Pinterest is likely not the first place most pastors turn for help in preparing their sermons. Pinterest may, however, be at least one place pastors turn before they finish preparing their sermons. Those who are willing to at least give it a shot and create an account may discover a trove of resources they never expected. I use Pinterest almost every week when preparing to preach. Here are three resources I regularly mine from this social media network:
Story-Telling Help
If you are a preacher, you are a story-teller. You should be regularly working to hone your story-telling craft. Pinterest is over-run with writers and aspiring writers who love to share their trade secrets with one another. Searching terms such as “story”, “writing” or “plot” will reveal lists, links, articles and charts all designed to make you a better story teller. I attempt to spend a little time each week reading story-telling material. I look for places in each sermon to implement the lessons I’m learning. Occasionally, when it works, I’ll structure a sermon as if it is one long story. While these skills can be learned elsewhere, a few clicks on Pinterest often proves beneficial and time-efficient.
Quotes
Quotations make great illustrations. Sometimes others have explained a concept using words that are much more sticky than anything I could manufacture. I may use an exact quotation in a sermon or I may refer to one and paraphrase it. I may discover a quote that prompts a line of thinking for me which leads me to an “aha” moment. I might just include a quote in the sermon follow-up materials I distribute via YouVersion.
Pinterest is a wonderland of quotations. Simply type in a topic or concept and begin scrolling. You will quickly discover many visual quotes and the more you click, the further down the rabbit hole you’ll go. Pinterest remembers your searches and your clicks, so the more you use the site, the better it will know you and it will sort your search results more efficiently. (You can see some of the quotes I’ve saved over the past few months here.)
Lists of Words
In a 30 minute sermon, I’ll use anywhere between 3500-5000 words. I want these words to be chosen wisely and to effectively communicate my message. I don’t want my words to be a distraction because they are repetitive, imprecise or misused. In addition to avoiding “um” and “ah” (I’m still working on this one), I hate when I say “things” because I’ve demonstrated I wasn’t quite ready to communicate an important truth.
Pinterest is crawling with word charts. If you want to avoid saying “thing”, you can find 200 better words to use. Do you want to communicate badness but want a better word than “bad”? Abhorrent, abominable and appalling are just 3 of the 100 words you can discover on Pinterest. I have a Pinterest board titled, “Expanding My Arsenal of Words.” Every week, I pull up one or two lists of words I’ve clipped and read through them a couple times. By filling my mind with alternative words, I’m growing my working vocabulary. This practice spills over into my preaching and empowers me to be more precise and concise.
Pinterest can feel like a non-preacherly site to visit. It may not work for you. However, if you give it a shot, you may discover a new source of material which will aid your sermon preparation process.
I imagine others use Pinterest as a piece of their sermon preparation process as well. If that’s you, I’d love to hear how you are benefiting from this site
SERMON|GEEK 