We created a sermon calendar that helps you preach through the entire Bible chronologically, in a year.

It’s right in line with those challenges that are issued every January in Christian circles about reading through the Bible in a year.

But wait.  Why is it a good idea for you to lead your congregation through the entire Bible this year?  That’s what we’re going to be talking about today.

The Gospel Story Sermon Calendar is 52 weeks.  Each week, there’s a recommended passage as well as context for what’s happened in the story since the last week’s message.  We tried to choose passages that emphasized certain periods of time.  The series starts with the Emmaus Road, where Jesus opens up the Scriptures to his disciples and explains how they point to Him.  Then, it follows the chronological order of the Bible.

Because it’s 52 weeks, you’ll already know what you’re doing all year.  You won’t be scratching your head mid-year to come up with a new series topic or a clever title.  All the designs you need for the year are included, too, and there are traditional and contemporary options.

So, besides the fact that we’ve already helped you plan your whole year, why should you want to preach through the entire Bible this year?  We’re glad you asked.  

See the Full Story of the Gospel

The first reason is that working through the entire Bible in a year forces you to preach a balanced view of Scripture and its overarching themes.  At the same time, it forces you to see that Jesus really is on every page.  We see the promise of Jesus in Genesis 3, and it bleeds through the entire Bible, from Genesis to Revelation.

On Sundays, you’ll set the tone by helping your church understand how the stories they’re hearing fit into the bigger story.  They can choose to follow or read along through the series during the week, but even if they don’t, that knowledge that the Bible is about more than just our immediate, temporary needs is a mindset shift that will help them grow as they read Scripture for themselves.

Yes, of course, you will have guests showing up who have missed part of the series- but since this is all one big story, they’ll be able to catch on.  Plus, when you give your people who are there every week the gift of this overarching view of Scripture, you’re setting the stage for both present and future discipleship- which is a huge win for those new people, even if they don’t know it yet.

Maintain Momentum All Year Long

If you’ve planned out 52 weeks, you’re not going to have a series or Sunday that doesn’t quite measure up to the rest of the year.  it’s going to be a lot easier to have people on your teaching team.  It helps you trust that what you’re going to be communicating over the next year is a balanced diet for your church, spiritually.  When this year is over, they’ll have learned a lot about the gospel and what it means to be a follower of Jesus, instead of hopping from topic to topic.  

That’s not to say the topical preaching is bad!  We have a whole topical preaching calendar, after all!  But this calendar is going to really help you maintain that momentum over an entire 52 weeks.

Dive Deeper Into Context

When you preach the whole Bible, is also helps people, maybe people who have never read the Bible for themselves, understand the timeline and context of Scripture.  When you understand when things happened and the context of why they happened, it opens up the Word in a whole new way.  You start to see the story behind every piece of Scripture, and that these were real events happening to real people.  

It’s going to help your people, and it’s also going to help you as a communicator because you’ll understand the overall context.  You’re going to create a love of Scripture in your church, because they’ll see the Bible in a whole new light.

When you use Ministry Pass series and calendars, the research and talking points are done for you.  All that’s left for you is to do is add your personal touches and work on your delivery.  It sounds like we’re overselling it, but you’re going to improve as a communicator.  And we can’t think of anything more worthy of better communication than the gospel.

We’d love to hear your thoughts!  Tweet us with the hashtag #HelloChurchPod or leave us a comment on Youtube!