Morgan Meader- "Tools of the Trade"

In this episode I sit down to describe, explain and share about the books that have helped shape me as a Christian and Pastor, study habits I have adopted over the years and helpful tips that have come from many failures in vocational ministry. 

The hope as always is for our hindsight is to be your foresight. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:32

Hello, everybody, and welcome back to another episode of Aspire Ministries Podcast. Today is a special episode. Um, something that I've been asked quite a bit about, um, as people have seen the videos and the library behind me, and just also friends and those that are aspiring to the role of uh pastor, ministry leader, you know, contemplating is that the road that the Lord is calling me to go down. Uh, I often get asked the question, Morgan, what books do you recommend? Um, how do you study for a sermon? Uh, how do you put together a sermon? And you know, these are tools of the trade of a pastor is having the right books and knowing how to study, knowing how to structure a sermon. And so in this episode today, we're gonna go over some of these things. And I my hope is that for those that are learning these skills and wanting to understand the what tools are out there, that this is beneficial for you. Um, maybe you teach a Bible study, maybe um you teach a class at your church, or maybe just you yourself, you're at home and you want to dive deeper in your own personal devotion time. Um, I hope this is beneficial for you. And so let's just dive into it. This isn't gonna be an exhaustive list if uh as far as the reading list goes. If you want the exhaustive list, go on our Instagram. Uh, you can find it very easily. It's Aspire Ministries. Um if you go on there, uh follow us, and then send me a message, um, I will send you the exhaustive list. Again, it's Aspire underscore ministries. Uh, you can find us, it's the same uh artwork as that's on the podcast, so you'll find us easily. Again, if you go and uh follow us uh and uh send me a message, I'll send you the exhaustive list. But um, I will send you some highlights in different categories. Um, let's go over that right now. Um, so uh if you want a general like theology, if you want to build a good theology, um, here are a couple books that I would start with that um are always good in any library of a Christian. Is uh first, uh this probably won't be a surprise to some of you out there listening, but um what is uh the gospel by Greg Gilbert? It is a tiny little black book. Um, it was one of the first books that I had um when I was starting out at 19 years old, and it is very simple, but it grounds you in what we are called to teach. Um, I think this is a great starting point for anybody really wanting to dive in. Um, also, it's a great book, just if if you're new to the faith. What is the gospel? What is sin? This book will help you out. Um another great book in any believer's library is the famous uh Systematic Theology by Wayne Grudom. This is a book, this is a reference book, it's a big blue book. Um if you want to understand the doctrines of grace, the uh eschatology, uh ecclesiology, um, you name it. If there's a particular doctrine that you're wanting to dive deeper into, what's the history behind it? What's the context of it? What are the different views of this? So take uh eschatology, for instance. You know, we have pre-mill, on mill, post-mill, uh pre-trib, post-trib, like all these different views. This book is gonna help you sort that out and help you understand what each view says and why. What's the biblical evidence for each view? Same with ecclesiology. There's many ways you could say to do church. Um, we have different denominations. What do Methodists say about doing church? What is their theology? What about um Pentecostals? What about Catholics? Uh, you go down the row of all the denominations on there uh within Christendom, and they and systematic theology will be able to help you work that out and help you understand why, how, when, all of the questions. Uh, so if you want some good um general theology books, that's a great place to start. Again, this is an exhaustive list. If you would like that, um, just send us a message and start following our Instagram and you'll get that. Um next for apologetics. Uh, there's I where this is probably where I started um around 18, 19 years old was uh I developed a great interest in apologetics. Um and so there's a lot of great great resources out there right now. Um I uh where I like to start um with this is one of my favorite all-time books. Um, it is a classic. It's called Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis. Um, you may have heard the idea of liar, lunatic, or lord. Uh C. S. Lewis uh penned this for Mere Christianity. And actually, Mere Christianity started as a radio show during World War II and eventually was written down um to what we call Mere Christianity Day. It's a wonderful book. I've read it many times over and over. It is a classic. If you love C. S. Lewis, you'll love this book. And keep in mind that C. S. Lewis was an atheist at one point and then came to know the Lord. And so he's able to articulate certain things from an atheist point of view because that's what he held originally. Um, next, I would put um evidence that demands a verdict. Uh, that's again another classic. It's been around for a long time. It's been revised uh by Josh McDowell. Um, he was somebody that you know was an atheist for a long time. He was one of those that went out to disprove Christianity and ended up fully understanding the truth of it. And these are his findings. Uh, I would highly recommend this for an apologetic section in your library. Um, if you're looking for something, maybe history, culture, how does Christianity interact with these things? Um uh one would be a good church history book would be Church History and Plain Language by Bruce L. Shelley. Uh, this is a great book. Um, I'm actually reading through it for the second time right now just to get my mind refreshed. It's very in-depth. Um, it goes all the way to the time uh really of the apostles, right after Jesus' death, all the way to modern day. And so that's gonna give you a good frame of reference of even why we do what we do today. How did we get here? Um, this is a great church history book. Another one would be by Carl R. Truman, Strange New World. Uh, this really is a book that will help understand culture uh and where church used to play a part and how we've drifted from that. Our church actually um uh did a class on this book, and it was packed. I mean, it was standing room only some weeks in the class, and it was a wonderful study. I highly recommend it. Um another one, I'm gonna throw one more out there for this one. It's called uh and this is not as well known. Um, it's called A Farewell to Mars by Brian Zod. Uh, this is gonna challenge you more in the American culture mindset. Uh uh where where does the Bible and American culture um come together, but also have a lot of differences and and he's gonna challenge you with pr some uh preconceived ideas. So I would definitely recommend that. Uh for pastoral leadership, there's so many great books out there. Um uh one pastoral slash church leadership. That's what I'll call this section. Pastoral slash uh church leadership. Um gosh, there's so many good ones. I'll start with uh Lead by Paul David Tripp. Paul Tripp is one of my favorite um speakers, ra authors. Um, this was a great read. Um and obviously he has the fruit to back up what he's saying. He's been in ministry for a long time, speaks, has a wonderful family. So um I would definitely take his um his writing to heart. Also, any of the nine marks books uh uh published by Crossway, um, they have it's these little books, they're different colors: blue, yellow, green, orange. There's some on church membership, some on the gospel, um uh discipling, conversion, like there's all different types. Highly recommend. They're easy reads, but they get to the point very fast. And it's a thorough study. Um, I would highly recommend for for any eldership to go through these books um as you're forming this. Um church planting. If you're a church planner, uh I read this book many years ago um called Total Church uh by Tim Chester and Steve Timmys. Uh basically they speak about how the what the church is like out in uh England and the London area and planting churches out there looked very different. And just, you know, unfortunately, um, in that part of the world, the gospel um has fallen on hard soil. And so instead of going and getting a building and putting banners out front and having loud worship music, they went into neighborhoods and homes and did more um uh uh church planting in the homes, um, home church style before it was cool, uh before it was popular. So I would recommend that because I think as I was reading it, what it taught me was if you're gonna go out and church plant, you need to understand the culture in which you're gonna plant in. Uh, what are the needs, what are the values, what are the struggles? And they saw that, they recognized it, and they were successful in their effort. And so um, it was a good, good read. Um, highly recommend that. Um something that often when we talk about church libraries, pastor libraries, something that gets overlooked quite often is marriage. Um we can't forget that this is the most important part of our ministry. If our home is falling apart, it does not matter what we're doing outside the home. Not that it needs to be perfect. Okay, when we read the New Testament and we read passages about elder qualifications, it does not say you need to have the perfect family.

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It talks about an orderly family. It talks about a healthy family, a healthy marriage, healthy relationship with your kids.

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And so um one book that I'd like to recommend um on this topic is If only he knew uh by Dr. Gary Smalley. Uh it's been around for I think close to 40 years. Um, it's a little book, If only he knew. And I remember a buddy gave it to me and he said, Because you don't know. And it was such a practical guide to how I was being a dummy and things that I need to improve on. Um I would highly recommend this. Um, if you're looking to improve your marriage, which if you're married, uh you should always be striving to do that. If you're not married, uh there's some really good wisdom in there for you to adhere to now. Uh learn lessons now through books. Um, please do that. Okay. So there's some recommendations there. Another question on this same topic is Morgan, what are some good commentaries? Now, commentaries. There are mixed views on commentaries. Some people think, oh, well, that's just man's um interpretation of the scriptures. You shouldn't do that. You should just open your Bible, pray through it, uh, read it over and over again, and there pops a sermon. And I respect that, and I understand uh, you know, the the mindset of that. However, and I might get some heat for this, uh, but there are some things that if you're gonna take on a teaching role, the Bible itself is not gonna teach you.

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For instance, let me just give you an example here.

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Um uh Jesus walking on water and the disciples call out that it's a ghost, they're afraid. Why?

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Out of everything that they could have said in that moment, why do they say it's a ghost? Have you thought about that? Have you wondered that?

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Why why is that what comes to their mind? Not, oh man, there's somebody walking on water. This is weird. No, it's a ghost. Well, Jewish culture uh was highly superstitious, very superstitious, much like akin to um Pirates of the Caribbean, right? The superstitions within that realm, within that world, right? And so when you understand the culture of the Jewish people, now it makes sense of why they said it's a ghost. Okay, they're superstitious, especially out in the Sea of Galilee, where this was a place known for enemies and darkness and all that type of stuff, right? But again, nowhere in scripture talks about that. You are not gonna find cultural and historical backgrounds that make the scriptures come alive from scripture alone. You need to go to historians that are gonna help explain why certain things happened, why certain things were done, why certain things were said. And so commentaries are a great tool to utilize that aspect for. It's to understand the culture and the history that in which we're studying, because we are so far removed from ancient uh Rome, ancient Greece, ancient uh Israel and the Jews, so far removed from this that it'd be nice if we understood it, but we don't. And so we need the help of those who have studied this culture and studied this history to inform us of why certain things happened, why certain things were said. And so the way I kind of look at commentaries is they're kind of like those um the guards at a bowling alley, right? Next in on both sides of your lane. And so what they're meant to do is to keep you on the straight and narrow. So yeah, you're not going to a gutter. Okay, they're meant to keep you pointing to truth, and the goal here, hopefully, is you're not using just one commentary. Because there is danger in that, you're only getting one perspective. Okay. Uh so let's somewhat switch gears here a little bit into some study habits that I have. Is I have numerous amounts of commentaries um uh on uh the whole Bible, different books, and if I'm studying a certain passage, I'll probably read two, three, four commentaries to see if there's consistency to see um where we should be going. And there's some here that emphasize more history, some emphasize more what's the theological concept of this passage. Okay. Um and so I like to have a diverse amount of commentaries within my study time. And yeah, it takes time, but but if you're gonna be teaching as scripture talks about, you're held to a higher standard. And so you better be taking the time to study. You better be taking the time to read. I remember when I first was uh uh starting out, the um the guy who was my youth pastor, his name is Caleb, he told me that you need to become a reader. There's there's there's no way to teach and preach the Bible without becoming that. And I took that to heart. Um, and so as time went on, I just started building my library, um, asking people what good commentaries, reading reviews, um, and only going to those that I truly trusted and were doing the work of a pastor already. I wasn't just going and asking other believers, I was asking those who were doing the work. No different than I'm not gonna ask somebody who just likes good woodwork, oh, what tools. No, I'm gonna go ask a carpenter what tools to use for whatever project in my house. Right? Uh commentaries are tool to the trade. And so um one commentary set that uh is very well known, is highly regarded, is the New International Commentary. Um the New Testament has a red um uh uh um what do you call it, illustration on it, and then the old testament has a blue illustration on it. Uh these are great sets, highly informative. There's various authors within this commentary set. Highly recommend you can find them on Amazon. Um wonderful addition to your library. I will tell you, this is not a cheap set. Um, especially if you want to go and get the whole set, both the red and the blue, the old and the new. Uh, it's not gonna be cheap for you. Uh, you're probably if you want everything, it's probably gonna run you about 1200 bucks, thousand bucks, something like that in that neighborhood. Um and so that's a commentary set that I would highly recommend for you. Um another one, another set uh specifically on the New Testament would be um the Baker New Testament commentary. Um this tends to be leaning more on the reformed theology side, but again, great resource, highly, highly respected. Um uh now specifically uh there is one commentary. If you're gonna study, there's times right when you're going through a book exegetically, um, and my favorite book of the Bible is Revelation. Um, not because of any one way to see it, whether you're post-mill, pre-mill, on mill. Um, I do have an opinion, but it doesn't really have to do with that. It's when you read Revelation, it's a book of hope. Um to the church, to the world, um, of Christ has conquered all and will come back and establish everything and do away with evil. That is the hope that we have. Um, one commentary that really helps you understand revelation from all viewpoints is uh Revelation for Views by Steve Gregg. This is so tastily done. Um, and you won't know what view he's taking. Uh and he goes through all of them. Uh so highly recommend if that's of interest to you. I would highly recommend that. Um Going back a little bit to the study habits. This is something that, you know, everybody does stuff a little differently. Uh, you know, for some people, um, they have to type everything out, some people they write everything out, some people use different colors, some people memorize their sermons. Um, there's different tactics. And here's the thing I want to emphasize, you need to find what method of study is best for you. What I'm gonna share has worked for me. Um, it's been beneficial for me. Maybe it will be for you too, but understand you need to find your method of study and preparation. Uh, what works for you? We're all different people, we all learn differently, we all understand differently. So learn your way where you are going to be the most effective as a teacher and preacher of the gospel. So, with that being said, my way of study and preparation is first, um, if I'm given a passage to preach from, I'll probably read that passage close to 10 times just on my own, no commentary, no nothing. I'll probably read it close to 10 times just to make sure I'm I'm understanding it, and I'll read the passages before it, the passages after it, so that I get full context of what is being said here. I'll do the underlining, the highlighting, the thought bubbles, the whole thing in my Bible. Um, this is my time of my own study and me trying to understand what this passage is saying, uh, what the Lord intended for this, what is the intended audience, all of that. From there, that's when I will get into the other commentaries. That's when I will take two, three, or four commentaries and really dive into the history, the culture, the Greek, the Hebrew, um, the uh the depth of theology that this particular passage is uh is going into. This is where the notes, when I take exuberant notes, um, I have notebooks upon notebooks upon notebooks of just my study notes that I have saved from various books of the Bible that I've taught through. And so I'll take two, three, or four commentaries and do that. Obviously, throughout this whole period of time, I am praying, Lord, please reveal to me the truth of this passage. Lord, please show me what you have for this message for your people that are going to be in that room when this message is delivered. Um, Lord, reveal your truth to me. I'm constantly praying through this. Once I've exhausted all of those, those two um parts of study of reading underlined on my own study and then utilizing commentaries. Once I've exhausted that, at that point now, that's when I will start to craft the sermon. Give it a title, have my points, right? I typically have four or five points per sermon. Um, that's just how I operate. Um, and that's when I'll kind of start getting ideas of where the points are gonna lead. Once you kind of get that, that's kind of your skeleton of the sermons once you get the title and the um and the points down of the of your sermon. And for me, some people roll their eyes at me, some people have embraced it themselves when I say this. Is I actually have in my study a big old whiteboard, and I've been doing and I write my sermons on on marker on my whiteboard, uh, on dry race. You know, I fully write it out and I do colors. The main point is black, and then I go to green, and then I go to blue, and just with each sub point, it's a different color. Uh Aaron, who is a good friend of mine, uh ministry partner. Uh we've been ministry partners for years. We've seen each other uh grow in our pastoral uh roles, and we've become husbands and fathers, and it's been just this great journey the Lord has brought us on. But to this day, he makes fun of me for doing this. But it's my process. This is how I work it out. And it's just something how I've always learned it's not just I can't just be taught or told or read something. I must do it. And so for me to write it out, write my sermon out, that's me doing it. It gets more ingrained in me. And so once then the whole whiteboard is taken up with what I've written, I'll sit back, read it, and if I'm happy with it, if it flows correctly, then I will start typing it up. And I'll do this until my sermon is completed. And there's different mechanics that as you progress in your pastorate, you will get better at. Uh, for me, uh the hardest thing for me was the transitions from point to point. That was very hard for me. But again, if you work at it, if you have somebody you trust that can help you uh work at it, that's gonna help grow you, but you can't stop. Um and so I would just write it out, type it up until I was finished, until I was happy with it, until I felt that this message is the best in my ability to deliver to the church in which I'm pastoring, that the Lord will be exalted in this message, that the gospel will be proclaimed in this the best way I can. Um and then after I have delivered this message, one piece, because it's not you're not done yet. There is more that needs to be done after you've delivered it, and that is you need to go back and either watch or listen to yourself. If you if if the sermon has been recorded audio and video, go watch yourself. Because you're gonna see how you are up there, you're gonna see what you do with your hands, you're gonna see your facial expressions, how you stand, how you slump, however. And that's gonna help you become better and better and better. If your sermon was only done audio, that's okay. You're gonna hear your pitch, you're gonna hear your tone, you're gonna hear yourself deliver point for point. There has never been a sermon that has been recorded that I haven't gone back and re-listened to because I tell you, even though it might make you cringe to hear yourself, you learn a ton about yourself and how you need to grow. You'll hear, oh, that's my 15th um in this sermon. I need to stop that. Or maybe you have a different word that you use, or maybe you don't like how much space there is. Maybe you just leave blank spaces just like that, right? Just like that emptiness, that space. If you're able to, when you when you listen to yourself, when you watch yourself, you're able to enhance that now. You're able to correct that and become better and hone your craft of preaching because preaching is a craft. It is something to learn and hone. And when you have somebody that's in the fight with you that is doing the same work as you, they're able to help you and you help them. Again, I brought him up. Aaron, him and I have done that for each other now since 2011. He has sent me sermons, I've sent him sermons, I've watched him deliver sermons, he's watched me deliver sermons, and we ask each other give me the good, the bad, and the ugly.

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And I can tell you that I would not be the pastor nor the preacher without that. Without that type of relationship, without that type of friendship and partnership.

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So go find that person if you don't have that person. Because I promise you, you will grow way more with that person than without. Um and so that kind of, you know, as far as study habits, books that I utilize. Um, and and I want to emphasize find a place where you can just dwell in your study. What I mean, if you're the type of person that you can do that at a coffee shop, go to a coffee shop. If you need to lock yourself in a room and not be disturbed for four hours, go do that. Like I said at the beginning, each and every single one of us is a little different on how we're going to study. But find your method, find your way. I remember I was told this many years ago um about crafting sermons and preaching. Is um is you need to preach the truth, but you need to make it delicious. And what what that person meant by that was like where we live here, I could probably think of ten different Italian restaurants here in just San Clemente. And San Clomeni is not that big of a town, I'm telling you, it's not. Like, yeah, like 10 different ones are popping in my head right now.

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But what makes them distinct from each other? Right? What makes them distinct?

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And so they're all good. I've been to a lot of them, they're all delicious and good. But what makes one distinct over the other? And so when you're crafting your sermons, make sure the most important, Christ is exalted, the gospel is preached. That needs to be job one of every sermon. But then make it appetizing. Make it so you the people that you are preaching this gospel to wants to hear more out of you, where they want to come back because of how you are preaching the truth. Not that you're tickling their ears as scripture talks about, not that you're being seeker friendly, not that you're just putting a bunch of sugar and tasty things on top. No, no, no, that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about a good, hearty meal.

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Where people are walking away saying, I need to hear that again. I need to be filled again. Your aim should be that.

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Your aim is to, as I said, job one, Christ exalted, gospel preached, and make and then third second to that is making it appetizing.

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Make it appetizing.

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Some people are gonna say, Morgan, how dare you should be discipleship. Discipleship is done one-on-one and it's done over time.

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It's done over time. If you go to a restaurant and the and the food is terrible, you're not going back.

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But the food is delicious, you're coming back. And you're gonna have more, and you're gonna try new things, and you're gonna get to know the waiters and the waitresses and the people there, and there will be a relationship there.

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If your sermons are delicious, for people seeking truth, they'll come back. And a relationship will start. And when the relationship starts, that's where discipleship will start. Make sense? So make your sermons delicious. I hope this has been helpful.

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I hope this has been beneficial. And again, the whole reason why we wanted to do this special episode is because going back to the beginning of why this podcast even started, and the heart behind this podcast is for those aspiring to the role of elders, it speaks about in 1 Timothy chapter 3.

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I want to equip you for the work of the gospel in any way I can.

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And the way this podcast is going to do it primarily is through the experience of those that have gone before you so that their hindsight becomes your foresight.

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And with this particular episode, it has taken me since 2011 to build a library that I have.

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Not that this is not that my library's anything impressive, it really isn't. But it's it's taken a lot, a lot of hard work, a lot of research to get get it to where it is.

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And if I can help you just make that maybe a little easier and give you some tools that, hey kid, this book really helped. This will help craft this.

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This will help you in this, and that's what I want to do. Or again, for that believer that just wants to div dive deeper, great.

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Here's some resources.

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And so in your journey and aspiring to this role, I'm hoping these resources, I'm hoping these habits, I'm hoping what I've shared here today is going to help you on your journey. If you have any other questions, please feel free to message us on our Instagram. Again, if you'd like the full exhaustive reading list, I will send that to you. Just start following our Instagram page and send us a message, and I'll get that to ASAP. Thank you for tuning in. And until next time,