Sean Palmer

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A Sermon in Search of a Text

Jan 16, 2025 | preachingtoday.com | Sean Palmer

One of the greatest disservices a pastor can do to their church is preaching a sermon in search of a text. We’ve all done it, and sometimes a congregation needs to talk about important topics which necessitate it. But far too often, as a preaching coach, I hear sermons that are little more than the topic a pastor wanted to talk about, an axe to grind, or a hot-take on the day's news. Pastors, sadly, need to be reminded that we are neither talk-show hosts nor opinion piece writers.
Preaching Through Darkness

Oct 31, 2024 | preachingtoday.com | Sean Palmer |John Johnson |Dave Ferguson

Barbara Brown Taylor writes in Learning to Walk In The Dark, “I have learned things in the dark that I could never have learned in the light, things that have saved my life over and over again, so that there is really only one logical conclusion. I need darkness as much as I need light.” She’s right. In her remarkable career as a pastor, professor, writer, and homiletician, she may have never been righter, at least not for me, right now. My brother died last July.
Make It Look Easy

Sep 12, 2024 | preachingtoday.com | Sean Palmer |Jeffrey Arthurs

“Good heavens, the man only works an hour a week.” Those are the words I can remember from Marge Simpson in an episode of The Simpsons from over 30 years ago. At least, that’s what I think I remember Marge saying. She was talking about her newly arrived preacher as he sermonized about how busy he’d been while adjusting to a new city. From what Marge saw, week-to-week, preachers worked an hour a week. It’s not funny because it’s true. It’s funny because people think it’s true.
5 Free Steps to a Better Sermon this Sunday

Jul 11, 2024 | preachingtoday.com | Sean Palmer

Scrolling through my social media feed, it’s full of ads for sermon hints and tips. There are programs, software, webinars, and courses. I suspect most of these are quality products designed to make a difficult, repetitive, and important job a little bit easier. As a matter of fact, I know they are designed to make sermon prep and delivery easier because that’s exactly what the ads promise to do.
Stuck in a Condemnation Corridor

Jun 27, 2024 | preachingtoday.com | Sean Palmer |Matthew Kim |Steve Walker

Ernest Hemingway said, “As a writer, you should not judge, you should understand.” The same is true for preachers. Unfortunately, a good bit of the preaching I hear isn’t understanding, it’s judging. Here is the template and tenor: “You people (the church), are doing X. God hates X. Stop doing X or God will hate you too. Now here are three takeaways so that you will stop making God mad and risking your eternal location.” It may be my ear, but that sounds condemning.
Preaching on Pentecost Sunday

Apr 24, 2024 | preachingtoday.com | Sean Palmer

Pentecost Sunday is the most important Sundays that most pastors miss. Yes. You had a great Easter service. Maybe you even hosted Maundy Thursday and Good Friday gatherings in the lead up to Easter, and then Easter hit. It was a big success! Churches had full pews, lively music, and many pastors spent more time than normal preparing their messages for Easter Sunday. Easter Sunday is a preacher’s Super Bowl. Most of us go all-out for that Holy Day. Then it’s over! Now what?
From the Dugout to the Pulpit

Feb 29, 2024 | preachingtoday.com | John Koessler |Krish Kandiah |Sean Palmer |Bearett Wolverton

Each summer, I enjoy taking my family to see the San Francisco Giants play as we live relatively close to their ballpark. By the end of the fifth inning, my kids are usually done with their snacks, have walked around the ballpark two times, been to the bathroom three times each, and have danced their hearts out to try to get seen on camera before they threatened to mutiny in order to leave the “long and boring” game.
Interrupted Life

Feb 15, 2024 | preachingtoday.com | Sean Palmer |Haddon Robinson

I have a dog named Rev. She is my constant companion and an ever-present nuisance in times of trouble, or anytime really. Rev is always with me and she almost always wants something from me. I work from home. Once, in a disagreement about family duties caring for our little labradoodle, my wife said to me, “Well, I don’t stay at home during the week.” I was quick to correct her.
Faith.

Dec 7, 2023 | seannpalmer.medium.com | Sean Palmer

a surrender to a story that sight cannot tellan acknowledgment of an author whose name doesn’t sound like our owna willingness to listen before we speak. to hear before we see. to take the pen out of our hands and put it in his because it is safer there. to let the ink bleed beyond the confines of our comfortability. to form words whose meaning can only be discerned by a relationship with the divine.
New Creation

Dec 7, 2023 | seannpalmer.medium.com | Sean Palmer

Why do we allow our brokenness to define our ability to be made whole? We trace our fingers across the ridges and valleys of our scars. They remind us of every time we’ve failed. Confusing grace for grief, we focus more on our pain than his purpose in it. We forget that healing isn’t linear. The absence of lines doesn’t mean that we’re lost — it means we’re human. The highs and lows of life remind us that we’re alive. For everything has a season. Even the strongest plants need rain to survive.