Bishop Eric Menees
Last week, in the Bishop’s Note, we looked at the scheduled
readings of the Old Testament, Psalms, New Testament, and Gospel over a
three-year cycle known as the Lectionary. Immediately following the reading of
the Word of God is the Sermon. During public worship a sermon must follow the
reading of the word – without exception.
Archbishop Cranmer, arguably the father of Anglicanism,
defined a Church, in Article 19 of the Articles of Religion (also known as the
39 Articles) as: “The visible Church of Christ is a congregation of faithful
men, in which the pure word of God is preached and the sacraments are duly
ministered according to Christ’s ordinance in all those things that of
necessity are requisite to the same.”
“The Pure Word of God is preached” … the sermon is an
essential part of being a church and an essential aspect of ministry for
deacons, priests and bishops. The purpose of the sermon is to train and equip
the people of God to live lives that reflect their identity in Christ as the
adopted children of God (John 1:12), new creations (2 Corinthians 5:17), and
disciples of Jesus Christ (Matthew 28: 19).
Because this is such an important and sacred duty, clergy
are tasked to give their very best to their sermon preparation. Sermon
preparation is not to be left to the last minute or undertaken without serious
prayer and study of God’s Word. On average, I would guess that I spend 20
minutes of preparation for every minute of sermon preached. Underscoring the
importance of sermon preparation is the biblical promise that those of us who
teach the Word of God will be held to a higher standard by God (James 3:1).
A point about the length of sermons: While in college and
seminary, well-meaning parishioners would give me preaching advice long before
I stepped into the pulpit. “If you can’t say it in 10 minutes, it’s not worth
saying.” As a student intern, I tried to adhere to that maxim until, in
seminary, my preaching professor told us that the idea of keeping a sermon to
10 minutes harkened back to a time with the entire congregation spent an hour
in Sunday School prior to the service and the sermon was meant to be a capstone
to the Sunday School lesson. However, following WWII, Sunday School attendance
began to wane to the point where it was essentially abandoned. Children’s
Sunday school was moved to the 20-30 minutes during the Liturgy of the Word,
and Adult Sunday School was moved to a Rector’s Forum between services — which
would be sparsely attended — with topics that were all over the map. So, then it
became clear that to be serious about our responsibility in teaching the Word
of God, a 10-minute sermon would be the bare minimum length of a sermon as
opposed to the maximum. As one friend of mine said: “Sermonettes are for
Christianettes.” If we are serious about our faith and serious about preaching
the “pure Word of God,” then both the preacher and the disciple need to be
serious about sermons.
I pray you all a truly bless Advent!
1 comment:
Hi Bishop,
I usually work on my sermon over the course of a week. Hopefully it becomes clearer as I amend it. Finally, My wife Sharon is the last test. Parishioners can thank her for an improved final product.
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