Monday Morning Scatter Shooting while wondering why I like all of the music in my
iTunes, except when it's on shuffle, then I like about one in every fifteen
songs in my iTunes?
Jeff Jenkins had
a wonderful post (http://thejenkinsinstitute.com/2013/02/top-10-things-preachers-love-about-preaching-at-least-the-preachers-we-contacted-for-this-article/)
about the great things about being a preacher. One item that wasn't on the list was how preachers
get to work mostly with Christians. As a preacher, my
coworkers are Christians. My bosses are Christians. The people I have meeting with
are Christians. Now any good preacher
has his dealing with the world but he does have a much better work environment than
most of the average members do. Preachers don’t have to deal with a lot of the
worldly things that an everyday job does. The dishonesty, sexual talk, the
three martini lunches, all the negative influence the world has on the market place. Preachers do have some unique difficulties (and
sometimes we get focused on them) but we do get to work for and with the best
people on earth. There are no more desirable people to be with than true
Christians! I think on my favorite
experiences in my life, they most exclusively were alongside Christians. People that love one another, serve one another
and live lives of moral excellence. Heaven will be a wonderful place if not just
for the fact that it will be filled with Christians!
If you want to
be a better Bible class teacher, ask better questions. I think one of best
learning experience for me was writing camp material that was designed to be questions
to elicit discussion and have the students look to their Bibles for answers. I found very quickly that simple “fill in the
blank questions” (Now where did Jesus go….) couldn't fill anytime and had a
negative reaction. Good questions make
you think, no just repeat what has already been said. Good questions stir you
to go deeper not search for what the person is getting at.
Look at how
Jesus asked questions[1],
"Which of these three do you think proved to
be a neighbor to the man who fell into the robbers' hands?”
“Who
do men say that I am? Who do You say that I am?”
"For
if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax
collectors do the same? "If you
greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the
Gentiles do the same?”
Notice how his
questions, even if they had an obvious answer, made you think about why that answer
is the answer. Questions are the most
powerful instructive tool teachers can have. Don’t think I will come up with questions off
the cuff. Write them out beforehand. Make sure they are good. Use them to guide your audience to the truth
so they can discover it for themselves
Finally, the new preacher was greeting the
members after his lesson, when a man walked up to him and said, “That sermon
was too long” and walks away. The
preacher is taken aback but shakes the comment off. The next week after a shorter message, the
same man comes up to him and remarks, “I thought preachers were supposed know
more about what they were speaking about.” and walks away. The preacher feels a little insulted but vows
to wow the man next week with a well research in-depth lesson. Sure enough the same man come to him after the
lesson and say, “If that is what settles for preaching nowadays, I’m just going
to stay at home!” The preacher is now
very concerned and goes to one of the elders to ask for his help. The preacher points out the man to the elder
and says “that fellow over there, I worried I have offended and I might have
run him off. The elders smiles and says, “Don’t worry about Tom, he is a little
off in the head, but he is no harm.” The preacher is relieved until till the
elder continues, “Tom doesn’t know much of anything, he just repeats what he
hears everyone else saying.”
[1] I could
write a book on how Jesus asked questions, or at least several classes. Don’t
anybody else do this, it was my idea first
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