Clear Preaching
You worked hard on that sermon. Did they actually hear it?
Clear Preaching is the podcast for preachers who are serious about closing the gap between what they meant to say and what their congregation actually heard. Hosted by Dr. Jonathan McClintock — preacher, pastor, sixteen-year homiletics instructor, and developer of the four-domain Clear Preaching Framework — each episode delivers practical, framework-driven teaching on the discipline of preaching with clarity.
Through solo teaching episodes, conversations with preachers and scholars, and real sermon analysis, Clear Preaching helps you develop clarity at every stage of the preaching process — from the moment you open the text in your study to the moment you close your Bible in the pulpit.
Whether you are stepping into the pulpit for the first time or have been preaching for decades — if you believe the message you carry is worth delivering as clearly as possible, this podcast is for you.
Episodes
12 episodes
Ep 12: How Do I Decide What to Preach?
Every week, preachers sit down to prepare a sermon. And every week, many of them start in the wrong place.They open a commentary before they've asked the most important question: Who is actually sitting in front of me on Sunday?...
Ep 11: What Actually Is Clarity in Preaching: And Why Is Everyone Suddenly Talking About It?
"Clarity" has become the word everyone in preaching circles is using right now. Coaching programs. Seminary institutes. Training cohorts. It's everywhere.But when everyone uses the same word, the word starts to lose its meaning.In...
Ep. 10: Illustration and Application
Most preachers know they need illustrations. Fewer know what makes an illustration actually work.The problem isn't that preachers don't tell stories — it's that they tell stories that entertain without landing. The illustration ends, the...
Ep 9: Don't Let AI Preach
AI can write your sermon in 90 seconds. It cannot tell you if your sermon has a point.Most pastors are using AI tools in some form now — and there's nothing wrong with that. The problem is what happens when a preacher lets AI do the heav...
Ep 8: Simpler Than You Think: Simplifying Sermon Preparation
Sermon prep doesn't have to feel like chaos every week.Most preachers sit down to prepare without a clear, repeatable process — and it shows. They read, study, collect ideas, stare at a blank page, start over, and patch something togethe...
Ep. 7: The Three Movements of the Open
Most preachers spend the least preparation time on the part of the sermon the congregation experiences first.Before you announce your text, before you say a word about the passage — something has already happened in the room. The congreg...
Ep. 6: The Foundation: Keeping the Sermon Textually Honest
Most preachers have sat with a rich biblical text and felt pulled in multiple directions. The passage says several true things. You can only preach one. How do you choose — and how do you know you're not just preaching what you already wanted t...
Ep. 5: Domain #4 - Clarity of Delivery
Episode 5: Domain Four — Clarity of DeliveryMost of what has been written about delivery in preaching treats it as a performance category — voice, presence, energy, gesture. Those things matter. But this episode is about something...
Ep. 4: Domain #3 - Clarity of Language
Your congregation never sees your exegesis. They never see your outline. The only thing they encounter — from your first word to your last — is your language. And most preachers have never systematically evaluated it.In this episode of ...
Ep. 3: Domain #2 - Clarity of Structure
"Here is a question worth sitting with: how well does your congregation follow your sermon when you preach? Do you even know the answer? Do you assume they do, or do you know they do? Some preachers/churches provide the congregation...
Ep. 2: Domain #1 - Clarity of Thought
"You have studied the text carefully. You know it well. You have commentaries open, cross-references marked, theological context understood. And then you sit down to build your outline — and something is harder than it should be. The sermon doe...
Ep. 1: Why Hard Work Isn't Enough: The Gap Every Preacher Feels but Can't Name
I have preached sermons I worked hard on, believed deeply, and watched land with far less force than I intended — and for a long time, I didn't know why. In this first episode, I tell the story behind Clear Preaching: the early years of confusi...