Episode 97: Spirit-Empowered Exposition with Jim Shaddix
What is spirit-empowered exposition? What does spirit-empowered preaching look like? What role does prayer play in the preaching moment?Join Ronjour this week as he sits down with Dr. Jim Shaddix to talk about spirit-empowered exposition and preaching.
Leading Your Church Through Change
If you have ever been whitewater rafting, you know how important the role of the guide is. The responsibility for getting the rafters through the rapids safely falls to the guide. A rafting guide must know the river well, aware of the shallow and dangerous sections that might stop the rafts or even cause them to flip.
Leading Your Congregation to Pray During Global Heartbreak and Hopelessness
The international news this week was bleak. We watched a desperate situation unfold in Afghanistan as men and women swarmed to the airport, clinging to departing planes. We heard stories of Afghanis who fear for their lives because of political or religious reasons. We saw video footage of flattened houses following the earthquake in Haiti.
Episode 40: Pastors and Evangelism (with Chuck Lawless)
In this episode of Pastor Matters, Ronjour and Brandon discuss pastors and evangelism with Dr. Chuck Lawless (Dean of Doctoral Studies at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary).
Panel Discussion on Prayer
Center for Preaching and Pastoral Leadership Director Ronjour Locke leads a panel on prayer with Dr. Keith Whitfield (Provost at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary), John Onwuchekwa (Pastor at Cornerstone Church), and Larry Trotter (Pastor at North Wake Church).
Episode 36: Pastors and Prayer
In this episode of Pastor Matters, Ronjour and Brandon discuss the prayer life of a pastor. Why is it so difficult to create consistent patterns of prayer? What does the Bible say about prayer? What role does prayer have in preaching and fulfilling the Great Commission? Join us this week as we answer these questions (and many more)!
Pleading with God and Equipping the Saints Through a Pastoral Prayer
I grew up in what might be considered a typical Baptist church. While many in the Baptist church might consider liturgy something that “high church” types undertake, even free church models–like Baptist churches–have a liturgy despite the insistence that we will not be put in a box.
How to Pray for Pastors During the Christmas Season
Christmas is my favorite time of year. But often, it’s also the busiest time of the year. Most pastors I know would say the same. Pastors often feel pressure to craft sermons on the incarnation that are new and fresh. Pastors are often asked to be part of every Christmas celebration within smaller groups in the church.
4 Ways to Pray for Your Pastor During Pastor Appreciation Month
Time has seemingly scrapped by since quarantine swept over all of us back in March. But even with the days slowly marching by, we have finally landed in October. This month we celebrate the Reformation and our kids get to run around our neighborhoods (hopefully) to chase after the spoils of Trick or Treating. October is also the month that many churches have set aside to encourage and uplift their pastoral staff through Pastor Appreciation month.
Book Review: Prayer (How Praying Together Shapes the Church), by John Onwuchekwa
In his book Prayer: How Praying Together Shapes the Church, John Onwuchekwa addresses deficiencies of corporate prayer in an ecclesiastical context. In 2015 Onwuchekwa helped plant Cornerstone Church in Atlanta, Georgia where he currently serves as the lead pastor.
I Am Prayer!
What does it mean to have your identity defined by a practice? Crying out to God regarding the oppression of his enemies, the Psalmist said, “In return for my love they accuse me, but I give myself to prayer” (Psalm 109:4, ESV; emphasis mine). The footnote in my Bible says the phrase means “I am prayer.”
How to Pray for Your Missionaries During the COVID-19 Crisis
When originally asked to write this article, COVID-19 was the talk of the town. Yet, in just a week’s time, a worldwide killer virus that has claimed nearly 400,000 lives, stymied the global economy, and persists in over 200 counties has taken a back seat in the headlines. Just weeks ago, our streets were eerily empty. Now they are eerily full with protests. America is on fire. As believers, we take seriously the commandment to love God and love neighbor. And therefore, we ask ourselves: What am I to do? How can I help?
Weaponizing the Spirit in Preaching
Every preacher that I have ever met has a genuine desire to preach powerful sermons. It seems that the general consensus among those who teach or write about powerful preaching is that you must diligently and “sacrificially” pray for Holy Spirit power in order to anticipate spiritual potency in the pulpit. To use a common metaphor, your spiritual gun must be loaded before you fire your sermon.
How to Pray for Smaller Churches and Their Pastors During the COVID-19 Crisis
Since mid to late March, this has certainly been an interesting season of ministry for all churches and their pastors. I currently serve as a pastor of a small church in Louisburg, NC, which is 20 minutes from the campus of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest. This season of COVID-19 is unique as I try to strategically shepherd and care for my church members.
Prayer Without Words
Perhaps you have been there. Maybe you happen to find yourself there now, a place where you cannot seem to conjure up words to pray. Your lips can make the movements, but nothing comes out. How is it that you got to this point? Maybe you have found yourself getting caught up in recent news headlines. Maybe the repeated blows of life have left you feeling as if all hope is lost. Maybe you’re like me and suffer with bouts of anxiety. Or maybe you find yourself in this position for no known reason at all. All you know is that you cannot seem to muster up adequate words to present to our holy God.
Lamenting the Personal Pain of Ministry
“Where do you go when your calling collides with the corruption of people who call themselves Christians?” Mark Vroegop, lead pastor of College Park Church in Indianapolis, Indiana, preaches on Psalm 55 about how we must not cease talking to God in our pain of ministry. Lament psalms teach us this. We must keep talking to Him.
Praying God’s Purpose for the Text
You know the importance of praying for your sermon—or at least you should, because prayer-less preaching is powerless preaching. But, even though you believe this, my guess is that you sometimes try to “pray yourself hot,” but barely mange to “pray yourself lukewarm.” I know I do. I believe we can learn from the laser when it comes to praying ourselves hot.
When Justice Rolls Down… Like Molasses
When I was a pastor in Baltimore, I had a neighbor who was involved in a verbal fight with a woman in front of his house. In mere minutes she had a group of fifteen at his house hurling obscenities and bricks at his house. He ran into his house and called the police. He may still be waiting for their help.
The Trigger of the Spirit
The Spirit of God who indwells the preacher is the most powerful force in the universe. And God has ordained a system in His Trinitarian economy that provides every safety mechanism necessary to prevent us from accidentally hurting ourselves or someone else with His Spirit, but at the same time enables us to engage His Spirit in our work whenever we are ready to fire. He’s done this by ordaining prayer to be the primary way we engage His Spirit in the Christian life and work, including our preaching.
Personal Prayer in Spiritual Warfare
Jesus instructs us that the thief comes to “steal, kill and destroy.” Jesus, however, has come that we may have life, indeed, abundant life in Him (Jn. 10:10). Paul reminds us that his life in the Kingdom is “righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Rom. 14:17). But the enemy comes and when he does his only desire is to ruin that which God is doing in the life of His sons and daughters. Among other things, the thief wants to destroy our ongoing testimony with God (witness) and to kill our communion with and dependence upon the Spirit and the Word. The father of lies wants to steal from us the tangible awe of who God is and the immediate remembrance of all that God has done for us practically and personally.
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