Juggling Sheep
Welcome to Juggling Sheep, Jay Perry's blog about time management and personal productivity for pastors. Learn to balance work, life, family, and personal spirituality.

Share your best practices, tips and tricks, processes, sermon planning ideas, and resources. Feel free to email me: jaylperry[at]gmail[dot]com.

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Get-It-Done Guy's 9 Steps to Work Less and Do More


Today is a special day! Today is September 14, the date of the long-awaited release of the Get-It-Done Guy's book - 9 Steps to Work Less and Do More.

Think of this book as a VERY PRACTICAL 7 Habits for Highly Effective Hipsters.

Stever Robbins has a refreshing, fun, witty way of hitting each of his points home with clarity and practicality. Did I mention it's practical? Because you can actually take the steps he's advocating and transform your life's priorities and efficiencies.

I've only read a few chapters so far (you can get your sample chapters here - and also download some audio), but I'm definitely looking forward to reading the whole book.


Order Get-It-Done Guy's 9 Steps to Work Less and Do More on Amazon.com Today

Friday, July 30, 2010

Sermon Planning - Yearly Skeleton

What topics/series do you typically use as a sermonic year framework? What topics do you always address around the same time each year? Why?

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Sermon Planning - Sermon Series Secrets

So, as I've mentioned before, I really like preaching topigetical sermons in topical series. The cool thing about this is that your six sermon series may be on one topic, but the whole series doesn't have to come from one scriptural pericope (because the series is topical, not exigetical). Each sermon, however, should be exigetical from one pericope that addresses a specific sub-topic. This is how I like to design my sermon series.

When I plan sermon series, I try to think like a spiritual dietitian planning a balanced spiritual diet for my church. So, throughout the year there would be a mix of Old Testament and New Testament, Felt Needs and Theology.

During a typical year plan, I would start with a skeleton of
  • Personal Vision or Finances or Health series in January
  • Life, Teachings, Death of Jesus series culminating at Easter
  • Church Mission, Vision, Values series in the Summer
  • Family or Marriage in September (after school starts)
  • Prophecy series in October
  • Advent in December
Then I'd fill in other series ideas between them.

Next post, I'll throw out some starter series ideas...

Till then!