Why I Track My Sermon Examples

A few weeks ago I read a challenging article in The Atlantic. Ed Yong, a staff writer for Atlantic, detailed his attempt over the previous two years to achieve balance between male and female sources in his articles. You can read Yong’s story here.

Ed’s personal journey led me to wonder: do the examples I use in my messages reflect the diversity of the congregation that I serve in? The only way to find an answer to this question was to follow Ed Yong’s example, and begin tracking the diversity of the examples I use.

Sadly, after compiling a spreadsheet of my sermons for the past year I discovered that my results were similar to Yong’s. In the eight messages I had given only 22% of the examples I used were females, even though Christian history is full of powerful examples of women of faith. I knew that I had to do better so I have continually updated this spreadsheet, and refer to it when I am building my messages, and I have seen it impact my planning in three key ways.
 

Tracking My Examples Pushes me out of my Comfort Zone

Now that I am a few weeks into this project I can say that it has been harder than I expected. It takes extra work, and extra research, to find examples that are outside of my typical wheelhouse. I have had to call friends from different Christian traditions to ask for their help. This task however is good for me.

I have been reminded that if I do not do the work of finding these examples, and translating the gospel into the language of my listener, then they will be forced to translate it for themselves. As a minister it is a privilege, to endure some challenge and discomfort, in order to help people understand my message.

Tracking My Examples Helps Me Build a Library of Stories

Since I started using the spreadsheet, with the goal of adding greater diversity to my examples, I have noticed an unintended consequence. Occasionally, in my preparation, I will come across a great example, but when I go to use it it my sermon it will skew my numbers because of the people involved. Instead of using that story I save it, waiting for a time when numbers are better in line with my congregation. Doing this is challenging but this discipline is required to keep on track with my goal.    

Tracking My Examples Keeps me Honest

It is easy to assume that you are better at something than you are. My spreadsheet gives me cold hard data that doesn’t lie. I can see in real time if I am living up to my goal. My goal is to the best communicator that I can be, and the only way to do that is find an improve on my weakest areas. Honestly tracking my examples helps me to ensure that I use examples that can connect with the broadest spectrum of people in my congregation.