In 2010, we're going to challenge NCCers to read through a one-year Bible. And we're thinking about having all of our weekend messages track those readings. But we need some help. If you've done something like this, can we borrow your wisdom? Obviously, you can't preach on all 66 books of the Bible in 52 weeks. Did your messages precede or follow the readings? What worked? What didn't?
This would be a very different endeavor for us. We're pretty intentional about branding our sermon series. And it's not like we wouldn't try to add creative elements. We're just used to new series every 4-6 weeks. A 52-week series is a little different.
Thoughts? Ideas? Input?
This would be a very different endeavor for us. We're pretty intentional about branding our sermon series. And it's not like we wouldn't try to add creative elements. We're just used to new series every 4-6 weeks. A 52-week series is a little different.
Thoughts? Ideas? Input?
33 Comments:
At a previous church we challenged people to read through the Bible in a year and we had a way to submit questions about things they read...then we took the questions that we got the most often and did messages based on those. Of course, that meant we programmed January-February and then took a few weeks to answer questions and then went to another series and then came back and answered more questions between series. Less frequent questions were answered through the newsletter (this was pre-blog era) but now a lot of that could be done online.
I've only ever thought about this and have in fact never done it, but it would be cool if the messages were based on the reading they did that week, allowing them a bit more of an "engagement" into the sermon, where they are familiar with the reading. My thoughts on the "branding" issue are you have 2 choices: you can brand each sermon (that's bit of a stretch with 52 brand icons, background etc.) or you could look ahead at the readings for the 4-6 weeks at a time and brand a common theme out of those readings. That would be cool, because it would be a great way to show how the whole Bible has connective narritive themes that come forth to speak about our lives!
I'm up for it, Pastor Mark! I recently discovered that there's a One Year Chronological Bible, which I plan to tackle in 2010. It's available at Amazon in NLT and NIV. http://www.amazon.com/One-Year-Chronological-Bible-NLT/dp/1414314078/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1256224279&sr=8-1
There is a 90 day Bible out there with some great support material
http://biblein90days.com/
Its a great challenge, but it is much more manageable in a short series
We tried that last year, and we divided the Bible into groups and series with a few stand alone messages, Here are the major series we broke it into.
Wii Generation (Genesis-Joshua)
Timeline (Judges-2 Chronicles)
Way of the Wise (Wisdom Books)
Restoring the integrity of God (Prophets)
The Jesus You gotta know (Synoptic Gospels)
The Family you gotta have (John Acts)
What Were You thinking? (Romans-Galatians)
What Jesus wants for his People (Ephesians-2 Timothy)
Tis the Season-(letters of John and Revelation)
The year we did this was great for us because we combined it with a one year reading plan, and several other resources and tie-ins. The danger is that you lose momentum through the year. But as long as you keep recasting the vision and breaking it up into smaller series, I think it can be a great way to get your congregation engaging in God's word. If we had to do it again though I think we would try to create more group tie-ins so that people could journey together better. We should have used this to launch more groups than we did.
Pastor Mark, I feel like I need to share this blog post with you today. Maybe it's not something you need to hear, but just in case, here it is: http://galsforgod.wordpress.com/2009/10/22/strengths-talents-part-6-do-you-know-your-own-voice/
Oak Hills Church with Randy Frazee and Max Lucado preached through the Bible during 2008/2009. I believe their series was 31 weeks long. The series was called "The Story" and they teamed up with Zondervan with great graphics and even a special Bible (kind of a readers digest version) that people could read through as they went through the series. They sent out study questions via email each week. Albeit, it wasn't a 52 week series, but they did go through every major theme and movement of the Biblical story. The Bible Zondervan produced is laid out like a novel (no chapters and verse notations). Not sure what other supporting materials are out there, but there should be no need to "re-invent the wheel."
Mark, great idea I want to consider further. Right now we're talking about doing something similar that may give you or others some ideas.
We are preaching through Luke in 2009. (Began Dec 08 with Christmas story and just kept going in Jan)
Since Acts is Luke II we're just going to keep going that way too...but with a twist...we're going to break off (either as a sermon series or sm grp emphasis) when we get to an epistle that comes up in the text or chronologically.
So for example, when we get to Acts 18 we will either teach 1 Thess. or get our sm grps to go through it. But we'll show the connection as part of the message.
So we'll have an overall series title for the book of Acts and then sub-series.
Here's the link to our tentative calendar for anyone's use. Preach on!
http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=tXFhwE0fNPmWofhWChjJtWQ&output=html
I challenged my congregation to read through the entire Bible in 2009. I called it Route 66. Most of our members bought a copy of the Daily Walk Bible NLT. Each Sunday I have preached from a key passage in the 20-25 chapters we've read the previous week. It's been amazing. We even have GPS groups meeting in homes midweek that help us stay on course. GPS get it? We gather in Groups for Prayer and Study to discuss personal application of the Sunday message. We are nearing the end of this journey through all sixty-six books of the Bible.
When we finished the Old Testament, we scheduled a Walk Through the Old Testament Seminar as a way of reviewing what we'd read as a church family. Participation was great. We even did the seminar on a Sunday (starting with morning worship).
Greg Asimakoupoulos
Mercer Island Covenant Church
www.partialobserver.com/books
I was really impacted by Mars Hill as they moved through Lamentations during Lent last year. I don't know how you would use that format for an entire year through the Bible, but the basics of study through the week were amazing. We were asked to read specific texts, ponder themes and questions, reflect and respond, pray, and finally a personal application question ie: "What can you offer to others so that they don't feel alone in their suffering?" The week culminated with the sermon. I really liked that this offered the community a chance to be in the Word together and to wrestle with God individually before the spiritual leader's words framed everything. Last year's Lent was one of those places in my spiritual growth where I felt everything was ramped up. I was very appreciative of the work the team must have done to enable a whole people group to encounter God in this way. Looking forward to what we will learn in the journey together next year as you roll out a year in His story!
Hi Mark,
As someone who's been a small group leader at NCC for a couple of years and also aspires to be a pastor, I think this sounds like a great idea. I'm not sure how you'd do branding though. Maybe a different brand for every book of the Bible? It honestly depends on which Bible tract you use. I'd highly recommend checking out the ones at Back to the Bible: http://www.backtothebible.org/index.php/Bible-Reading-Guides.html
Hey Mark! Saw the story in the paper and makes me proud to be apart of the last service and congregation.
Anyway, I have done this with a couple churches and even podcasts. The trend seems to be a scheduled teaching, so the congregation knows ahead of time what chapters/verses the pastor will be teaching on. At the end of each of the sermons the pastor says something like, "Next week we will cover such and such, so read up." On numerous occasions he would ask questions during the sermon and the congregation would actually have answers leading me to believe that they were doing the reading ahead of time.
I don't know if that is really what you were asking, but hope it helps.
I love the idea of a systematic approach to the bible. Especially the Old Testament because when we only get topical teachings on it people have a hard time following because they don't know the history. I'm excited for this!
dustin
http://hobab.endurelife.com
Our church is currently going through The Bible in 90 Days which a previous commenter mentioned. For us it has worked well in that we're challenged to read it in 12 page chunks, and our pastor is preaching through passages based on that week's readings. Haven't seen this many people talk about the Bible together like this before!
How crazy is this! This morning at 10am, I was meeting with one of our guys and we were throwing around the idea of doing a series through the Bible next year, and then I check out your blog and WHOA! I know that Willowcreek did "The Story" series that was mentioned earlier... I think it was done in their midweek "New Community" service. Riverside Community Church (AG) in Oakmont, PA (http://www.riversideconnect.org) just did "The Story" series last year on Sunday mornings. Let us know, via your blog, what you are thinking... might be nice for other churches to get on board.
Mark,
Praying for you guys.
I did something similar to this over the past two years with our young adult service. New Testament one year and Old Testament the other.
We preached following the reading. I wanted our people to come having read, because my primary goal was to inspire people that they could study and understand the Bible on their own. If my sermon precedes their own reading, it could reinforce the idea that they can't understand it without help.
Can't wait to hear how it goes.
Chris
Biblegateway has 61 day reading plan chronological hitting the major themes and events in the Bible. You could cut a few down to 52 weeks, at quick glance King David and Saul have a few multiples. http://www.biblegateway.com/resources/readingplans/chronological.php
Great idea! I've been doing this for 10 weeks now, which puts us on track for 1 Kings this coming Sunday. The way I do it is that everyone self-studies through the book of the week and then on Sunday I teach on AN important part of that book. I don't try to cover the entire book, but something really important that's found in it. Something that helps people know WHY that book is in the Bible and something that helps to really further define God and faith and the understanding of the Gospel. Strengths of this idea are that anyone can come on board and fill in because each week is an individual sermon in a larger schema. Also it helps people get out of the rut of reading the Gospels, Genesis, and Psalms all the time and read books like Obadiah and Jude. It also helps to move through the Bible in that fashion in order to help people understand how the story flows better. Weaknesses to this idea - it can tend to lock out other ideas that you come up with in that long time frame. So, you might have a cool series idea, so you either take a break and sort of get off track, or you write it down and come back to it in a year. Also, a book like Psalms comes along and you feel like you've barely touched it, compared to how in depth you can get with Ruth in a week.
I am thinking of doing a modified version next time around which would be more like a 2 year schedule in which we do sections of the Bible and rotate that with series. So, weeks 1-5 the Pentateuch, then a 2-4 week series, then Joshua-2 Chronicles, then a series, etc. Still thinking about this, but it allows you to not put off inspired ideas for as long, and it keeps things fresh for people who prefer one or the other, but it still allows you to get a good section of teaching in at one time and come back to it. I'll keep checking back here to get more ideas. Thanks!
I should also say that each week, I give an overview of the theme, author, audience, setting, and notable points for that particular book. This lasts maybe 5-10 minutes. Then we really focus in on a story from that book.
took a year preaching through 1 corinthians but we branded each section of the book. so we started with a general series. then Christians Gone Wild, then Old Time Religion, then Supernatural, and we'll finish with 2nd Life.
Still branding...but with an overarching theme. This might be possible with a year in the Bible...but You'd have to look for connecting big ideas.
In one of my old churches, the youth did something like this. They just focused on the big things that absolutely needed to be covered from the last week's reading. So, even though we read 10-12 stories in a week, we only heard preaching on one or two.
As long as every sermon points the people to Jesus, you can't really be going wrong.
I just floated a similar idea with my church last night for our Wednesday night studies. Lots of interest! Really exciting to know I'm not alone out there! I'll keep checking back to learn and offer up things that work/fail for us.
Thanks Mark!
If you guys are going to use the One Year Bible, it combines OT, NT and Psalms for each days reading. So the series itself would not have to start in Gen and in in Rev to go along with the readings for the weeks.
I'll be interested to see what you come up with.
I've experienced two versions of this, once as a member of a church and then last year as a church staff member.
Each had an overall branding...The first was Route 66...the second GPS. Both utilized a small 3 ring binder and the binder began with the "trip itinerary" (the weekly reading checklist).
In both churches as well, the sermon outline/notes was distributed each week with holes punched so that it could go straight in the binder.
Three other helpful things that were implemented were a weekly devotional on the passages/theme for the week...a FAQ page that would answer some of the seemingly odd/difficult texts of the assigned readings...and a "Fast Track" option that allowed people to read key chapters/passages for the week rather than the whole assigned reading if they couldn't keep up.
The branding, as others have mentioned was based on section of the scriptures...Pentateuch, History, Writings, etc.
Everything that was passed out fit into the little half size binder so that by the end, you've got a pretty handy resource, even if you get off track.
If you want more info, let me know at www.mustardrevolution.blogspot.com
We did a series like that last year. We actually took more than a year to finish and did every book. Our chuch assigned the reading to follow with the preaching.
For us, it was not a productive endeavor. I think we did not do a good job making the series relevant to us. Our series was "A Bird's Eye View." It focused on looking the books as a whole instead of bringing application into them. It became more like a seminary class and we lost the appeal of the people.
If you can do it and keep it applicable, I think it can be done effective. Unfortunately, we did not succeed at that.
God Sightings is an experience to read through the One Year Bible and learn to experience God every day. There is a 52-week Companion Guide with grappling questions for people to use as they read the Bible. God Sightings can be done by an entire church as there is a Launch Kit with videos to play during service and ideas for sermons.
We did this in our church, loved it, had a strong following. The sermons reviewed what was already read, we also created small group curriculum that people used as well - hard to do but worth the effort!!!
Check out the four volume Unlocking the Bible Story by Colin Smith. That helped us do this. It's based an a two year through the Bible series he did a few years back.
As one of your previous posters mentioned, Max Lucado's church did The Story: http://www.thestorynow.net/
Check out the link above. My friends went through it and said it was wonderful. Also, they had all of their ages go through it even their preschool classes. I think it is a really great idea.
We planted a church three years ago and have done a read through the Bible plan each year. We create our own plan that involves reading 5 days per week with an Old Testament, New Testament, and Psalm / Proverbs reading each day. This allows for the weekends to catch up and allows people to choose whether to read the whole Bible or just the New Testament for those not ready to take the plunge.
One year I did a Wednesday night Bible study and taught on one story or passage each week from the current weeks reading. It went very well because everyone had read the story or passange and was able to discuss and give feedback more readily.
Our church has really appreciated the 5 day per week plan verses the traditional 7 day.
We are in the midst of doing something similar right now. We're doing it from September-May so that the major holidays line up with our calendar (So the OT stories are from Sept-Dec...then we do the birth story and Christmas and move into the NT)
Our focus in on the stories of people interacting with God rather than on the theological teachings, so we are hitting a lot of the major stories. This week is Joshua.
Our Bible Reading program is going really well (about 30-40% participation). We have people read before the sermon, so everything culminates on Sunday morning. We are having people read 2 ways. 1) we printed up an outline. OR 2) the more effective way. We have used a blogger blog and pre-programmed it to post the scriptures each day. This way people can subscribe, get it on their facebook etc. Had a lot of success with it.
This post has been removed by the author.
Our church reads through the Bible every three years. each Sunday we usually read a portion from the Old Testament, we chant part of a Psalm, we read a section of one of the Epistles and then the Pastor reads from the Holy Gospels. I absolutely love it and think it is a great way for the congregation to be taught the "Whole Counsel of God" rather than the pastor to get stuck on one of his pet peeves. I've also come to realize that when you do this, you hear A LOT of scripture every week.
Here's another idea. Why don't you start at the beginning of the church year (this year begins on November 29) rather than the calendar year.
I'm glad to hear your doing this!
Mark,
I am finishing a series of preaching the whole Bible in 10 sermons. It is based on the series Reading the Bible in 90 days. Here is what I learned:
There are lots of great themes that you have to pass over when you preach large chunks at one time.
There are amazing strands of continuity that weave through all of Scripture.
Preach behind the reading - If they are reading it then you preach it, it will sound familiar.
Use an uber-theme of preaching the Bible through 2010,but break it up into smaller chunks so it feels like several series. You could do a series on the Pentateuch, then the writings, then the prophets, etc.
I have enjoyed the 35,000 foot overview.
Post a Comment
<< Home