What shall I preach about this Sunday?

In our early life as pastors, my wife and I had this thing going every week, usually midweek. I would ask her, “What shall I preach about this Sunday?” and she would give the standard reply… “Preach about God and about 20 minutes!” Ah, those were the days! Some of the preachers and leaders reading this still go through it every week. And it is not much different from “What shall I put on the Home Page next?”

It was a hard life being a Pentecostal pastor. If we had been ministers of a traditional denomination, like Lutheran or Anglican, the Revised Common Lectionary put out by the church would determine the scripture passages to be read the coming Sunday and give some indication of what to preach about. If the denomination did not have a lectionary, like evangelical Christians perhaps of Baptist or Holiness background, it was up to the minister to decide, and the majority would turn to some source like the popular Pastor’s Annual or the Ministers Manual (providing two Sunday sermons and one midweek teaching for every week of the year) or purchase one of hundreds of books of sermon outlines. Others might subscribe to a magazine like the Sermon Builder or Preaching (all this is true; I have been there and done that!). Some would delight in presenting series, which meant you only have the problem of “what next” four or five times a year. Other more honest preachers, like G. Campbell Morgan or Martin Lloyd-Jones, would preach through a book of the Bible or follow the life of a biblical character for however long it took.

However, being Pentecostal pastors, it was expected that we had “heard from heaven” and the Holy Spirit had led us to preach on that particular subject that Sunday. To some, scholarship and study were not the criteria and the pastor should just open his mouth and God will fill it, giving him the words to speak. And yes, they had a verse for that! So, have you ever wondered how your pastor or teacher came up with that sermon or teaching from last Sunday?

The major example the Christian church has is found in the Acts of the Apostles, backed up by the epistles to the churches and personal epistles written during the same time-frame. The preachers and teachers of that day were “generic New Testament Christians”, as I term the audience for our ministry in the footer of emails I write. You might wonder if there are any other kind of Christians. Unfortunately, many prefer to live and think in Old Testament terms and who struggle and strain over statements not meant for them.

The word “preached” is used 20 times in the KJV of Acts, “preach” 7 times, “proclaim” 5 times, and the word “taught” 8 times and “teach” 5 times. We can get some light from these verses. We have Peter’s sermon on the Day of Pentecost (3,000 believed), and his sermon following the healing of the lame man at the temple gate (5,000 believed). Remember, the Jewish faith was the predominant religion of the day in Israel, and we can see from Acts 4:1-2 that the major problem the priests had with this new movement was “because they were teaching the people and preached through Jesus the resurrection from the dead.”

Peter and John were arrested and so Peter got the opportunity to preach to the chief priest and the whole synod of priests! After they were let go, we read, “And with great power the apostles gave witness to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus: and great grace was upon them all” (Acts 4:33). “And daily in the temple, and in every house, they ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ” (Acts 5:42). After Saul’s persecution of Stephen, believers were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria, “Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word” (Acts 8:4). They did not preach about Daniel and coming events, they did not teach that this was the year of “breakthrough,” they did not teach that if you gave $24 you could have the blessing of Acts 2:4. No, the “word” they taught was the resurrection of Christ and that Jesus was the Christ. Paul later ministered on his journeys and when he came to Athens “he preached to them Jesus and the resurrection” (Acts 17:18).

You can follow this through the book of Acts yourself. Look for references to the words above and you’ll start to get a picture of the early church that contrasts greatly with the church of today. What does all this mean to you personally? You already have Christ as the center of your life — “Christ in you, the expectation of glory” (Colossians 1:27), so “grow up into him in all things” (Ephesians 4:15) in your mind and allow Him to show forth his life through you for the glory of God.