day no. 15,154: swing away!

Hebrews 4:12
For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it pierces even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It judges the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

A good sermon must have good bone structure. It must know where it's going and what it's going to hang on. The destination must be clear and the path plotted meticulously with rest area stops, meal times, scenery and efficiency all taken into consideration. A good sermon will have this completed prior to Sunday morning.

A great sermon will have this completed with around a week to kill darlings, refine poetical power and contemplate the particulars of the upcoming message.

At this point in the process, now that my thoughts are all on paper and edited to a point, I attempt to do a mental run through without my notes. Do I understand the message well enough to take a 30,000 ft. view tour of the overall message? Do I have the sermon chunked in such a way as to know what I'm talking about broadly without requiring my notes? On a run or walk around the block, I try and walk/work my way through it from memory. I say it in my head and grow familiar with its content.

It's like the first part of sermon prep is all hammering out the sword in the heat of the blacksmith's shop and now the fun part is learning how to wield it. The hammering and tinkering and heat is necessary on the front end to produce a sword. But now the goal is to learn how to fight with this sword, to learn how to make its points puncture. This is the time to feel its weight in your hands and grow accustomed to it.

Too many preachers wait until last minute and barely get the sword pounded out and shaped properly before they need to swing it. 

If you're outline is completed a week out, you're in a great place.

Swing away!!!

Psalm 149:5-9
Let the godly exult in glory;
let them sing for joy on their beds.
Let the high praises of God be in their throats
and two-edged swords in their hands,
to execute vengeance on the nations
and punishments on the peoples,
to bind their kings with chains
and their nobles with fetters of iron,
to execute on them the judgment written!
This is honor for all his godly ones.

Praise the Lord!