week 5

· Make sure sermon ideas are clear and well worded.

· Think beyond church-world to real-world experience.

· Remember the nature of human nature.

· Allow your own humanity to come through.

· Address assumptions, symptoms and consequences.

· Express compassion and understanding for hearers.

The human element is the human condition that corresponds to the truths that are presented in your text. The factors of human experience may be described plainly in the text or only implied.

· Identify the factors of human experience mentioned directly in the text as they pertained to the original textual setting. -

· Serving Christ can bring hardship and suffering

· God can and will use you in any situation

· The hardship and suffering can bring you joy and satisfaction

· Any situation can offer opportunities to share the gospel

· Identify the human issues suggested in the text by implication as the writer addresses problems of his day.

The church at Philippi was concerned about Paul’s situation. Paul understood how it looked to them and the outside world, so he shared his perspective on it with them. Being imprisoned and having the guard chained to him excited Paul because he saw great opportunity for him and the church to advance the gospel. Even the fact that some preached Christ with false motives brought Paul joy because he knew his situation was secondary to spreading the message of Christ.

· Summarize the concepts from your text that will become the main ideas of the sermon.

· A life dedicated to Christ can come with trials and hardships

· Many times trials and hardships are the foundation for blessings, for victories, and for God advancing his plans for our lives

· We should look for the good in bad situations (James 1:2)

· Being confident in our faith during trials and hardships can bring great opportunities to share Christ

· Use the following categories to begin describing the likely experience of the person who needs to hear the message of the text as a remedy for his needs:

(1) His symptoms of the trouble he is experiencing: - It is easy to become overwhelmed by our circumstances. Emotional struggles, financial problems, family issues, illnesses and more are real and sometimes we encounter more than one of these at a time. Depression, doubt, fear, and anxiety are likely the symptoms of and reaction to these things.

(2) His underlying assumptions about the issue: - As a believer our first thought to trials and hardships is often that something is wrong spiritually. God may be punishing us for something. He is not hearing our prayers or doesn’t care that we are suffering. We may assume for whatever reason he has not kept his word in our case and we feel abandoned.

(3) Some consequences in his experience: All these assumptions can lead to doubt, depression, even anger toward God. This can cause us to question our faith in God and his faithfulness to us. It may even lead us to believe God has turned his back on us so we turn ours on him.

(4) How a person feels who is suffering at this point: This person is despondent and discouraged. They feel their situation is hopeless and nobody, especially God, understands. They possibly even feel like there is no point going on because nothing will ever change. They feel like things are never going to get better.

· Write a profile of the person needing your message in vivid, concrete terms as you sympathetically identify with his suffering and interest him in the good news you have for him. This person is a believer, though right now they’re struggling with that belief. They have heard stories, sermons, and testimonies about how God showed up right on time and saved the day. They want and need that in their life but don’t see it happening. We have all been there. We know how it feels to believe God has abandoned us and left us to fend for ourselves. We’ve felt hopeless, been discouraged. But the stories are true. The sermons were right. And most importantly, the testimonies are from people who have been exactly where this person is and held on to their faith and God came through. Hebrews 10:23 states, “ Let us hold on to the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.”