Tim Keller talks about how much time to put into sermon prep:
I pastor a large church and have a large staff, and so I give special prominence to preparing the sermon. I give it 15–20 hours a week. I would not advise younger ministers to spend so much time, however. The main way to become a good preacher is to preach a lot, and to spend tons of time in people work—that is how you grow from becoming not just a Bible commentator but a flesh and blood preacher. When I was a pastor without a large staff, I put in six to eight hours on a sermon.
I am a part-time local pastor serving 
This love we believe to be the medicine of life, the never-failing remedy for all the evils of a disordered world, for all the miseries and vices of men. Wherever this is, there are virtue and happiness going hand in hand. There is humbleness of mind, gentleness, long-suffering, the whole image of God; and at the same time a peace that passeth all understanding, and joy unspeakable and full of glory.
He had some interesting thoughts on the process.
Essentially, his thoughts parallel what we tell our lay speakers – it takes about 15 hours to prepare a good sermon. But I would think that beginning pastors should be using that amount of time from the start. If your sermons/messages aren’t up to par, it will be very difficult growing the church.
When I started as a 1/4-time pastor, I was given the instruction (and the congregation was informed) that I had 15 hours a week that I could give them and that the primary focus needed and should be on the Sunday service (i.e., the sermon). I gave them more hours than that but used the 15 hours in preparation.
I find it interesting though that he spends more time as a senior pastor than he did as a beginning pastor. He indicated that he meets with two associate pastors who also preach. Somewhere in all of this I am having a disconnect about his allocation of hours but that has nothing to do with sermon prep.
After I had preached through the lectionary cycle several times, I came to a point where I decided that my sermon preparation required more prayer time than study time. I made a switch, and it made a positive difference in the quality of my preaching. I STILL spent a considerable amount of time in sermon preparation, but I used my time differently. All of life is actually sermon prep–not just the study, writing, and practicing.
The problem with the church is there are way too many preachers and way too few teachers.
The young want answers and they are not getting them. The answers they do get are usually personal opinions and not based on facts or scripture.
I don’t know what some of these preachers are reading and studying but it is not the early church fathers. They are not studying the great theologians because if they where they would not be preaching what they do. I can not tell you how many times I have sat in pews of different churches and listened to so much misinformation.
Can you explain what “sitting at the feet of” really means, implies and looks like?
Ever heard of Hillil the elder and how the elder relates to Christ’s teaching?
Can you explain the history, culture, and practice of the early christian church and how it relates today?
Most preachers that I have listened to can not even explain in an intelligent fashion what the Trinity is. How you ever read Tertullian’s description? He does a pretty goof job explaining the Trinity. After all, he was the first to use the word.
If I read your comment correctly, you are concerned that preaching is not intellectually sophisticated enough. Is that a fair description of your point?
First. Goof in my prior post was a typo. It should read “good job”.
My apologies.
What I am pointing out is there are too many preachers not prepared for the job. The Holy Word of God is about as sophisticated as we are ever going to get. To try and understand the mind of God is an awesome task…. don’t you think?
Most Christian churches teach the Gospel of Jesus Christ on a very elementary level. It is time to stop dumbing down the church. The church in general is unable to defend the faith. Many cannot defend the creeds, explain why they exist and what they mean.
Here are some very elementary questions.
Can you answer them?
Can the church?
It is said Jesus was born in a manger. Is that true? If so, what kind and where would that manger be located..inside or out?
Everyone knows the story of Mary learning at the feet of Christ.
Was Martha really upset Mary wasn’t helping her with preparations or could something else be bothering Martha ? What did Christ say to her complaint?
Did Christ see more?
Jesus taught in the synagogue and was called Rabbi ( master).
Do you suppose he trained with a Master? Would Jesus be required to have credentials to teach in the synagogue?
What were the educational requirements of a Jewish boy ?
At what age would they begin to teach if they trained under a “Master”?
Who had the authority to interpreter scripture and why were the crowds so upset in that synagogue?
We need to teach better, think and study harder so we answer questions asked with confidence.
We need to pray for discernment.
Have a good one J
I don’t know that this exactly pertains to DB’s point(s), but I cam across this post from a friend on Facebook a few days ago and liked, and I think it generally fits the discussion; I believe it is from an Asbury Theological Seminary publication, but I really cannot say for sure.
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THE MIND
by J. Ellsworth Kalas
Somewhere in the last century, when I was a student in seminary, one of my best classes was with an adjunct professor who was also a very effective pastor. A person of wide learning in art and literature, he stimulated thought. One day he told us that he never used the hymn, “Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing.” This hymn was a favorite of mine then, as it is today, so I asked why. He explained that no one in a twentieth century congregation knew what was meant by “Here I raise mine Ebenezer.” I raised a second question: Why not teach them, so they would know the Bible story and thus have a greater capacity for life in general? He chose not to answer that question and moved on to another subject. Now, half a century later, I find myself discussing the same basic issue, but on a different front. My students often note that it seems useless to quote a literary or historical figure, “because nowadays no one recognizes the name.” My first answer is very pragmatic. If a sentence is worth quoting it ought to be worth quoting on its own merit, no matter what the source. If a quotation’s major merit is the person who said it, its worth will be lost as soon as that person is out of fashion. My second answer is a quite Wesleyan one. If I were in an abrupt mood (which I try to avoid) I might answer, “If they don’t know the name, it’s time they learned.” To make the point more kindly, part of our job as preachers is to broaden and deepen human minds. If we believe that we should love the Lord our God with all our minds, we should do everything we can to make our minds as good and large as possible. We’re often told that a mind is a terrible thing to waste. It’s also wicked to waste it. One of Satan’s favorite tools is to fill the mind with so much garbage that anything sane, thoughtful, beautiful and redemptive is crowded out. In our contemporary culture, Satan has developed this practice to a corrupt art. But I said a moment ago that my answer is a Wesleyan one. Let me explain. John Wesley said, famously, that he was a man of one book. I am passionately with Wesley in his commitment to the Bible as our key book, which means to make it the filter for all else we read and hear. But I’m also impressed that for Wesley (as a secular authority has put it), “conversion had as a sequel the overcoming of illiteracy in the individual.” Thus Wesley published his own Dictionary in 1753. It dealt with only 4,600 words, but they were the words he considered “those hard words which are found in the best English writers.” He compiled an anthology of poetry, in three volumes. In 1763 he published his own edition of Milton’s Paradise Lost. He also wrote A Concise History of England. All of this, mind you, from the man who told his preachers, “You have nothing to do but to save souls.” That’s because it’s quite strange to save a soul and leave the mind behind. How, exactly, does one do that? In a culture that is increasingly superficial, hurried, and dull, we preachers are compelled by conscience to learn as much as we can and then to tell it as clearly, succinctly, and directly as possible. Because it’s wicked to waste a mind.
Amen Kalas..Amen
It is impossible to understand the breadth and depth of this gospel we say we honor without more understanding of the culture, history and heroes of the faith,
The Christian Faith today is taught like a fairytale for children, when it is so much more.
Wesley ,Luther, Calvin, Clement and so many others knew that fact
If one has never read “The Apology”, “Against Heresies” and many so other great Christian writers and apologists , one does not know what they are missing.
In those writing we get to look back at Christianity from the start.
How those early Christians lived , what they believed and why they believed what they did.
We learn what the early childhood of Christ must have been like and the similarities, as well as ,what Christ stood against and why.
For all those that think material outside of scripture is not relevant I would point you to Gamaliel found in Acts 22. He was an important figure. Gamaliel,s name written begs the question:
Who was he? Where did he come from? Where does he fit in the story?
Maybe a little historical writings will spark a little interest?
What Christians were accused of and their defense.
Secret crimes.
We are accused of infamous secret atrocities,—infanticide, a feast of blood, and incest; though no proof has ever been forthcoming, and only rumour is responsible for the charge (ch. 7). Whereas natural instinct would revolt from such crimes, and the burdened conscience of one unwittingly led to perpetrate them would be intolerable (ch. 8).
You yourselves are guilty of sacrificing children and adults in your worship of various deities, and of eating blood in several loathsome rites and horrible repasts; |xii whereas your knowledge of our horror of eating blood is evidenced by the tests which you apply to us. Incest, too, is one of your commonest crimes
We worship the same God as the Jews, but, Unlike them, we acknowledge Christ, the Son of God, to be God. He is the True Word, Reason, and Power of God, Who, begotten eternally by His Father, and being Co-essential with Him was made Flesh. The Jews misunderstood His Advent, His Work, and His Doctrine. They put Him to death, but He rose from the dead, as was predicted, and after forty days ascended into Heaven. Meanwhile His gospel is being spread throughout the world by His disciples (ch. 21).
From THE APOLOGY of Tertullian Chapter 9,21