Turn a Loved One’s Sermons Into a Book

Somewhere in your family, there might be a hard drive or a filing cabinet packed with sermon notes. They were stored up from every Sunday that your dad or grandfather ever preached. If you’ve ever thought about how to turn his sermons into a book, now you can, and it’s worth doing.

If you’d rather listen or watch than read, you can catch more on this over on the Podcast or watch on YouTube.

Why Turn a Loved One’s Sermons Into a Book

He gave years of his life to those messages. Whether he’s still up in the pulpit today or his voice now only comes through old recordings, those sermons shaped a congregation once. They don’t have to stop there.

Paul told Timothy to take what he’d heard and entrust it to people who could keep teaching it (2 Timothy 2:2). That’s the whole idea behind preserving a sermon. A message preached once was never meant to live and die in one room on one Sunday. It was meant to keep moving from person to person.

I’ve watched this play out in my own ministry. A sermon series that took months to prepare and present can sit forgotten within a year. That is, unless someone does the work of gathering it and shaping it into something that lasts. A book does that. It gives those words a second life.

How to Turn a Loved One’s Sermons Into a Book

You don’t need a finished manuscript to start. Full sermon transcripts, rough notes, old cassette tapes, or even a handful of recordings pulled off an ancient hard drive. All of that is useful material! This is what Pulpit to Pages was built to do.

Send along whatever you have, and we’ll work through it together. We’ll shape it chapter by chapter into a manuscript that still sounds like him. His voice stays. His theology stays. The illustrations he used from the pulpit stay right where they belong.

I’ve published six books of my own, some through a publisher and some through self-publishing. I understand both sides of putting a book into someone’s hands, the writing and everything that comes after. Whatever you’re picturing- something to pass down in the family, something for the church archive, or something polished enough to hand to a publisher- there’s a path built for that.

Join the Conversation; Answer This Question

• What’s one thing your father, grandfather, or a mentor in the faith taught you that you’ve never wanted to forget?

The people who sat in those pews years ago were changed by what he preached. There are people today who could use those same words.

If you’ve been sitting on sermons that deserve more than a folder somewhere, now’s the time to turn a loved one’s sermons into a book. Visit LeadBiblically.com/PulpitToPages or drop me a message at jeremy@leadbiblically.com, and let’s talk ab@jeremynortonblog