Out of Ur<\/a> ran a piece which got some comments. (HT: Garry Poole) I\u2019m wondering what you think. Here are my thoughts:
\nI once was in a situation when a pastor admitted to using sermons from sermon sources, and he also said he hadn\u2019t thought there was anything wrong with it. What most confused me about the situation was that he was using illustrations from other preachers in the first person \u2014 and you really did think these experiences were his. So far as I know, he stopped.
\nWhat are the issues? Here\u2019s what I see:
\nFirst, it is not honest. Part of the pastoral task is to preach (if that is part of your \u201cjob description\u201d), and that means preparing their own sermons. I don\u2019t know any search committees that prefer their pastoral candidates and preachers to use sermon sources [in order to borrow or swipe sermons preached by others on a routine basis or without acknowledgement \u2014 added in light of Steve May\u2019s fine suggestions and clarifications below].
\nSecond, the temptation is evidently strong, and I\u2019d like to know what you think drives pastors to plagiarize sermons, but here\u2019s what I see. Sometimes they don\u2019t have the time to get a sermon ready. Sometimes they have too many sermons or talks to get ready for the week and resort to using somebody else\u2019s for one of the talks. Sometimes the pressure to be a good preacher is so strong the preacher is tempted to use someone else\u2019s already-shown-to-be-good sermon. Sometimes there are so many good preachers in the area swiping sermons is the only way a preacher can \u201ccompete.\u201d Sometimes a pastor\u2019s job is on the line for how he or she preaches and they are able to postpone the inevitable with a few good sermons swiped from a source.
\nThird, pastors should not subscribe to such services if they are at all tempted to swipe sermons. I suppose these services are designed to help pastors see what good preaching looks like \u2014 but that\u2019s another series. If the temptation is there, it is far wiser to make it unavailable.
\nFourth, sermon services are partly culpable here: I\u2019ve never been part of this so I\u2019d like to hear how they work. Do they warn of plagiarism? Do they educate on the proper use? Someone will know more than I about these services.
\nFifth, what is a sermon? Well, it\u2019s a whole life brought to bear on a text each week for a single 30 minute or so sermon before a specific congregation. It shames the preacher not to be who he or she is in the pulpit, and to pretend to be someone else. It de-localizes the sermon from the local context. It distorts who the preacher is before the congregation.
\nSo, the sermon is highly biblical, highly personal, highly local, and highly temporal: it is the individual preacher engaging God and Bible and congregation, in that specific location, for that time.
\nSixth, which brings up the philosophical issue: Is there not nothing new under the sun? Well said. To be sure, nearly every sermon emerges from books and sermons and ideas and all sorts of things that were used. But it is bricolage, it is quilting, it is convergence \u2014 it is precisely those things and not simple usage of others. It brings together other people\u2019s ideas and says so if it is substantial; but it is a uniquely personal, local, and temporal bringing of those things together. Taking someone\u2019s sermon destroys the bricolage and turns it into a canned, deceitful act of creating a false image in front of God\u2019s people.
\nNow let\u2019s be honest: sermons don\u2019t have footnotes and need not. You need not end each separable idea with a \u201cI got this point from Ortberg and this one from Niebuhr and that one from Bonhoeffer.\u201d We all use things from others in sermons, and when we use a lot from someone about some point, we say so. By and large the congregation doesn\u2019t care about that. But, I think they expect the preacher to be preaching his or her own sermon and not someone else\u2019s.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The NY Times ran an article about pastors swiping sermons from sermon sources, and then Out of Ur ran a piece which got some comments. (HT: Garry Poole) I\u2019m wondering what you think. Here are my thoughts:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":197,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1740],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1579","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pastoring-and-preaching"],"yoast_head":"\n
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