why pastors must incorporate prayer in sermon preparation.

Why Pastors Must Incorporate Prayer in Sermon Preparation
Geoffrey R. Kirkland
Christ Fellowship Bible Church

Prayer is the single most important factor in a man’s sermon preparation and yet I fear that many neglect this preeminent element. Many are too busy. Many claim they have to work with the original languages and that simply takes a lot of time. Many work at application and spend time on the outline. And, let these not be underestimated, the preacher should work hard at all of these. However, prayer as the most supernatural and powerful part of a preacher’s sermon preparation is, shamefully, one of the most oft neglected and pushed-aside parts of sermon construction.

All preachers know prayer is important. But how many really spend adequate time poring over his text on his knees before God in fervent prayer? How many pulpiteers are men of prayer during the week? How many shepherds bring their sheep before the throne of God in applying that specific sermon text to their own life as he intercedes for them before the throne of grace? How many heralds take hold of God and wrestle with God and beg God for His glory to overwhelm the preacher and the hearers? How many spokesmen for God wrestle with God like Jacob did begging the Spirit of God to supernaturally move and sovereignly draw dead sinners to Christ and His glorious gospel of grace as the Word goes forth?

Why must pastors incorporate prayer in sermon preparation?

1. A Preacher Must Pray and Ask the Spirit to Illumine the Correct Meaning and Appropriate Application of a Text.

2. A Preacher Must Pray and Worshipfully Meditate and Overwhelmingly Bathe and Pore Over His Word So as to Internalize It.

3. A Preacher Must Pray So That He Preaches to His Own Soul That Which He Will Soon Preach to His Hearers.

4. A Preacher Must Pray Because It Forces The Frail Man to Trust in His Sovereign God for Any and All Efficacy of the Spoken Word.

5. A Preacher Must Pray Because God Promises that When We Ask Anything in His Name, He Hears and He Will Do It.

6. A Preacher Must Pray With Humble Reliance on the Spirit of God to Give Him Insight into the Meaning of the Text, the Correct Application of That Text, and the Most Profitable Way to Structure and Herald That Text.

7. A Preacher Must Pray So That God Receives the Glory.

8. A Preacher Must Pray To Ensure that the Message He Gives is Divine and Not Human.

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