How Pastor Barnes Creates a Sermon

The biggest tool any professional pastor has is words. We’re word people, and you have to know the words. A guy by the name of Steven Olford is a very good resource about different sermons. What I like about it: it doesn’t have to be a black person, it could be a white guy or whatever else. Steven Olford has a book that is called Outlines in Preparation for Sermons, and it helps you out. I have a lot of tools that I use: Bibles, and references, and commentaries. The New Testament was written originally in Greek, so you have to know something about Greek . The Old Testament was written originally in Hebrew, so you have to know something about Hebrew. There’s also The Biblical Illustrator by Baker. I also use another illustration book to make my points. I was counting the other day: By the time I finish one sermon, I’ve used 17 resources on an average, sometimes more than that, but usually 17.

One of the sermons that I preached that was really touching, and I think I got it from some of the tragedy that’s going on in Oakland. We came from Proverbs 3:5-6, where it says, "Trust in the Lord and lean not to your own understanding. Acknowledge him and He shall direct your path." The name of the sermon was "Trust in the Lord." I came up with that idea because in this community it seems like everybody’s trusting everything else. I’ve got a chance to talk to some of the homeless people we feed, and it seems they’re trusting in a dollar, trying to do all that they can to get a dollar. They’ll do anything they can to get money. The Lord gave it to me to preach about: That’s the wrong thing to trust in.

When we talk about the word ‘trust,’ it came from the Hebrew word batah, which literally means to lean every bit of your weight upon that which is able to sustain you. The conglomerates of getting that sermon together had to with seeing people being defeated. Especially in this neighborhood, many poor people think this is what they’re going to always be. They’re caught into a web. They don’t think they can pull out, and because of that, they’ve lost faith. These people just seem like: I’m not going to make it, so what the heck. I’m going to be a bum, because that’s what I’m going to be. The sermon I preached was to encourage them: You can make it. In fact, you’re going to make it. Even though you live in the ghetto, you don’t have to a ghetto mind or mentality. But there are some things you have to do -- to trust in the Lord and acknowledge Him. And then He will direct your path.

That’s just a summary of the sermon, of course. It was 45 minutes long. I’m not going to give you the whole thing -- you might want to preach it!

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