How Much Time Is Enough Time?

The question that tends to haunt me in sermon preparation is how much time is enough time? It has been said that anything less than 40 hours is insufficient sermon preparation. Who says?! I think the person who can say that is a person who everything in order in ministry administratively, evangelistically, personally, financially, relationally, and spiritually. Realistically, does anyone have 40 hours of sermon preparation time, be it a full-time or bi-vocational pastor?

Life demands a lot of us every day and consumes much our time with priorities and often times sermon preparation falls prey to neglect. Let’s be honest here, any person who’s been in ministry long enough knows how to stir a person’s emotions with any text. People are hurting in more ways than we can imagine and they need more from us than cute jokes and pulpit slang.

I have a DVD by Bishop Noel Jones on preaching that starts with these words; “Take time to study!” No further explanations, illustrations, ministry experiences, or anything were needed to be said after that. “Take time to study” said it all in a nutshell.

I think many preachers (not just pastors) get caught in the trap of:

- Time spent in the study: 40 hours vs less or more hours
- How many pages a sermon manuscript should be: 6 or 12 pages
- Am I original?
- Can I shout a congregation with what I’m saying?

And actually I believe that all these things and many more affects or sermon preparation because we approach the word with wrong expectations.

I have found, as a preacher that hearing from God during sermon preparation is more important than how much time you spend in the study. We can get so caught up in time spent that we miss hearing from God.

There have been times when I did my homework including writing a manuscript and my sermon was powerful and effective on Sunday morning in 10 hours of sermon preparation. However, there have been other times, my sermon preparation took longer than 10 hours and in those times I had to learn more faster as Dr Ray Pritchford has stated so eloquently in time past. However, learning more faster required that I place my butt in a seat to learn.

Chuck Swindoll emphasizes that sermon preparation is hard work and we are workers.

I admit, I love preaching but I hate studying. However, I realize that there can be no effective preaching without good effective studying. Studying and preaching go together like salt and pepper, peanut butter and jelly, ham and cheese you can’t have one without the other. The power of sermon presentation comes from the fruit of our labor in our study. No exceptions and no matter how long it takes! Sunday's come quick and Jesus is coming soon. We must make sure that we glorify God in our sermon preparation time as well as sermon presentation. Think about this, what would God say to us if He returned during our message on Sunday after we wasted time all week long and didn't study? I'm not sure what He would say but I'm sure He wouldn't be pleased.

In addition, we don’t give our audience enough credit during the preaching moment. We think our members and invited guest are ignorant to biblical truth. While, this maybe true in some cases, they know when you’re prepared and when we’ve goofed off all week.

Let’s be honest, full-time preacher or not, we’re all guilty of goofing off and neglecting our study from time to time. We’re human. We love to have fun. We get lazy, tired, hungry, and irritated. But, we’re still obligated to study.

I resist the temptation to give tips, suggestions, advice, or anything of that nature on sermon preparation because we’ve heard it all before. However, I do believe in challenging us to make our study a priority. Do whatever you need to do to study the text to hear from God. The amount of time you spend is determined by how well you hear from God during the process (whatever your process maybe).

“Study to show yourself approved to God a workman who’s not ashamed rightly dividing the word of truth”. – 2 Timothy 2:15