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So here is the secret to preaching that you may not know.
Preachers do not come up with their sermon the week they are preaching it. They come up with it weeks and years in advance, and sometimes preachers are unaware they are working on a sermon at any given time.
What I mean is that crafting a sermon is often thought of sitting down at a desk and Bible open and heart in deep meditation crafting each paragraph to perfection. But the fact of the matter is, crafting a sermon happens in and out of the daily life of the preacher.
Preaching is not about coming up with something to say on any given Sunday. Preaching is about learning to see and hear the world in ways that others may not. Much like a comic or an artist who sees the world in different ways, so too the preacher must see the world in a different way.
The demands on a minister in a local church are so much more than they used to be, and as such the time for traditional sermon prep has gone the way of the dinosaur. It is not possible to sit in front of a bit of paper and a bible for one hour per minute you are going to preach.
Rather the preacher must be able to see the time they take reading a book on their leisure as sermon prep. The time they take talking with a person who is dying as sermon prep. The time they take listening to the problems of the world as sermon prep. The time they take on their Sabbath as sermon prep.
You see the idea that a sermon is something that one preaches is just not true. A sermon is something that one lives out of.
A sermon is not a collection of words but a collection of life experiences.
A sermon is not something that is said, but something that is embodied by the preacher.
Perhaps that is why there is an abundance of great public speakers, but few great preachers.