of God's Word? It isn't easy to compete for the attention of today's media saturated people. We need all the help we can get. Besides encouraging you to read the content of this ezine, I invite you to visit and subscribe to The Preacher's Study Premium Website. You'll find over 200 interestingly outlined, illustration packed, full-text contemporary sermons along with many other items that you can use in your preaching. There is a free section and a "Premium" section. The latter is accessed by a password you may purchase for a small annual fee. While it's fresh on your mind, why
not click on over?

http://preacherstudy.com

Also check out the sermon samples at:

http://preacherstudy.com/sample.htm

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IN THIS ISSUE:

[1] Greetings from the Editor

[2] Featured Article:

[3] Preacher's Study Website Updates

[4] Contact Info

[5] Easy Subscribe/Unsubscribe Instructions

[6] Copyright Info
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[1] ***Greetings from the Editor


Greetings friends. Welcome! A special welcome to new subscribers.

Feel free to pass this ezine along, in its entirety, to friends and
colleagues if you find it helpful.

Summer is here and I suspect many of you will be preaching at camps, rallies, retreats and the like. I'll be in and out of my office for the next three months with various speaking opportunities. Thank God for the matchless privilege of preaching for Him!

I plan to keep up the ezine publishing schedule through the summer. Barring some unforseen event messing up the plans, I hope to be in your mailbox twice a month for the duration. Thanks for allowing me to be a small part of your preaching life. I value the opinions you share with me when you write.

May God bless all of your efforts for him this summer.

Dave Redick
editor@preacherstudy.com


[2] ***Featured Article

"GETTING SERMONS DONE: Maximizing Your Sermon Preparation Time" - Part 2 of 2

In the first half of this article I spoke to you of the difference in
attitude that develops when the week's sermon is done and ready to preach. I suggested three things that can contribute to that happy state:

***This One Thing I Do (Making preaching your priority)

***Leaky Cisterns and Bags with Holes (Dealing with time wasting)

***Firmly Planted by Streams of Water (Staying on task by staying in your chair)

To view the last issue which contains the article, go to:

http://preacherstudy.com/ezine17.htm

Here are two more suggestions:

***Clear Your Mind - Clear the Deck

I hate hypocrisy whenever I see it. Especially when the hypocrite is me.

I want to say something here about clean desks and uncluttered minds. That's certainly what many of the efficiency experts speak of in their books. Whenever I manage to accomplish it, I find I'm in full agreement with them.

The trouble is, at the moment, the only clear place on my desk is the screen I'm looking at. Looking again, I notice that even the monitor has two Post-it Notes stuck to the right side and someone's business card taped on down at the bottom. Also present in the vicinity is this morning's empty yogurt carton, a stack of papers screaming to be sorted, a couple of cassette tapes waiting to be delivered to an absentee from the services last week, an unlabeled diskette... AAK! I'll spare you any further details. Please don't drop by today for a visit.

Look around your own desk. If the verdict is "guilty," keep reading.

If you already have a system for putting things in order that works for you, use it. If not, here's what helps me. Think in categories. It makes a huge task manageable.

1. Get rid of all the miscellaneous junk that should be thrown away. (That yogurt carton!)

2. Set a box beside the door of your office for things that need to be returned or delivered.

3. Make a single pile of all your papers then go through them, making generous use of your round file (wastebasket). Divide  what remains into four categories:

*Immediate action
*Low or no priority
*Pending
*Reading Material

4. Put the immediate action items right in the middle of your desk. File the reading material on a shelf (or have someone else do it for you.) Put low or no priority items in a stack in the corner somewhere (they might just die there in the pile, which would probably be to your benefit.) Put pending items in a drawer of your desk.

Feeling better? I am. Even writing about it makes me feel better. Repeat as often as necessary. You don't have to change your lifestyle all at once. Just clean up after yourself. It will make preparation time more pleasant and sooth your cluttered mind.

***Rewards and Punishments

Well actually, just rewards.

I spoke in the last issue about time-wasters, those fun things that are in the vicinity of your workspace that beckon and distract. They can be enemies or they can be friends. Make them your friends.

Break up your prep time into intervals. Do what works for you, but I do well with 2 hour intervals with a 15 minute break at the end. The 15 minutes is a reward for staying on task. For me the reward might be surfing the web, returning a personal email, or browsing a magazine article. You might take a walk or a quick shower. I find that it is easier to keep myself motivated when I have self-imposed rewards for jobs well done.

I like both micro and macro rewards. The little rewards are in the last paragraph. The biggest reward I offer myself is for completing my sermon on time. Finishing, of course, is a reward in itself. (Having to stay up late Saturday night is a fitting punishment also.) But a victory trip to the ice-cream shop with one of the grandsons or a drive to browse a couple of hours at the local bookstore makes the victory even sweeter. "Well done, good and faithful... ."

There are many things you can learn by gleaning from others. Perhaps you've picked up something useful from this series. Maybe you have something you'd like to share with me. Drop me an email if you have something you use that works.


Copyright (c) Dave Redick, The Preacher's Study, 2000. All Rights Reserved. Reprint by permission only. Please do not cut articles out of this ezine and paste them anywhere else without permission. You may, however, forward this entire Ezine to friends freely.

[3] ***Preacher's Study Website Updates

Two messages were added to our website for Father's Day. Since Dads must also father the other 364 days of the year, these messages could serve other occasions during the preaching year.

The latest message from the Abraham series has been added. It is number 5 in the "Abraham the Believer" series. This message is called, "Returning to God." It is based on Genesis 13:1-18. View it, if you have Premium access, at:

http://preacherstudy.com/premium/abraham5.html

You must have Premium Access to view these and most of the the other sermons on the site. For information on how to become a Premium Subscriber, go to:

http://preacherstudy.com/subinfo.htm

For free sample sermons, go to:

http://preacherstudy.com/sample.htm


[4] ***Contact Info

The Preacher's Study Website & Ezine
http://preacherstudy.com
"Energize Your Preaching"
Owner: Dave Redick
Email: editor@preacherstudy.com
To subscribe to this Ezine go to:
http://preacherstudy.com/maillist.htm
Back issues available at:
http://preacherstudy.com/bkissue.htm
US Mail:
The Preacher's Study
1470 Westwood Lane
Sweet Home, OR 97386


[5] *=*Easy Subscribe/Unsubscribe Instructions

To subscribe or unsubscribe to this free ezine, go to the following web page:

http://preacherstudy.com/maillist.htm

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or
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[6] *=*Copyright Info

The material in this Ezine is copyright (c) 2000 by The Preacher's Study. Reprint articles by permission only. Please do not cut and paste this material into any other documents. You may, however, forward the email version to friends and associates.