Latest / Better Preaching Podcast / BP2 Season 1 Episode 7 – Danny Cox | Embrace the Grind
Transcript
- Frank Weller: Danny, welcome back to the Better Preaching Podcast. Hey, listen, I wanted to start by just talking about sermon preparation. Dive right into kind of the nuts and the bolts. You told me that a good sermon can be written in 10 hours, but a great sermon might take 15. I'd just love for you to share with our listeners what you mean by that and talk to us about what your 15 hours looks like. Danny: Good to be back. Yeah, so ⁓ there's no rubric behind that. You some preachers may be able to write one ⁓ shorter than that. The whole entire point is that however long it has, I've just discovered that a good sermon can be written in a certain amount of time, but if you want it to be a great sermon, ⁓ it really takes ⁓ a little bit more time, a little bit more application, and a little bit more grit than that. ⁓ My sermon preparation starts very early on. I think when you're part of a church and a growing church, especially when you have teams, worship pastor, student, and so much of what we do revolves around preaching the word of God. ⁓ A lot of preparation goes into that. And so one of my processes is I always retreat with a creative team that I have established at my church, which includes ministry staff, elders, different things along those lines. We retreat for about three days in November, and we actually look at the calendar for the remainder of the next year. And so we actually try to put our sermons together. about 11, 12 months in advance, go through all of our series, what we're be doing, whether it be topical, whether that be verse by verse, what fits in different areas, what our church needs to hear, and what the real plan is. And so with the preparation, ⁓ we make the game plan ⁓ early on in November. Again, literally spend about three days all day getting that done. and then it'll at least give us a roadmap of that where we went ahead. And then that way we spend the remainder of the next year. We have the plan and then we work the plan. And so while I know what I'm preaching on a year in advance, that doesn't necessarily mean that I ⁓ am a year advanced in writing sermons. I, from my rhythm, I try to stay about three weeks ahead on my sermon preparation. ⁓ Being ⁓ a pastor of a church and the main preacher, ⁓ I spend a quality amount of my time. each week writing sermons, planning, studying, and really going through the process of what it is to try to communicate God's Word as effectively as I can. Now that sometimes is a little bit shorter, a little bit longer depending on the week, but the time I spend actually preparing the message, reading through commentaries, planning direction, it's a good chunk of my time. In fact, I usually have writing days. I like to have writing days on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursday mornings if I I spend Mondays on leadership, staff meetings, development, different things like that. And so I actually have schedules, times where I really focus on the bulk of that. And then one of the things that I've really learned is not just the writing of it, but I spend more time now with the rehearsal of my sermons probably now than I ever did. And I feel like my craft has gotten better, but I've realized the importance of the rehearsal as far as... you've just got done preparing the message. Now, how can you communicate it as effectively as you can? And so I'm not one of those preachers that's gifted enough to memorize my sermon week after week. But by the time I step up, I preach three sermons every Sunday. By the time I step up, I'm really familiar ⁓ with that message, ⁓ highlighting the points that I want to drive home, what I want to communicate, what I want my congregation to come away with. And so it's a craft and it's something that I've been trying to study for the last 20 years. Hopefully I'll be studying it for the next 20, 25 years, but I actually spend more time now in the preparation than even I did 10 years ago. Frank Weller: So, and I think that that's true for most people who preach for a long time, right? ⁓ You do, you've just got to put in the seat work and we're going to talk more about that in just a minute. But this idea of rehearsing your sermon is intriguing to me. I don't know too many guys that do that. I'd be interested to know, you know, what does that look like for you? Are you rehearsing that? Are you taping it? You're going back and watching game film. I mean, you know, what exactly does that rehearsal look Danny: Yeah. Frank Weller: constitute. Danny: Yeah, so it's kind of rough, but after hearing myself preach three times on Sunday, every single Monday morning, now generally it's usually at the gym on the elliptical machine, but I listen to myself every single week. I figure out if, like until I started listening to myself, I didn't realize that I would speak and know, ums would come or different phrases or different bad habits that I formed. And so listening to myself has actually helped a great deal. ⁓ Now again, if you preach, several times. Obviously, you know what you're about to say, but anything from mannerisms to eye contact, ⁓ how you delivered a specific line, how you can get better. And then as far as the delivery, I literally work on the words of emphasis, pacing, ⁓ what one liners I really want to drive home, times to pause. I am generally someone that speaks really, really fast. It's natural for me to speak fast, but that's not always the most effective way. And so I'll even have parts of my my message. I don't necessarily preach from a manuscript, but if there are certain words or phrases that I really want to hammer home, I'll literally write it out. And sometimes, like even in the course of my notes, I'll hit, it's time to pause, or it's time to, like I'll actually have cues that have just helped me. Now know some people do that more naturally. What has helped me is emphasizing how I think ⁓ I can convey that message in a way that people will hear it, understand it. ⁓ and it's worked well for me as I've tried to develop this craft. Frank Weller: What do you take with you to the pulpit when you go up to preach? Danny: ⁓ I preach from an iPad and I bring my Bible and you if I have a illustration or something like that I can but generally my iPad ⁓ I preach from a screen it's become I've done it now for seven years it's become very very effective for me and so even learning that learning how to to scroll properly, how to interact with the screen, how to not stay too glued to it. But I've preached from a screen for years and then my Bible. ⁓ I preach from a table, not necessarily a pulpit or a platform, but just a table and it's worked really well for me for years. Frank Weller: You know what I found really helpful is I preach from an iPad too. And when I first started doing that, there's some people like, well, why aren't you preaching from the Bible? I said, because I can't see as well as I used to. I need to be able to increase that font size. But I started sending my document to my Kindle device. So I actually opened the Kindle app on my iPad and can open a Word document and Danny: Yeah. Frank Weller: What's great about that is it gives me the option to highlight phrases or words in four different colors. And so I've found that to be really helpful. I started doing that years ago. And now I do also like though having the Bible because there's something tactile about that. And I think there's also something about ⁓ encouraging our people to be in their Bible. Right. And I just like, I like doing that. Danny: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So I've done a few things for that. One, I used to read for years from my iPad and then I noticed people stopped bringing their Bible. Cause one, mean, they already have it on the screens behind me. And so they're able to see that, but just being able to step away from, ⁓ step away from the table, actually open up the word and read from it. One, it draws emphasis, but then also like there's a few things, things that I wouldn't have considered. Like I was wondering why as many people weren't bringing their Bible and then it. ⁓ someone made the comment, they're like, well, you guys keep the lights in the house so low, we can't even see them. So what's the point? And so then we had to start even bringing like, during the time of preaching, we actually bring the lights up a little bit because we want to encourage people to actually bring their Bible. And so just those little things, but I have noticed, yeah, yeah. Frank Weller: Right. Right. Yeah, we've started doing that here in chapel, right? We realize, you can't even read your Bible. We're seeing students pull out their phone, use their flashlight so they can read their Bible. Like, okay, maybe we'll turn the lights up a little bit. Danny: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I call me old fashioned, but I think there's also more authority when you pick up your Bible, you open it and read it as opposed to looking at an iPad. I just, maybe an old fashioned thought of me, but I just do think there's more emphasis when people see that this is coming directly from, I mean, you could quote the scripture, but when they actually see it's coming from the word of God, I think it helps. Frank Weller: We talked a little bit about this the last time we were together. A lot of preachers I talked to are concerned that preaching today can just really get watered down. I know that's a concern that you share. Talk to us about that and how do you ensure that what you're preaching is true to the text and not just something that is entertaining for the listeners. Danny: Yeah, sure. And don't get me wrong, I preach topically ⁓ and I also preach verse by verse. ⁓ I actually prefer ⁓ verse by verse preaching because I think it allows the Holy Spirit to set the agenda and not the preacher. ⁓ But with that just comes proper study. I mean, you gotta know the word of God. I think I went to schools where they trained me on God's word pretty well. And I have a passion, I have a love for communicating and teaching that. And you gotta do that. I think people hunger for the word of God. They can go and get a message, a different type of message from this world in a lot of different ways, but it's really the word of God that makes our message stand out, the truth behind it. And so with that, you gotta preach it. You gotta preach it accurately. You gotta make sure that you're doing your homework, looking at the hermeneutic, looking at the proper context, bringing that in. Because it's amazing to me how people are very much interested in what the Hebrew or what the Greek says or what the original context is. It's those things, those little extra tidbits that we went to Bible college for that I think sometimes we take for granted. But it's those bringing the scriptures to life and actually communicating it. I think there's a fear or a hesitation within reading the scriptures. ⁓ because people, you know, they think they're not gonna be able to understand it. There's names there in the Bible that they will never be able to pronounce. And so I think if we can realize or have them realize that, this word was meant for you by God. It's his word for you to understand. And with a little application, a little teaching, and not just on Sunday mornings, but with other ministries that we have, not only can you understand it, but it has the power to transform your life in eternity. ⁓ It's important. Frank Weller: Yeah, I agree. And I think as you unpack some of the intricacies, whether you're looking at the context of ⁓ the cultural context when the text was written, or if you're taking a look at the original languages and the nuance behind the text in the original, that's the difference between 480p and HD, really. mean, and you begin to... really preach the Bible in high definition, I think it speaks to more than just the Bible nerds. I think it really, that's how you make it come alive. Danny: ⁓ for sure. Well, not only that, but you can only take your people where you're willing to go. Like, and so, you know, I've, I've been saying the word of God my entire adult life and even before that, but I'm never going to out learn it. And, and so part of, and we got to be careful because you know, one of the, ⁓ I always wanted to write a book and how to survive Bible college, because you know, when you're at Bible college, there's, there's a certain aspect where the word of God becomes a textbook. And so remembering, ⁓ as it says in the book Revelation, know, remembering your first love. It's remembering what draw you drew you to it, the joy of your salvation and making sure like part of the part of the problem, I think sometime with being a preacher is the day in and day out and that getting into the word of God, it becomes we spend more time working for Jesus than we do walking with Jesus. And so, yeah, and so we just need to make sure that Frank Weller: ⁓ that's powerful. Danny: that we're studying, that we're allowing ourselves to be transformed, that sanctification is just as much for the preacher as is for anybody else. And oftentimes people ask, well, how do you come up with your sermons, different things like that? I oftentimes tell them, I just think what the Holy Spirit of God is working in and through my life, what I need to hear. And if I need to hear it, odds are people in my congregation are gonna need to hear it as well. Frank Weller: Yeah, that's good stuff. Well, listen, I want to pause just again and thank our sponsor Great Lakes Christian College and their new Master of Arts in Practical Theology program enables students to learn at a flexible, convenient pace without sacrificing community. You get real instructional support. This isn't a degree mill. It's more face to face and less busy work. GLCC is focused on helping you serve your church and community now and in the future. If you're ready to answer God's call to ministry, go to www.glcc.edu. You've kind of walked us already through your preparation cadence. I love that your team's getting together in November and planning out a year. The fact that you're working three weeks ahead, I think is a really healthy rhythm because it enables you to build margin into your calendar. So you're not shortchanging your family on those weeks that are especially full. I'd love to... hear more about how I think the way you put it is that preparation feeds your soul and strengthens the message, but delivery allows that message to connect with people. I think there's something powerful there. It's basically the idea that you've got to have nourishment before you can feed someone else. I'd just love to hear you share a little bit more about that concept. Danny: I mean, it's the concept of leadership. know, you, if you want people lead, if you want to lead people, you have to be willing to be able to go there yourself and you have to have the ability to lead them. And so that's a huge part of it. But obviously, you know, one of the things we also need to remember is we're called to discipleship, go out into all the world, make disciples, baptize them. I love the real-life model of discipleship. A disciple is one who follows after Jesus, one who's being transformed daily by Jesus, and one is committed to the mission. And part of the aspects of that is you have to yourself be willing to be transformed by Jesus daily. Like, hopefully we realize that as pastors, it's so important that we are feeding our souls, our minds, our families, that we're remembering our first ministries. Because if we want to lead healthy, if we want to preach, we have to be able to preach in a way where we're preaching with conviction. And that goes with everything. How could you preach on finances or tithing unless you or your family are actively doing that? How could you preach on all these things unless you yourself are working through these things? And if you're not nourishing your soul, if you're not ⁓ bettering yourself, and not just spiritually, but taking care of the whole aspect of the body, the whole temple, physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, relationally, you're only going be able to lead your congregation to a certain point. One of the rhythms, by the way, I think that has really helped me with that. And I wasn't able to do this, you know, when you first, when I first launched a church. But now my rhythm is I always want to consider that I'm not the best communicator within my own congregation. And so I'm to the point now where I'm only preaching about 38, 40 times a year. We have guest preachers, you have come in to LifeWell before, ⁓ but most of our guest preaching comes in-house ⁓ because I have to be willing, if I'm calling my church to make disciples, I have to go and make disciples too. And so I have to be building into people that I find to be communicators building into their life, showing them how to develop messages, how I work that. And so we have the vast majority of the people that take the pulpit here at LifeWell are businessmen that I've come alongside, helped develop, I work with them in their messages, because I have to be willing to make disciples too. you know, people say, okay, you're only preaching 38, 40 times a year, what are you doing with the rest of, you know, that 10 to 12 weeks? I'm doing plenty, don't get me wrong. Like I'm doing, I'm doing a lot. But that rhythm, like, I just know so many pastors that are preaching, they're, you know, leading churches for 30 years, still preaching 48, 50 times a year. And I'm like, guys, what are you doing? Frank Weller: Yeah. Yeah, that's a lot. ⁓ I think if we, well, someone else actually said in another podcast that when you're preaching that many times a year, 48, 50 times a year, that your voice becomes white noise for your congregation and, you know, becomes a little bit like Charlie Brown's teacher. So, but, know, that can be a scary thing, right? You've got to have some confidence and some, some self-assurance in order to be able to say, okay, we're going to put somebody else up there ⁓ rather than me. ⁓ Listen, I, I'm, Danny: Yeah. Frank Weller: I'm interested to know if there's ⁓ something else that's just kind of burning inside of you that you're like, listen, Frank, you haven't asked me about this, but I really, I really want to unpack that. So kind of be thinking that in the background, but as you do listen, Danny, there are more sermon tools available to preachers today than at any other time in history. mean, bookshelves are lined with commentaries and ⁓ Danny: Yeah. Frank Weller: Bible helps. And that doesn't even begin to scratch the surface of the digital tools that are available to us. But all of those tools are no substitute for hard work. There's a phrase that you mentioned to me that I really appreciated applies to preaching. You called it embrace the grind. ⁓ I'd love to hear more about that. Danny: Yeah. Yeah, like you said, so the amount of resources that we have ⁓ is phenomenal, especially in an AI technology world. I'm not going to lie, I use AI literally all the time, ⁓ but I don't use it as a ministry. Frank Weller: ⁓ that's fascinating. I'm interested to hear how you do that. Danny: ⁓ in all kinds of ways. ⁓ I don't use, the way I would like to phrase it is I use AI as a ministry assistant, not a ministry replacement. And so there are certain things that I think pastors excel at and there's certain things that depending on the personality, they're just not good. And there's also certain things that are just absolutely life sucking. And so anything administrative, if you want to. take my least favorite time of the month as far as, you know, it only takes me about an hour, hour and a half. Expense reports, I absolutely hate. For some reason, doing those receipts, those type of things, it's something that you have to do. ⁓ And so ⁓ you just gotta deal with it. But there are certain tools now that we have at our disposal that are just great. Not only that, but helping draft emails, social media, different things along those lines, ⁓ outlines, brainstorming. ⁓ leadership meetings, I just had a meeting with my city earlier on. And so I was able to help use AI technologies to help, you know, bring down the points as far as the things that I want to talk to my city with. So I use it a lot. The danger though with AI is one of the things I'm really worried about, not just from the context of preaching, but even within young people is this concept of embracing the grind or missing out on the grind. So much of who I think I am now as as a preacher, as a husband, as a father, as a pastor, is because the hours I have spent preparing, doing the work, and really embracing the grind of what day-to-day ministry is actually about. literally there, we gotta be careful with AI technology because one, you can literally have a topic for a sermon nowadays and you can tell AI technology, I am a pastor of a restoration Christian church from the Stone Campbell movement. And AI will get the theology so close it's crazy. And there's a worry about that. With that, I can't think of what I would be if I didn't have those times in my life, those hours of sermon prep and different things like that. So yeah, there's a lot of technologies that I've been able to utilize that cut some of my administration work down three to five hours a week. And so I use it as a ministry assistant with the day-to-day stuff so that I can go and shepherd my people and spend those times in doing it. But you really got to make sure that you're doing that with the right motives, the right reasons, and use that tool effectively. I also share with you, and forgive me for saying this on the podcast, but I absolutely love the outdoors. ⁓ I'm a big time archery hunter. I go out west. I go up to Alaska. I've gone out to Alaska again this August. There's a phrase that my buddy and I really like to use and it's called not just embrace the grind. The phrase we like to use is embrace the suck. And what do you mean by that is when we're out, sometimes it's raining. I go to places where the only contact you could have with the outside world is through satellite phone. We're eating freeze dried meals for 12 days at a time. And for whatever reason, Frank Weller: Yeah. Danny: the harder it becomes, the bigger smile I have on my face ⁓ because I enjoy the grind. I enjoy the process. And ⁓ if I can give advice to anybody, I would say embrace the grind, but embrace it in a good way. Like I'm not talking about the grind of, you know, the weight of ministry pouring down and, know, we could all tell stories over multiple podcasts of the situations that we had or the elder meetings that we had or the suicides or, you know, that's a different part of the grind. I'm talking about embracing like the the actual work in a way that if you do it correctly, yeah, it's gonna be a grind, it's gonna be challenging, but how you'll be developed, how you'll have the potential to help other people develop, it's an important part of the equation. And we miss out that sometimes being uncomfortable might be our greatest growth tools or areas that we have, not just in our life, but with also other people. Frank Weller: Yeah. And there's, really is no replacement for, the seat time. gotta, you gotta put your, put your bottom in the chair and do the work. Danny: Absolutely, you gotta do the work. Yeah. Frank Weller: So it's interesting you brought up AI because obviously that's huge in higher education right now. There's just a real arms race between students and those who are evaluating students with AI. Is there a particular tool that you're using? Are you using a language model that's closed or open? I mean, is there something that you're using as a ministry assistant that you find particularly helpful? Danny: How, man? I know how keep up. It just depends. I've been dabbling. I've been probably dabbling for the last year and a half into it. So whether it be chat, GPT, Gemini, it's really, it's crazy what is available and what it can do. And I only know I'm scratching the surface. For me, I know I've tried to use it in a way that it frees me up so I can be the pastor that I want to be to my people. Again, there's certain, I mainly use it as an administrative assistant because there's just certain things as far as, like I actually love. not just reading the word of God, but I love sermon prep. I love those type of things. As far as spreadsheets and those other kinds of things, there's just things that have dramatically cut down ⁓ my time it takes to do some of those things that has freed me up to go be the pastor that I really want to be. I ⁓ would love to be able to say I could talk about the discussion of where AI is going, but it has changed things at such a rapid pace that I think people can guess where it might be going, I think by the time you're done guessing or putting a hypothesis together, it's already outdated. ⁓ Frank Weller: And I think where AI is concerned, I don't use it to create content, but I do use it to curate research. I put together, or I should say I had AI put together a pretty comprehensive memorandum for a foundation that we're going to be approaching for a grant the other day. And it ground for about five minutes, which that tells you it was doing some real deep work. Danny: Yeah, yeah. Frank Weller: But about five minutes it took and it created a 15 page comprehensive document on the history of this foundation, the kind of grants they give, how we should approach it. It's really valuable stuff. And look, it'd take me a month to generate that kind of report. And it really does free me up. But I think AI has its use and you're right, it's here to stay. Danny: Can I tell you how I use it in preaching? Yeah, so I'm a little old fashioned. I write my sermons out and ⁓ I guess I do it the old fashioned way. I still really enjoy that. ⁓ But when my church went from two services to three, one of the things that we have to figure out how to do is transition from service to service. And if the preacher goes long, I hear about it from the children's ministry. And so ⁓ after I'm done writing my message, Frank Weller: What it cannot do, yeah, go ahead. Danny: I'm a type of preacher that I'm really comfortable between 38 and 42 minutes, but I preach at a church now that really requires me to be at between 30 and 33. And ⁓ after I'm done writing, I will actually literally put my manuscript within to an AI model. And then I will tell them, this sermon needs to be between 30 and 33 minutes. And it helps me cut out the fluff so I could actually stay on time. And it's been remarkably effective for me. Frank Weller: That's interesting. I'll tell you one thing that we're seeing here, and I think this is a distinct advantage for us as an institution of higher education, and certainly the church can benefit from this. The one thing AI cannot do is spiritual formation and discipleship. So it is a lousy substitute for that kind of knee-to-knee or face-to-face contact where you're really pouring into someone. And to that point, I think the church may be little bit occupied or preaching at least is a little bit occupation proof compared to, you know, maybe a coder or somebody who's working in technology sector. We, I think are going to continue to have that conversation about where it's going and how it can be used and what it can do to free up our time to do other things. But I'm fascinated to see where we're preaching or how preaching is impacted by AI. Well, listen, we're almost This half hour went really fast, Danny. ⁓ We got just a few more minutes before we wrap up. What's that one thought that's burning inside of you that you want to get out before we conclude? Danny: Yeah. ⁓ gosh, that's a good question. ⁓ Really quick, just let me just touch on that last point, because you talked about what AI is not. I think AI is not a lot of things. I think AI is not a voice. I think AI is not wisdom. I think AI is not discernment. ⁓ I think what it is is a language assistant, a thinking partner, a drafting tool, ⁓ a pattern recognizer, a time saver. I don't think AI ⁓ will ever, will ever be a spiritual authority. ⁓ It is not a moral compass. It's not a replacement for prayer. It's not a substitute for pastoral care. And it's not a sermon writer that replaces your voice. And so there's a lot of things that AI is, but there's a lot of things that AI absolutely is not. And we need to be careful with that. One of the things as far as burning in the back of my mind, ⁓ I am someone that, and I've really discovered it over this last several months. ⁓ I got to a point where just health-wise physically, ⁓ I just gained too much weight and ⁓ been really, really, really focusing on my health the last three to four five months. And ⁓ I have been remarkably amazed at, and I think this is something that I know, I think this is something that I would have preached, ⁓ but I've been remarkably amazed at the more I take care of my physical self, the more I want to engage spiritually. ⁓ Like I'm... I still got a long way to go. I'd like to lose 20 more pounds. I'm down, think, 32 pounds now. I've drastically changed my eating habits. I'm working out six days a week. And it is amazing how much more I've realized how my spiritual life is intertwined with my physical, ⁓ my relationship with my kids as far as even wanting to get down and play on the floor with them, engage them, ⁓ how I have more energy to pursue the scriptures. ⁓ how I wanna worship more. And so one of the things I've just been really wrestling with and really discovering in a good way is my spiritual life is becoming better the more I take care of myself physically. And with all of our meetings, with everything that we have to do, the amount of times we're going out to lunch, it could just develop habits that are detrimental. And I didn't realize that the more... I wasn't healthy physically, how much it was so much affecting myself spiritually. I would have preached that sermon, don't get me wrong, probably have preached the sermon, but I've really just utilized it and recognized that over the last three, four, five months of my journey. I got a long way to go still, but ⁓ take care of yourself pastors, ⁓ take care of yourself preachers physically. ⁓ It'll help you engage spiritually in ways that my eyes are just being opened and it's been a grind. I've had to embrace it, but it's been good. Frank Weller: Love it. That's it. out of time. Hey, Danny, I want to thank you. I want to thank our sponsor, Great Lakes Christian College. I want to thank you BP2 listeners for listening and supporting the Better Preaching podcast. You can listen to past episodes as well as read our blog and get more information at betterpreaching.org. So until the next time, better preaching makes a bigger impact.