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August 6, 2007
by Brian Lowery

From October 2006 through March 2007, Preaching Today surveyed listeners and readers about preaching on family topics. I thought I would put together some highlights from the feedback we received (349 respondents, +/- 5.25 percentage points). Enjoy!

We asked preachers what family-oriented topics should be addressed from the pulpit. As a follow-up question, we asked how many of them had actually addressed those topics from his or her pulpit. Here's what we discovered:

  • 95 percent said adultery should be addressed; 79 percent had actually addressed it.
  • 93 percent said divorce and remarriage should be addressed; 64 percent had actually addressed it.

  • 88 percent said disciplining children should be addressed; 67 percent had actually addressed it.
  • 87 percent said domestic violence should be addressed; 42 percent had actually addressed it.
  • 87 percent said dating should be addressed; 58 percent had actually addressed it.
  • 85 percent said same-sex marriage should be addressed; 56 percent had actually addressed it.

    For those keeping score at home, that's a 28 percent disparity between theory and practice. Why such a considerable gap? Our sampling of preachers simply said some issues are a bit too difficult at times. Though we didn't ask them how difficult it was to preach each of the topics listed above, preaching remarriage and divorce is a good example. Fifty-one percent of those surveyed said it was a very difficult thing to do. This seems to be the reason for the 29-percentage point disparity between theory and practice. According to the respondents, the easiest topics to cover are childrearing and marriage (56 and 71 percent, respectively, said these issues "were not difficult at all").

    As for frequency of preaching family topics:

  • 52 percent preach family topics several times a year.
  • 17 percent preach family topics 2-3 times a month.
  • 17 percent preach family topics once a month.
  • 9 percent preach family topics 1-2 times a year.
  • 5 percent preach family topics weekly.

    Here are the hottest topics among preachers:

  • Husband-wife relationships (80 percent)
  • Parent-child relationships (67 percent)
  • Premarital relationships (25 percent)
  • Sibling relationships (23 percent)
  • Singleness (13 percent)

    Respondents indicated sermons on husband-wife relationships and parent-child relationships overwhelmingly receive the most positive response from the their respective audiences.

    One final matter worthy of mentioning: resources on preaching family topics. Sixty-nine percent said they use both Christian and secular psychologists in their sermons. Twenty percent reference only Christian psychologists. Eleven percent use neither. Dr. James Dobson and Focus on the Family seem to garner the most attention during times of sermon preparation.

    • Posted by Brian Lowery at 11:27 AM on August 6, 2007

    Comments

    Family is always a great topic, whether specific or general. Church families need models of what family looks like, how it functions, deals with issues, etc. The New Testament is a great example of how family functions, especially Acts 2:42. God has always been interested in family, whether it is the bigger family of the church or the smaller one that meets in our homes daily.

    Posted by: Robert Szoke on August 6, 2007

    Hi! I just found this forum and it looks really cool.

    Now, I gotta run off and read some posts. :)

    Posted by: hollywoodheidi on October 19, 2007


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