I followed the instructions to the best of my ability.  It wasn’t long before I learned how little my ability actually covered.  I knew something wasn’t right when the light not only dimmed the dining room chandelier, but it also switched off the basement lights!  Thankfully, with the help of a family member, the error was corrected and the lights worked as intended with the new dimmer!

While I’ve gotten better at home repair, it’s taken a lot of learning.  When I think of the amount of times I’ve phoned a family member or friend, or ventured into Home Depot with nothing but iPhone photos (and the ability to point to them like a caveman who’s only form of communication is audible grunting) and still complete a project…. well, it’s amazing!

Am I an expert at home repair?  No.  But I’ve gotten better.

What’s true for home repair is also true for Bible study.

No one starts as an expert in anything.  They must learn.  Athletes practice and train to be their best.  Craftsmen practice and train in the workshop.  Christians need to do the same.  That means that if Christians are going to follow Jesus, they must learn what God has said and learn how to apply it.  No one is born with the ability to instantly know and apply what God’s Word says.  It takes practice and training.

No one is instantly able to know and apply God's Word. It takes practice and training.
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So where can you start?  How do you begin to study God’s Word for yourself?

With the help of friends, I’ve compiled a list of favorite resources for DIY Bible study.  This list, by no means exhaustive, is simply meant to be a launch pad to give you the skills necessary to beyond a surface reading of the Scriptures.  I’ve organized this short list into paid and free resources depending on your own budget.  Plus, these are my favorites, and aren’t meant to ignore yours!  Feel free to share what your favorite resources are for DIY Bible study in the comments!  (PS – There are no affiliate links below).

Paid DIY Bible Study Resources

• The Bible Study Handbook by Lindsay Olesburg.  This book uses “manuscript Bible study” from an inductive approach, and is the best approach to dealing with the text without undue prejudices regarding interpretation.  The idea is that even our favorite Bible translations impose their understanding when it adds headers to particular sections, and the manuscript method simply lets the text be the text.  You determine ideas through contextual observational study (click here for an example).  This book also does more than give you steps towards understanding.  It gives you a framework in important convictions as you approach studying Scripture, including authorial intent (seeking to understand what the author says before I impose my experience and assumptions).  It provides guidelines for gaining background information on what you are studying, and how to start “stepping into their shoes” to understand the original audience culturally, and it gives you opportunities for application.  Highly recommended by pastors and bible teachers who I respect, this resources is a great starting point for DIY Bible Study.
• Deep Preaching by Kent Edwards.  I find this book enormously helpful in understanding the goal of study, and the questions designed to help get at the main/big idea of a natural unit of Scripture are powerful primers.  While it is focused on how to communicate and preach Scripture, the goal of biblical preaching is to understand and communicate what God said to the original audience.  While this book doesn’t include resources for gaining insight into background on culture and context, it teaches you how to ask the right questions regarding the text, and how to wrestle with applying what you learn.
• We live in a different time than the one in which the Bible was written.  We need help in understanding the culture, lives and language of the original audience.  Some resources for this include the New Bible Dictionary and the Bible Background Commentary.  For general life and times of the ancient Biblical world, check out The New Manners and Customs of Bible Times.  Once you have studied the text and come to your own conclusions, you can compare your ideas (and further questions to) the New Bible Commentary in general and the Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentaries (buy the entire set or just the book you are studying).  (PS:  don’t use the commentaries until you’ve come to your own ideas regarding the passage!  The goal is for you to learn before consulting what others have learned!)

Free DIY Bible Study Resources

Sometimes cash is tight, so here are some resources that will cost you nothing to get into DIY Bible Study!  (But start saving those dollars for the purchases above!)

• http://intervarsity.org/bible-studies/inductive-bible-study-hints
• http://intervarsity.org/bible-studies/bible-studies
• http://intervarsity.org/sites/default/files/uploaded/bookmark_print.pdf
• http://intervarsity.org/bible-studies/communal-discovery-method – While designed for group use, this can be adapted for personal study.

Question:  What resources have you found helpful for DIY Bible Study?  Share your favorites!

The post Resources for DIY Bible Study appeared first on Brian French.

It might be:

• That guy on your sales team that doesn’t care if they don’t bring in their quota.
• That lady in customer service who rolls their eyes when a customer comes to their queue.
• The waiter focusing on their phone instead of your table.

When that happens, other people have to pick up the slack.

Your best effort matters.  For example, consider the world of sports.  I’ve never heard an athlete say during an interview that they mailed it in for the game.  They would be out of a job if they said, “Yeah, I didn’t feel like giving 100% tonight, so I gave 50%…. maybe 40%.”

But what if you’re the person who’s lost their motivation to give their best?  I’ve been there.

As a pastor, there have been times I’ve:

• dusted off an old sermon and preached it without reviewing and meditating on the passage.  (That’s not to say you can never reuse a message, but it’s a mistake to preach it like you’ve just pulled old leftovers out of the fridge.)
• plugged the same worship elements into a service plan like I’m working on an automated assembly line
• picked songs because I liked them, not because they fit the idea and flow of the sermon text.

And then there’s the times when I’ve not prepared for a meeting, rushed through times of prayer (both corporate and personal), given half baked ministry or vision updates….

You get the idea.  Lack of motivation is pretty humbling.  Perhaps you’ve felt and done the same.

However, I was reminded of something in a recent sermon on Joseph from Genesis 37-41.  When his brothers hated him, he served them.  When his father (who had recently scolded him for some dreams that he shared) asked him to go report on his brothers (did I mention that his brothers hated him?), he did it.  When he didn’t find them where they said they would be, he didn’t give up.  He kept following the trail until he found them and when he did, he was sold into slavery.  When he sold to Potiphar, he worked hard as his servant.  When he was in prison, he gave his best effort.  He never lacked motivation regardless of his circumstances or low position

Why?

I believe it was because he knew that he didn’t just work for his father, or his brothers, or Potiphar or the warden.  He worked for God.  In other words, Joseph knew Who he worked for, and that gave him the motivation to do his best.

Have you ever struggled with being motivated to do your best?  It’s never wrong to be sure that you are using your time and skills in your areas where you are passionate, but maybe it starts with something more simple.  Something that Joseph knew; that you ultimately work for God.  Your best effort matters to your Heavenly Father, because He is interested in all that you do.

Your best effort matters to your Heavenly Father, because He is interested in all that you do.
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That can be a sobering thought, but it is ultimately so much more!  Imagine what it would be like to have God involved in your work!  When you remember that God is interested, you begin to bring your questions, projects and challenges to Him.  You begin to invite God into your workplace, your project, and your work ethic.  It’s not just a wake up call, it is an encouragement.

When you’re struggling with giving your best, remember Who you work for.

Question:  What comes to mind when you think about working for God?

The post Finding Your Motivation appeared first on Brian French.

If you regularly research and prepare sermons alone, a week with others who are just as passionate about compelling preaching could be just what you need. Led by faculty mentors with extensive experience in homiletics, Logos Master Classes offer the individual attention, constructive suggestions, and practical instruction you long for.

Source: Master Class – Logos Bible Software

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To have a great sermon, you have to have a goal for preaching it. Great preaching (like anything else that is great) has a specific aim. You don’t have a great sermon because someone says “Great sermon, pastor” as you stand around in the lobby. By having a measurable target, I can evaluate and improve my preaching.

Great preaching is something every preacher can achieve by asking three questions of their sermons:

1. Did this sermon say what God wanted to say? God is the author of the text, and guided the process of the human writers so that what they wrote was exactly what He would say in that situation. While we preachers are not writing Scripture today, we are under a similar mandate as the original writers and prophets to speak the words of God to our listeners. If your messages will be great, say what God has said. That does not mean that you have to reiterate what God has said verbatim in Scripture. That’s reading, not preaching. You can be incredibly creative in making what God said clear and memorable so that the idea sticks like glue to the souls of your listeners.
2. Did this sermon communicate the emotion in the text? You can say the exact same words and have a completely different result by missing the emotion of the text. For example, you would not say, “I love you” to your spouse with grated teeth and rolling eyes. It would be the right words but wrong emotions. Scripture has a emotional context that must be faithfully represented for your sermon to be truly a great sermon. The text tries to make you feel something, so make sure your listeners feel that.
3. Did this sermon help my listeners apply what God said?Great sermons prime the pump for application. It gives your audience potential ideas to try. It is one of the benefits of incarnational preaching. No one knows your congregation like you do. You know how they are struggling and how this text can help them. (If you don’t, carve out some time and get to know them better). You can help them apply what they have learned, and you can do so in creative ways. It doesn’t have to be a big step, but great sermons always point the listener towards what that next step might be. Don’t be afraid to offer an idea (or even multiple ideas) on how they can apply what they have just heard. Be careful not to elevate your suggested step to having the same weight as the Biblical idea. They are suggestions, not Scripture.

Great sermons say what God wanted to say. Great sermons connect the listener to the emotional context of the text. Great sermons give suggestions for application. If you define these targets in your sermons, you will begin to see areas of improvement that can make a huge difference. You will move toward preaching great sermons.

What great sermons have you listened to lately? What steps would you add?

The post Great Sermons Need A Target appeared first on Brian French.

Preparing sermons isn’t that far off from the big Sunday dinner.  There are always leftovers.  Just like the dinner with all the fixings, there are many things that you want to add to your sermon but cannot.  Like the limited space on your plate, your worship service is simply too full.  You have to cut some things out due to time or secondary interest.

I’ve added a new section to the blog that you might enjoy.  It’s the leftovers section.  This section is dedicated to the tasty morsels that didn’t make it into the sermon meal for my congregation.  It is for the portions that if I had placed it on the plates of my listeners it would simply stuff them to inactivity and they would fall asleep, unable to process what they have been fed.

Sermon leftovers are a great time saver.  Throw those secondary truths into some Tupperware, and reheat them for a midweek meeting.  They make great devotional snacks for your elders meeting, your worship team practices, and staff training.  Leftovers make for great meals that take little preparation on your part because you’ve already done the preparation.

There’s one guideline though:  Just like leftovers though, if you use leftovers, just let people know that is what you will be serving.  Leftovers are not the primary point of the text.  They are a secondary building block that might be interesting at another time, or a rabbit trail worth chasing as a secondary endeavor as you have meditated on Scripture.

Using leftovers from your sermon prep is just like serving leftovers to your family.  It saves you time if you have to preach multiple times during the week.

Enjoy the upcoming leftovers!

Question:  Do you use preaching leftovers?  What part of recent message preparation did you have to leave out?

The post Sunday Leftovers appeared first on Brian French.

(I still feel some remorse for the guy I asked to be Mary’s donkey at Christmas time so “Mary” could ride around the room.  Sorry Rob.)

Of course, with any ministry, people show up with their ideas on what could make things better.  One particular mother of two young children wanted me to do music differently.  She wanted to use some of the classics.  It was not a good idea, but that was not the first question I asked.

My first question was “How would you like to get your idea started?”  Her response?

“That’s up to you, I don’t have time to do it.  But you should do it.”

She wanted to offload her idea onto me to get it done.  Needless to say, her idea didn’t get very far.

Unless it is my boss, I don’t give a lot of thought to people with who approach me with “you should do this”.  Why?

• When God gives a vision, it’s not because you are a messenger for someone else.  The reason God gives you a vision is because you are the best person to implement it.   You might need help, you might need direction and clarity but fulfilling the vision is up to you.  Your job is to implement that vision, not give vision up for adoption.
• I’m looking for partners in ministry, not spectators in ministry.  Anyone can make a comment about what you should do.  But people who want to partner with you are worth some time and attention.  (It may still be a bad idea, but it’s worth a shot).

That doesn’t mean you don’t listen.  It might be a good idea that fits with your strengths.  But you must always ask one question when someone decides to comment on how you could be doing things better.  That question is this:  “How are you willing to help?”  After all, your goal as a leader is to train others up to do ministry, not do it all yourself.

If you make this the first question you ask when people come with something for you to do, you protect yourself from doing ministry that you were not intended to do.  You also release God’s people to do the ministry they are feeling called to do.  It will move people from being a spectator on the sidelines to being a partner in ministry.

The post Look for Partners appeared first on Brian French.

That’s what Drive is all about.

I was privileged to take a group of 3 leaders from my church so that they could be inspired about what church could do and what church could be.  I wanted to go and potentially learn a model for evaluating ministry effectiveness.  In the end, I wasn’t just inspired.

I was overwhelmed.  Rejuvenated.  Inspired.

Here are my top 3 takeaways from Drive 2011 (in reverse order):

3)  “Defying Gravity” (Andy Stanley)

• In order to work against the natural pull of gravitating towards insiders in the church, identify and remove obstacles to outsiders.  Andy said to obsess over the question “What if this is their first time?”.   He also stressed in another session to consider “What if it was the last time they were going to try church?”
• Don’t preserve what you have, advance with what you have.  Remain openhanded with your possessions, ministries, building, and staff.  It all belongs to God anyways.  God’s mission isn’t to preserve, but to advance.  I guess this is why the punchline for “Glory to God Forever” is not  “save my stuff and let it be safe and shiny for your glory”.
• Figure out your distinctive.  Figure out what you want your church to be known for in the community and make that your singular focus.  Being bigger isn’t always about doing more, it’s about doing it better.

2)  “Vision Casting Is A Team Sport” (Jeff Henderson)

• People are listening to how you talk about your organization.  This struck me because I think I mostly see what I don’t like in my church.
• Vision casters are vision carriers.  Vision carriers are vision casters.
• My role is to help people move from benefiting from the vision and contributing comfortably to the vision to giving their lives to the vision.  This is a great definition of how churches do what they have been called to do.  A great way for me to do this is to help people see how they are giving their lives to the vision of Pineview.  I do send thank you notes, but they’ve always been “thanks for helping” but I’ve never really concretely spelled out how their actions helped fulfill our purpose, mission and vision.  That’s a great easy step to take that I hope will have enormous impact.
• (On a side note, Jeff Henderson is probably moonlighting.)
  

Now, here’s the #1 takeaway that I learned:

1)  Something Julie Arnold said (Julie Arnold)

• Julie is the director of service programming.  She and her team put together one amazing set of main sessions.  I had a chance to ask her one question at the “Planning Engaging Sermon Series” breakout session.  Julie wasn’t even the breakout speaker, but she participated in a panel discussion at the end.  I asked, “How do you evaluate whether an event was a success?”  Her response floored me.
• “We don’t criticize.  We look for things to celebrate.  And we ask two questions.
  1)  Did we enhance or distract from the main takeaway of the message?
  2)  What did a first-timer think of how things went?“
• These questions have destroyed my model of thinking about effectiveness.  I am already dealing with the implications of how to evaluate Sunday worship.

Those are my 3 takeaways from Drive 11.  Time to go do.

Question:  Where you at Drive 11?  What did you learn?  What were your takeaways?

The post What I Learned at Drive Conference 2011 appeared first on Brian French.

Every time someone samples one of her savory creations there is a moment where you can almost see their taste buds explode.  Then it always follows with “Wow!” or “Amazing” or a basic, almost primal moan of sheer delight.  Don’t you wish preaching was like that?  Don’t you wish that your message had people saying “Wow!” or “Amazing” or just a basic, primal moan of agreement at the end of every Sunday?

I don’t anymore.

Recently, I preached a message on loving your enemies (Luke 6: 27-36).  I gave people an opportunity to respond but no one did.  One of our elders came up afterward and simply prayed, “Lord, keep working through plugged ears and hearts.”  And that prayer reminded me of this truth.

Putting the message together took time.  You took time to wrestle through the biblical idea.  You took time to think about where that idea applies to you.  You took time to craft the message in a way that would fit your audience.  Doesn’t it make sense that it might take your audience some time to process the sermon?

Transformation takes time.  Seed takes time to grow and produce a crop (Matthew 13: 1-23).  Great sermons do the same.  They give time for transformation to happen.

How do you have great sermons that transform?

• Offer a next step.  Give people something they can do immediately.  It might be something simple like a chance to pray.  Give them a take home item so they can give it to a friend or post it on their fridge to remind them of their next step.
• Preach series rather than standalone messages.  Give people repeated exposure to a biblical idea.  Preached from multiple texts, they give people repeated opportunity from multiple angles for response.  This works whether you are preaching topically or are preaching through a specific book.  The books of the Bible are so well arranged that major dominant themes become evident in each book.  Repeated exposure helps to create momentum for transformation.
• Allow people to give feedback. Don’t just talk to people after the service in the lobby.  Let people know where they can email comments or questions.  Post application questions with your sermon podcast online.  Offer them to your small group leaders for discussion.  Give people a spot for feedback on your church’s Facebook page.  Ask open ended questions on Twitter.  Use these tools and more to begin discussion that gets people mulling over the message idea like a cow chews cud.

Great sermons take time.  Great sermons give people repeated opportunity for transformation.

Question:  How do you give opportunities for transformation?  What are some concrete ways you encourage change once your preaching is done for the day/weekend?  How do you creatively invite people to follow up and follow through on your message?

The post Give Your Messages A Chance appeared first on Brian French.

I have phoned others preachers.  I have phoned professors (both past and current).  I have walked across the hall and talked to staff about the passage.  I’ve also brainstormed through the text with my wife (this is a clear sign that she loves me and is a gift).

So let’s help each other.

Going forward, I’ll post a passage here that we can work on together.  You can also leave a comment in this thread about the biblical text you are working on.

Wrestling through the Bible with others works for classrooms.  It works for small groups.  Why not the development of a sermon?

Question:  What text are you working on?  What do you believe the main idea of that text is?  What is giving you problems?

The post Cracking The Code Together appeared first on Brian French.

But consider what they were doing.  They were expected to entertain their peers (not to mention all of America).

Could you do that?

In my context, could I entertain and enthrall a room packed with the most influential Biblical communicators and church pastors and leaders in the known world?

Why is it that we pile on when people are failing?

Post your thoughts!  Do you struggle with showing gentleness when others fail?  What would you say to Hathaway/Franco in the aftermath of the Oscars?  What would you say to their critics?

The post Could You Do That? (Lessons From The Oscars) appeared first on Brian French.