You Can’t Pour from an Empty Pitcher

Written by Rev. Dr. Heather Henson, Director of Quest

 

We have a coffee maker that uses coffee pods. There are actually several humans in my house who use that coffee maker (some for tea, others for espresso, and still others for coffee). It never ceases to drive me crazy that I’m pretty sure I’m the only one who ever fills up the water tank. 

It typically happens in the morning when I am looking forward to my favorite warm beverage, only to discover that my cup stands there empty even after placing the pod in and pushing the button. I sigh as I pause to fill up the water tank, again. 

Because no matter how much I will it, or want it, or research it, or whatnot, I simply cannot fill my cup of coffee if the coffee pot is empty. 

 

Letting the Word Do Its Work 

The same is true of our sermons. If our souls are empty, if we, ourselves, are not being transformed by the Word of the Lord, then we have nothing to preach at all. 

When I am working with people who are preaching for the first time, they always care a lot about the basic process of writing a sermon. They ask the same basic question: Where do you begin writing a sermon or a message? And they think they already know the answer: With the Word of the Lord, the Bible, obviously. 

But what exactly do we mean by that idea? The Bible is, in fact, God’s Word. So, yes, it is a great place to start. But we are so quick to jump into commentaries. So quick to jump right into the Greek, the history, the context, the application, the illustration. It’s easy to jump into thinking and preparing to communicate before we’ve actually done the hard work. The real work. The most important work. 

First, we ourselves must be transformed by the Word. 

What would it mean if you never preached a sermon unless you, yourself, had been impacted personally by that passage? 

Sit with that for a moment. 

How many sermons would you not have preached? Or how many more might you have? 

I tell all my students that to begin writing a sermon, they must first let it wash over them. They must spend much time allowing that passage to challenge, change, transform, impact, and wash over them. 

Not with a commentary or article or a study Bible filled with facts. 

Not with someone else’s personal experience. 

But with it impacting them. 

What if, before you ever said a word from the pulpit, you were 100% committed to letting God shape, challenge, and transform you? 

What if you only preached from that space? What if you started with the invitation to “be still and know that God is God”? 

Allow the Holy Spirit to enter into your reading and your study. Wade into the truly vulnerable space of God’s Word and allow it to do something to you. Not for you. Not for them. But allow the Word of the Lord to do something to you. 

 

Be Present with the Word 

This is where I think many pastors have gotten knocked off track. The demand to preach 52 sermons a year (sometimes even more than that), the demand to be relevant, personal, compelling, you fill in the blank. The demand to be something gets in the way of the most important thing, which is to be fully present in the Word of the Lord for your own sake, for the sake of your own soul. 

So, I encourage you to start every single sermon with an emphasis on letting God shape, transform, and disciple you. Do not preach a single sermon that has not spoken deeply to your own soul and called you into a new and right relationship with the Lord. 

Because if we want to have compelling, creative sermons, we cannot preach from an empty pitcher.