The Big Advantage of Shorter Series

Once in a while, it’s not bad to mix in a smaller book, such as Philemon or 3 John, just for variety. It’s also not bad to choose a series on smaller selected passages, such as Hebrews 11. But if you have a congregation that will take on a longer series, it can really be a blessing. It’s great to preach through Isaiah or Jeremiah or Ezekiel if the group can take it. I will do the longer series on the midweek Bible study, because those are generally the people who are hungriest for the Word and will work through a long series. It’s good to know your congregation, but I believe in expository preaching and we have to help them develop a taste for it.

Sorry, Steve, but the midweek service is reserved for church-wide corporate prayer.

I’m not a pastor by profession, but I do get to teach and preach from time to time at a local nursing home, and one thing I’ve found to be very helpful is if you’re delighted in the text. If you use the text as a springboard to jump off to what you really wanted to talk about, good luck—it’s not going to go well except with those who also have that soapbox in their heart. However, if you’re digging into the text, asking questions that you don’t necessarily know the answer for (“why did David’s sons ride mules? “), most people will get interested as well if you have anything resembling good delivery.

Some have no interest, sure. Jesus saw that, and so did the Apostles. There are also people who are interested, but get bogged down in details when the material is unfamiliar to us—I saw this when teaching Hebrews a while back. Oddly, the person who had no clue (and admitted as much) had a seminary degree. (score one, apparently, for schools teaching techniques, but not Scripture?)

I am almost finished with a series preaching through the book of I Samuel. I started on 1/8/17 and I anticipate that I will finish on September 24. The total number of sermons should be 26, and those sermons are preached over the course of 39 weeks. Why thirty-nine weeks? As I recall, we missed a Sunday in the winter because of bad weather. We had special speakers several times. On fifth Sundays, we have communion and I have used those Sundays to preach on the seven sayings of Christ from the cross. I missed being in the pulpit once when I went to a pastor’s conference, and I’ll be out of the pulpit twice for vacation. I preached topical sermons on Palm Sunday and Eater this year (though I did not preach topically of mother’s or father’s days). So a half-year series gets stretched to 3/4 of a year. Then I think of the times my church members miss church because they are on vacation or are sick (or other lesser and less noble reasons) and don’t hear specific sermons. I thought about going right into II Samuel and I’ve thought about preaching for a couple of months through Titus, then going into II Samuel. I haven’t decided on that yet. Frankly, in I Samuel, there are passages that are easy to preach and some that are hard. If I did an abbreviated series in I Samuel to cut the length, I’d skip the hard stuff. I would lose and so would my congregation. Overall, there are so many interruptions for a series that is only 1/2 a year, that I think it’s best to keep plowing through consistently.

A few thoughts regarding longer series:

1. Is a long series actually preaching the text? When we separate verses from their context, are we still preaching that text? There is a kind of long series that isn’t actually expositional. It is what has been called serial topical preaching, which amounts to a series of topical messages built by isolating sentence, words, or ideas from their context, by chasing rabbit trails hither and yon. Expositional preaching seems almost contrary to long series because expositional preaching should typically deal with thought units. Expositional preaching is developing a message along the lines of the text/author’s argument and progress. I wonder if some “expositional preaching” is more of developing a message along our own ideas.

2. Is a long series actually preaching? Or is it a running commentary communicating facts about the text? I wonder if long series have lost the focus on the need to preach and instead view the preaching as merely (or almost merely) an intellectual exercise in a classroom.

3. Is a longer series actually preaching the text as a sufficient revelation from God? Or are we feeling the need to say more than God said by actually preaching our own thoughts about what really should have been said? I realize this is a fine line, but I think it is one worth considering. If authorial intent matters (and I think it does), then preaching a text expostionally should track that fairly closely. That means that 16 message on Ephesians 1:3-14 is probably going to add something that Paul through the Holy Spirit wasn’t intending. That’s not to say that a few topical rabbit trails would be inappropriate as one delves into election, or grace, or the unfolding mystery, or some such. But let’s not confuse that with expositional preaching of that passage. Let’s call that topical preaching (which, incidentally, is the predominant pattern of the Scriptures).

4. Is a long series actually serving the congregation well? Why does a congregation need 75-100 messages from one book? Would they be better served by hearing a few of the other things that God has said? What does 75 messages from Ephesians grow in God’s people that 30 messages from Ephesians, 15 messages from 1 Thessalonians, and 20 messages from Isaiah, and 10 message from Proverbs wouldn’t grow? One of the things that helped sparked my interest on this that turned into a longish academic work on preaching planning was a comment comparing the preaching of Lloyd-Jones with Spurgeon in terms of which congregation was exposed to the greatest amount of Scripture. Put aside the obvious differences in style of handling a text and just think about the difference between spending week after week after week on one page of Scripture vs. being all over the Scriptures from week to week. I wonder if we as evangelicals are quick to talk about the inspiration and authority of all Scripture but slow to demonstrate that through our preaching. When we spend long periods of time in one book, we may be at risk of devaluing the rest of Scripture. At the very least, we probably aren’t preaching the whole counsel of God.

5. Is a long series actually a point of pride for a pastor? I once heard of a pastor who spent months in the first few verses of a book. He meant it as a good thing. I cringed.

6. Is a long series an indicator of a pastor out of touch? Or, dare I say it, bordering on too lazy to understand his congregation and their needs at the present time?

A number of years ago, much earlier in my ministry, I was laboring through a longer series. A man in my church approached me and said, “I think the congregation is getting a bit weary of this series.” It was a thought well worth having. Over the years, I changed my preaching style somewhat. Sometime later, I actually surveyed my congregation about how long a series should last before moving on to something else. The bulk of the responses was from 4-8 weeks. As a pastor of people, I think we should consider how a long series affects the congregation.

I have found that preaching 4-8 weeks at a time (occasionally ten weeks) on something is sufficient both for me and them. I then typically move away to something else and come back to it. So a recent series through Ephesians was 33 messages preached over 42 weeks with two series and a “high altitude” message interspersed in there. I am currently preaching through 1 Samuel since February. I have preached 12 message in 1 Samuel and 12 messages in other series. It’s helpful both for me and for them to change it up more frequently.

Why make it shorter?

Because God gave us a lot of Bible to preach.

But I do think there is a difference in what we might do in a classroom format vs. what we should do in preaching. But atomizing the text might not be as helpful to the congregation as we think it is.

Some recent books that he has preached through:

1 Peter: 6 weeks

Ecclesiastes: 19 weeks

Ruth: 9 weeks

Acts: 20 weeks

Jonah: 9 weeks

Comment: His sermons average about 50 minutes, and he’s a fast talker, so I’d venture that he covers an above-average amount of material in each.

“How Long Should You Preach from One Bible Book?” -

http://www.preachingtoday.com/skills/themes/sermonseries/preachingfromonebiblebook.html

[T Howard]

Sorry, Steve, but the midweek service is reserved for church-wide corporate prayer.

That’s great if you do that. But it’s not the law of the Medes and the Persians to do so. A lot of churches don’t. Hopefully you have some other opportunities other than the Sunday morning service to teach people.