My thoughts here are partly tongue-in-cheek and partly “why not?” In thirty-five years of ministry, I’ve only got one sermon I’ve used more than once. It was a wedding message that someone heard and actually requested when he and his spouse renewed their marriage vows. Other than that, I’ve always prepared a fresh sermon for Sunday worship, funerals, weddings and special occasions like Christmas.
The other day I wondered, “What would happen if I preached the exact same sermon two weeks in a row?” Here are a few possibilities.
- People tend to forget what they just heard. I’ll bet most people wouldn’t even know it was a rerun.
- Many don’t attend worship weekly, so they wouldn’t hear it twice. Some folk would miss both of them.
- Some would think, “This sounds familiar.” But they wouldn’t be able to put their finger on why.
- There would have to be someone who would immediately react, “Hey, didn’t you preached that sermon last week?”
I remember reading about a pastor who preached a sermon several weeks in a row. When asked why, he said, “After the first time, nothing changed, so I thought you all needed to hear it again!”
A pastor friend of mine told me about one of his classmates from seminary who wrote fifty-two sermons for his first year of ministry. From then on, he simply cycled through them for the rest his career. That approach would free up a lot of your time.
I might just do it. I’m not going to tell when or where. I’ll let you know how it goes.
Waite for it... 
when in early Sem days the class was assigned to write a sermon on Zachias. Many Sem students preached at vacancy congregations. One Sunday I preached this sermon at a vacancy
and on the way out of church a parishioner said it was the best sermon on Zachias he had heard this month…
What a great memory, Larry! The people in those churches were doing God’s work by letting us preach for them.