I love yellow legal pads. I love the blue horizontal lines across the face of the yellow paper. And don’t get me started on the double red vertical lines on the left side. Think of the lists you could make, the bullet points that could be arranged, or the post-script inspirations that could reside on the left side of that line. Sometimes I get one out just so I can think, like an intellectual version of Pavlov’s dog. I buy them by the pack at Sam’s Club and flip the page and write, flip the page and write, flip the page and write. And then I throw them away.
In fact, I just did that very thing. Upon discovering that a couple of previous generation legal pads were filled with everything from budget calculations for construction projects to grocery lists to sermon notes, I threw them away. Gone. In the trash. And yes, you read correctly, my sermon notes.
There’s sort of a conundrum regarding sermon notes. The preacher (hopefully) studies and prays and meditates over a text until a sermon emerges. His notes represent that entire process, which encompasses at least the time invested in those aforementioned activities. But ideally, it represents the totality of his life. Because while some topics are narrow, the preacher still brings his entire knowledge base and life experience and maturity and holiness to the process. What does the preacher have to show for his effort? One answer is his sermon notes.
I should give a disclaimer before continuing. Most people would (and do!) laugh when they see my sermon notes, or find them lying on the pew next to my Bible. My notes are…sparse. I only take with me what I know I will need to remember the flow of the sermon, or what I know I can’t remember – like quotations from extra-biblical sources. Other than that, my goal is for my sermon to follow the text in a natural way. The more notes I have, the more I have struggled to untangle the knots in my head. Anyway, the point is that those who have invested in more thorough sermon notes (and it is entirely possible that I should become one of those people!) may have a different sense of this thing than I.
Ok, on to a narrative. A friend of mine related a story about going into ministry as a young man. He was just starting out on his journey and so a mentor of his decided to help him by bestowing upon him the gift of approximately 50 years worth of sermon notes, collected in multiple boxes. It was a kind gesture and kindly meant, but one sees the problem, doesn’t one? First, they took up a lot of space. Second, they were hard to search. But even assuming that one could digitize them and make them searchable, it’s hard to know how much value they would really have. High quality scholarly works are available that, from the perspective of utility, would likely exceed the value of the mentor’s notes. For sermon structure, my young friend was more likely to establish his own. In short, the material was of little value to my friend, though he was very appreciative of the gesture.
So my notes get thrown in the trash. Sometimes I wish I had carefully saved and organized them. But then I wonder where I would store them, and whether they wouldn’t be a burden pulling me towards the past, and why I would want to saddle my children with them. I think of the Dewitt Talmages and the John MacArthurs of the world and how I have profited from reading their sermons, but with almost 30,000 preachers in North America, we can’t all leave a legacy of sermons to be read by our descendants. And this doesn’t even take into account the reality that I am NOT a Jonathan Edwards or Spurgeon caliber preacher.
So the notes are disposable. But this doesn’t bother me anymore than it should bother a chef that his recipe card got discarded. The deed is done, so to speak. The meal has already been prepared and eaten, enjoyed and digested. The work of the meal is accomplished, and the recipe card is only needed if the chef intends to make the same meal again and for some reason cannot re-produce it. But this doesn’t often happen to me because I preach from the same pulpit every week and my “meals” are never repeated.
I’m not advocating that everyone be as laissez faire about their notes as I am, and I’m not saying that there aren’t things worth writing down and saving. Perhaps there is a particular work or topic or even book that you may want to invest in. I am saying that there is no reason to despair if you can’t go to a filing cabinet (or several) filled with past sermons. The work of the Spirit in the hearts of believers as you preach the Word is the work. Hopefully, the impact of your studies has stayed with you and the words of Scripture are still fixed in your heart. Your writings may be disposable, but His are magnified above His name and not one iota has fallen. You may write down some things that should be remembered for a generation, but His are the Words that will last for eternity.
Nathan Writes 