Hey Friends -

All month we have been talking about what it means to stretch your sermon beyond Sunday. The first couple of weeks where more theoretical and started building out this larger idea of how sermons can be part of a larger vision of formation and discipleship. Last week I shared with you the easiest way I know to get a sermon podcast off the ground.

Today we are going super old school.

As in a handout and put it in your bible.

At my last church, we started doing these HomeSheets. I got tons of questions in my inboxes from people about them. And a bunch of churches and pastors I know started doing them. I want to share with you the idea today.

The idea was borne in a way to literally keep people thinking about the message during the week. These weren't stand alone devotionals, and they really weren't designed to be done in one sitting. We would use them to engage in the scripture from Sunday morning (hence seeing the Luke teaching text and the Jeremiah engagement). And we would always ask people to "think" and to "do". These sheets were designed for individual use AND for a couple of small groups that were meeting through the week and focused on the Sunday message.
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Each week as I was working on the sermon, I also had a note file where I would think through the home sheet. I would sometimes take pieces or questions that were editing out of the message and put them in there. We would also talk about the homesheet during the closing of the message at times and talk to people about the specific discipleship actions. I always tried to tier the questions and the discipleship actions to the vareity of Christian experience we had in the church. Some folks were really comfortable with the tough stuff and others were just starting a more introspective side of the Christian life.
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Each week we would also have these as a .pdf in google drive. That means we could link to them during the Sunday livestream, and the podcast download.

At first I questioned how effective they actually were, but we started having to print more each week, so I knew folks were taking them. They also started to come up in conversations with others, and would also get featured in instagram posts by those who were using them for their own personal worship. I began to realize that like anything, we had to talk about it on Sunday morning for folks to realize they were there and get comfortable using them. And when they were integrated well into the sermon, and seen to be an extension of the teaching ministry of the church they became more popular.
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If you are stretched for energy and resources, and want to begin working on this more expansive idea of the sermon and your churches formation, I would highly recommend trying out the HomeSheet strategy for 6 months. If you have questions about them, hit reply and let's talk.

Chad

PS. I am building out my coaching schedule for the first quarter of next year and have open slots. My rates are going up a bit, but if you want to book out coaching, let's talk soon. You can fill out this quick form here and grab a free 30 minute exploratory call.