Should Pastor's Preach Through Sermon Series?

By Billy Rice - September 22, 2022

If you were to ask me on Sunday what passage I'm preaching from next week, my response would most likely be, "I don't know."

I have struggled through my entire pastorate with preaching through certain series, especially verse-by-verse through books of the Bible. I see pastors that I admire greatly posting and commenting on their series through certain topics and books, and I think, "I would love to be able to do that." I even attempted to do it several times, mostly resulting in glassed-over gazes that silently screamed, "WHEN WILL THIS BE OVER??" In my heart, I thoroughly enjoyed preaching through books of the Bible--I was pretty good at it! Yet I blamed the stone-faced countenances of those many faithful listeners on their own immaturity even to the point of questioning their dedication to the Lord. The pride I had in my own preaching was disgusting. In praying about this matter, and even asking God to change their hearts, God did something incredible--He began to change my heart. He convicted me of my attitude toward God's People and my personal affection for precedent. I became so driven by my own personal pridefulness in the precedent of preaching through series and books that my dependence upon the leading of the Holy Spirit in sermon preparation was hindered to the point of near non-existence. Something had to change--and it had to start with me.

To eliminate my pridefulness, the Holy Spirit led me to make a decision that I (and many dear brothers in the ministry) found to be startling to the core--Stop Preaching pre-planned series and depend on the Holy Spirit weekly to lead in deciding which passage to preach on Sunday Morning. I'll admit, it's not easy. I believe wholeheartedly in the effectiveness of expository preaching--to take a passage of text, squeeze every little golden nugget of truth out of it, and tell the people why it matters. This kind of sermon is not easy to prepare. It takes time. When the end of the week starts closing in, and I'm still struggling and begging God to give me peace about which meal I should prepare for the current spiritual needs of His People, it gets stressful! There are a great many late Saturday nights and even early Sunday Mornings. To say that I'm "preacher tired" on Sunday Afternoon is an understatement! I realize, though, that this is God chiseling away at the armor of pride I gleefully took upon myself. And more so, to see the spiritual growth in my congregation as I have been these past several months has been incredible. They don't even mind if it takes me a full hour to preach the message--for the most part, not that I try to make that the norm--as long as they can see that their pastor "has been with Jesus" (Acts 4:13).

Now, I do not want you to misunderstand me, beloved. I have a great many dear friends in the ministry who faithfully preach through series and books of the Bible week-in and week-out as the Holy Spirit is leading them, and I praise God for them. I do not accuse them for a second of not heeding God's guidance and I would never tell them to preach contrary to how the Holy Spirit is leading them. So to definitively answer the question posed in the title of this article, "Should Pastors Preach through Sermon Series?" my response would be, "To each their own." Who am I to impose my own personal conviction upon another pastor? If preaching through series and books is how the Holy Spirit is leading him and edifying his congregation, to God be the glory! If you are reading this, and you are not a pastor, do not dare go to your pastor and demand that he do as I am doing. Instead, Pray for him. Pray that he continues to follow the leading of the Holy Spirit in his life and ministry.

I know I will face criticism for an article like this--I've even criticized myself. However, I recently came across a small section in Charles Spurgeon's Lectures to My Students that encouraged me greatly to know that I'm not the only one who shares in this experience. Charles Spurgeon, The Prince of Preachers, shares so much wisdom through his own personal experience in a way that only he can. Not only that but how to move forward in this conviction on a weekly basis. I would like to share that with you, to encourage you as well if you are facing the same...

The following has been adapted from Charles Spurgeon's Lectures To My Students: Volume 1, Lecture 6, "On the Choice of a Text."

I am asked whether it is a good thing to announce arrangements, and publish lists of projected sermons. I answer, Every man in his own order. I am not a judge for others; but I dare not attempt such a thing, and should signally fail if I were to venture upon it. Precedents are much against my opinion, and at the head of them the sets of discourses by Matthew Henry, John Newton, and a host of others, still I can only speak my own personal impressions, and leave each man to be a law unto himself. Many eminent divines have delivered valuable courses of sermons upon pre-arranged topics, but we are not eminent, and must counsel others like ourselves to be cautious how they act.

I dare not announce what I shall preach from tomorrow, much less what I shall preach from in six weeks' or six months' time, the reason being partly this, that I am conscious of not possessing those peculiar gifts which are necessary to interest an assembly in one subject or set of subjects, for any length of time. Brethren of extraordinary research and profound learning can do it, and brethren with none of these, and no common sense, may pretend to do it, but I cannot. I am obliged to owe a great deal of my strength to variety rather than profundity.

It is questionable whether the great majority of list preachers had not far better burn their programs if they would succeed. I have a very lively, or rather a deadly, recollection of a certain series of discourses on the Hebrews, which made a deep impression on my mind of the most undesirable kind. I wished frequently that the Hebrews had kept the epistle to themselves, for it sadly bored one poor Gentile lad. By the time the seventh or eighth discourse had been delivered, only the very good people could stand it: these, of course, declared that they never heard more valuable expositions, but to those of a more carnal judgment it appeared that each sermon increased in dullness. Paul, in that epistle, exhorts us to suffer the word of exhortation, and we did so. Are all courses of sermons like this? Perhaps not, and yet I fear the exceptions are few, for it is even said of that wonderful expositor, Joseph Caryl, that he commenced his famous lectures upon Job with eight hundred hearers, and closed the book with only eight! A prophetical preacher enlarged so much upon "the little horn" of Daniel, that one Sabbath morning he had but seven hearers remaining. They doubtless thought it:

"Strange that a harp of thousand strings,

Should play one tune so long."

Ordinarily, and for ordinary men, it seems to me that pre-arranged discourses are a mistake, are never more than an apparent benefit, and generally a real mischief. Surely to go through a long epistle must require a great deal of genius in the preacher, and demand a world of patience on the part of the hearers.

I am moved by a yet deeper consideration in what I have now said: it strikes me that many a truly living, earnest preacher, would feel a program to be a fetter. Should the preacher announce for next Lord's day a topic full of joy, requiring liveliness and exaltation of spirit, it is very possible that he may, from various causes, find himself in a sad and burdened state of mind; nevertheless, he must put the new wine into his old bottle, and go up to the wedding feast wearing his sackcloth and ashes, and worst of all, this he may be bound to repeat for a whole month. Is this quite as it should be?

It is important that the speaker should be in tune with his theme, but how is this to be secured unless the election of the topic is left to influences which shall work at the time? A man is not a steam engine, to run on metals, and it is unwise to fix him in one groove. Very much of the preacher's power will lie in his whole soul being in accord with the subject, and I should be afraid to appoint a subject for a certain date lest, when the time come, I should not be in the key for it. Besides, it is not easy to see how a man can exhibit dependence upon the guidance of the Spirit of God, when he has already prescribed his own route. Perhaps you will say, "That is a singular objection, for why not rely upon him for twenty weeks as well as for one?" True, but we have never had a promise to warrant such faith. God promises to give us grace according to our days, but he says nothing of endowing us with a reserve fund for the future.

"Day by day the manna fell;

Oh, to learn this lesson well!"

Even so will our sermons come to us, fresh from heaven, when required. I am jealous of anything which should hinder your daily dependence upon the Holy Spirit, and therefore I register the opinion already given. To you. my younger brethren, I feel safe in saying with authority, leave ambitious attempts at elaborate series of discourses to older and abler men. We have but a small share of mental gold and silver, let us invest our little capital in useful goods which will obtain a ready market, and leave the wealthier merchants to deal in more expensive and cumbrous articles. We know not what a day may bring forth--let us wait for daily teaching, and do nothing which might preclude us from using those materials which providence may today or tomorrow cast in our way.

~ C.H. Spurgeon ~

Charles H. Spurgeon, “On the Choice of a Text,” in Lectures To My Students. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 2017, pp. 97-99.