Can I Borrow This?
- Posted by: Todd
- Posted on: Tue, October 09, 2007
- Viewed 71
- (10) comments so far
• I am not saying pastors should not study or spend time with God and wrestle with a text.
• I am not saying that pastors should claim as their own that which clearly is not.
• I am not saying pastors should use entire sermons verbatim.
Here is what I am saying. I think it is AWESOME when a pastor uses another pastor’s sermon. Here is why.
Borrowing has given me fresh insight into the Word of God from other pastors. For years pastors have robbed themselves of the opportunity to gain insight from other pastors in the word of God by not listening to other pastors preach. Hearing how a message is presented is a valuable tool in gaining wisdom and discernment into a text. Often I will listen to another preacher and find the Holy Spirit has used their insight into the word to quicken my heart and give me new insight into God’s Word.
Borrowing provides me the opportunity to hone my presentation skills. Let’s face it; throughout history God has gifted some brilliant preachers. Their ability to capture the truth of God’s Word in the language of the culture shines brightly. When we use other pastor’s messages we can improve our abilities in presentation by seeing how they turn a phrase, their use of words and their insight into the culture in which they speak. We can also gain valuable training into cadence and rhythm.
Borrowing helps me maximize other pastor’s spiritual gifts that are used in their preaching. My preaching is seasoned with the gift of evangelism, wisdom and leadership. It is usually not seasoned with mercy as that is not one of my gifts. I listen to and borrow sermons from someone with the gift of mercy and discover mercy comes out in my preaching. Preaching and teaching is definitely a gift from the Holy Spirit but often other gifts come together to make preaching and teaching connect. When I use parts of sermons from differently gifted pastors I find those gifts tend to come out in my sermons.
Borrowing helps me grow in the skills of collection and organization of content. Preaching is strategic and a part of that strategy is how information is collected and organized. Borrowing has opened up many resources for me as I collect information in the process of study. Borrowing has also helped me think better thoughts about how information is organized. The sequence of points being made is very important to the points being understood. This in my opinion does not preclude the Holy Spirit but in my experience is something the Holy Spirit has used to help me as a pastor.
Borrowing enables me to work collaboratively with the Holy Spirit and other pastors. When I first started in ministry pastors did not share their sermons, their ideas or their resources. It was considered taboo to not spend 30 hours a week alone in my study, mining nuggets of truth for my church. I discovered that many pastors were working on similar sermons and had wisdom and insight I did not. In my isolation I was made weaker not stronger in preaching. Today I share at least 2 sermon series a year with pastors of other churches. By doing this I am able to partner with other preachers who are passionate and gifted in communicating God’s Word. Dividing the sermon preparation has enabled me focus on one particular portion of a sermon while another pastor focuses on a different piece. This partnership makes a better sermon series.
Borrowing has made me a better steward of my time. I have more freedom to develop leaders, disciple others, cast vision, counsel people and still be a father and husband. Shepherding people is not just about feeding people, sometimes it requires us to fetch sheep, lead sheep, coach sheep, counsel sheep and develop other shepherds. Borrowing has enabled me to find a bit more time to be a well balanced shepherd.
Let me close with my 4 rules of borrowing:
1) Never let borrowing replace study.
2) Give Credit. I will say I am grateful to Pastor…. For his brilliant work on this subject.
3) Never use someone else’s personal illustration as your own.
4) Keep all your borrowing in the light. Darkness divides; light brings fellowship.
For interaction:
What do you think about borrowing other pastor’s sermons series, titles and messages? What rules do you apply to borrowing? When does borrowing become stealing? How has borrowing helped you in your ministry?
About the author: Leonard Lee a regular commenter here at MMI. He is also a church planter and a veteran of over 25 years of ministry. He is married to his best friend and they have two awesome kids. He currently pastors Bayside of Central Roseville and loves to hunt, fish and play.
A few years back, on the East Coast, a pastor got fired for using another pastor’s sermons. Week after week he shared the illustrations, made the points and spoke each sermon as though he created them in the privacy of his own study. We call this plagiarism... Today, pastors put their sermons on line as MP3’s and PDF’s with an open invitation to other pastors; “Use them any way you want.” Often when this is discussed amongst Christian leaders there are many who are aghast that this kind of “borrowing” would ever take place. They cannot imagine any man of God not investing the hours into preparation and study necessary to develop “original” sermons. If that is the camp you are in you might not agree with me here but before you disagree let me make three clarifications...
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bishopdave on Tue, October 09, 2007
Good points. When you get right down to it, nothing you say in that pulpit is original with you. How much of our study time results in quoting what you’ve read in the commentary or heard from Swindoll? I certainly wasn’t the first guy to tell that illustration about the old violin at the auction; nobody cried plagiarism when someone wrote a song based on that illustration.
Who teaches the pastor? do we not constantly encourage one another to pursue spiritual growth? Reading & hearing sermons of others is a good thing. Maybe not copying, but many times those resources have helped me find a direction to take on the sermon. And remember, if you copy from one source it’s plagiarism; more than one source, it’s research. Just give credit where credit’s due.
Brian on Tue, October 09, 2007
My favorite place to look for illustrations and other sermons for more insight is http://www.sermoncentral.com.
It’s also where I post my sermons. Anyone can get any of the 10’s of thousands of sermons, illustrations, etc.
You have to get Pro for some of the stuff, but all the sermons are available for free.
As Leonard mentioned, one of the benefits of borrowing is not just seeing something else in the text, but finding better ways to present the truth you’ve found.
Another benefit is that you might find that you are totally off in what you were seeing in the passage, and seeing a bunch of others come to different conclusions will make you re-think some things. Hopefully that won’t happen very often, but it’s a great way to check, especially if you aren’t in the habit of simply writing your sermons by copying the commentary!
A third benefit is on the part of those who put their sermons out there. There’s nothing like getting a phone call or e-mail saying that someone used your sermon and God decided to do something huge through it.
It brings me to tears, thanking God for the opportunity to be a blessing to someone in that way and partnering with Him for the advancement of His kingdom.
Thanks Leonard!
Eric Joppa on Tue, October 09, 2007
I am not a huge fan of using sermons verbatum, (points and scripture references) and definatley not illustrations. I do think, however, that there is alot to be learned from the messages of other preachers.
Something I have found invaluable at times, is series ideas/titles/subjects. When I feel a little low on ideas, there are alot of great series ideas, that have served as a spring board for me to put the most effective stuff together for my people. It is taylored for my people right where they are and has been given to me through study and prayer, but the spring board was the idea I got from another preacher.
Good Stuff Leonard!
-E
Wendi on Tue, October 09, 2007
I was part of a church staff that lost a very loved pastor over this issue. His departure caused a church split. When it became known, those who loved him said, “who cares where he gets his stuff from, as long as it’s good, biblical and helps people grow.” He failed to follow two of Leonard’s rules; he didn’t give credit and he preached sermons about 2/3 verbatim. Even if he had given credit and used his own wording, it might not have prevented the brouhaha, as those who were most upset were from our “anti-seeker church” faction, upset with his choice of sermon mentor (RW) as much (perhaps more) than they were with the practice itself.
Having experienced this, I would emphasize Leonard’s rule number 2. Omitting the credit giving isn’t a sin against the sermon’s originator, it’s a breach of trust with the congregation that reasonably assumes their pastor’s message is his/her own, unless he says otherwise. In our case, giving credit to Rick Warren would have been troublesome for our pastor, because he would have had to give credit every single Sunday.
You listed several cautions Leonard, but one slightly different take on those is that borrowing (as a general practice) can prevent a pastor from seeking the Lord on behalf of the unique needs of his own congregation. We felt that we had been betrayed in two ways. The first I mentioned above was obvious, he knowingly allowed us to believe something that was untrue. The second (because so much was verbatim) was that we felt he had failed to seek the Lord’s guidance about what we needed to hear from scripture, how the sermon text should be applied to our unique challenges and ministry opportunities. We only heard what RW had been led to teach his congregation at Saddleback in upper-middle class Orange County (Remember me . . . I’m a RW fan. Our problem wasn’t his bad).
I love the idea of collaborative prep of a sermon series with fellow pastors from different churches. I’ve heard of churches doing this in house with the preaching rotation team, but your idea is a new one for me Leonard. Think of how a group of pastors collaborating on a series to be preached at several churches in a community can join their efforts to challenge members to impact the same community. Now that is innovation!!!
Thanks Leonard - Wendi
Paul J. on Tue, October 09, 2007
A similar argument can be made for musicians. As a performer, I started out sounding like the artists that influenced me the most. Now, because I learned from the best (fresh insight…honing skills…“collaboration”, even though it was one-way), I have my own style, and it’s better than it would have been otherwise.
I’m planning on teaching a series on worship in January that was originally taught by Rick Warren. I’ve already let people know this far in advance that I’ve borrowed the main framework and content from him, and that I’ll be tweaking it and adding my own experiences and insight. Everyone is cool with it…
Derek on Tue, October 09, 2007
Leonard,
Are you saying that pastors should not study or spend time with God and wrestle with a text themselves?!?! (I am just kidding. I put that in there for contentious MMI readers who will miss your disclaimer.)
Seriously, bishopdave is right on. There is nothing really original in preaching. It is just repackaged. If you use a Bible commentary in your sermon you have borrowed. We all borrow and we should.
You (LL) make a good point that borrowing allows us to work collaboratively with the Holy Spirit and other pastors. We are the body of Christ together and so why not use the creativity and the insight gained from other pastors.
When I borrow, I try to change it slightly. For example, I am preaching through 1 Corinthians and was looking for a series title. I saw that Mark Driscoll preached through the same book and called it “Christians GOne Wild.”
I called mine “Church Gone Wild.” But I received a lot of ideas from Mark…thanks MD!
In my notes, I try to attribute quotes—
or major sermon points—to the original author.
If anyone wants to borrow from me, feel free. My mp3s and pdfs are at http://www.cornerstoneamericus.com/sermons
Derek
Peter Hamm on Tue, October 09, 2007
Well, in my own words, here’s my four rules for borrowing
1) Never let borrowing replace study.
2) Give Credit. I will say I am grateful to Pastor…. For his brilliant work on this subject.
3) Never use someone else’s personal illustration as your own.
4) Keep all your borrowing in the light. Darkness divides; light brings fellowship.
Just kidding along Derek’s lines…
I copied a whole song of David Crowder’s last week… I hope I don’t get fired…
Camey on Tue, October 09, 2007
Hey Leonard? Can I borrow this?
Oh.. okay..seriously.. As someone who enjoys listening to sermons from a variety of individuals as well as my hubby too…. there are times when we’re listening and go… “Hey! Heard that word for word before.” Often times it prompts the discussion of… why did that particular sermon stick out both times?
The only time I really think it inappropriate to use someone else’s sermons is if the person doing so is not wanting to spend any time studying God’s Word for themself.
Thanks Leonard.
Doug Smith on Fri, October 12, 2007
If others’ sermons are going to be utilized this way, why not get someone skilled in dramatic speech or acting to present the sermons when it’s time to present them? Why does it need to be the pastor? Couldn’t someone do just as well from the congregation? Why not just show them a video of someone doing it better than we could, since the same technological revolution that made all this mass-borrowing possible makes bringing another preacher’s persona (regardless of where he is or even if he’s alive) to the people through media? Will this encourage preaching through books of the Bible?
I can see how familiarity with others’ material can be a blessing. But it seems to me that should come in one’s own private study. Who wouldn’t benefit from reading a Spurgeon sermon aloud (pastor or not)? Of course, one could have a study where such things are read (and acknowledge it). But it really seems to bypass the work needed for authentic shepherding where the sermon comes from the warp and woof of the pastor’s own time in the Word and knowledge of his people (I’m not saying that an adapted sermon can’t minister, just that it is quite likely to be more generic than a pastor doing his own legwork and creating his own sermon from his time in the Word and, later, secondary materials. I’m not accusing you of saying no study should be done.)
I’m afraid advice like this, if heeded, will only lead to an increase in plagiarism and dishonest and lazy preachers.
Leonard on Fri, October 12, 2007
All, thanks for the input and comments.
Doug I think a short answer to your question is about gifting and calling. It is not the call of an actor to lead the church. I am not advocating that we verbatim make speeches that we deem better than the ones we might come up with on our own but then I think that was clear in the article.
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