11 Church Sermon Series Ideas for 2024

Last week, I went on a study retreat to plan our preaching series until next Christmas.  Part of this retreat included meeting with a few other teaching pastors in our area.  The conversations centered around this question: 

“What are a few sermon series that really connected with your congregation over the last few years?”  

The conversations were fantastic and provided us with great ideas for planning our preaching calendar.  I thought I’d share some of the most compelling ideas with you.  So, here are 11 church sermon series ideas. 

The Church as…

I’ve been dreaming of doing a series about the Church.  Why?  I believe the COVID experience has redefined what church involvement looks like and it’s time to remind people, from a biblical perspective, what being a part of a Jesus community means.  

My idea for this series is to study the Church through the lens of a few metaphors that are used by New Testament writers to describe the church.  There are a lot in the New Testament, but we are planning a late summer series around these 4 metaphors:  

1. The Body
2. The Family
3. The Bride
4. The Building
   
   

Dinner with Jesus

A few summers ago we did a series that I LOVED called Dinner with Jesus. Each sermon was centered around what happened and what was said around meals in the Gospels.  As you read the Gospels, you can’t help but notice that long unrushed meals was Jesus’ ministry strategy. 

In this series, we challenged our people to do what Jesus did, invite people over, share meals and share life.  It was a great summer.  If you’re interested, here’s the link.  

Also, this book was helpful in preparation for the series. 

Hearing the Voice of God 

This sermon series idea kept coming up in our conversations with other pastors.  It seems that discerning what is God’s voice and what isn’t, is a felt need right now.  I wonder if you are sensing the same thing?  

Living Life Backward

This was a sermon series we did a few years ago on Ecclesiastes that I really enjoyed.  It was very challenging and also took us to a section of the Scriptures that isn’t often taught.  We used this book as a guide in our preparation and I found it very helpful.  

The Last Word

Another one that came up in our conversations was a sermon series about the authority of the Bible. 

The sense among the pastors was people need to be reminded that the Scriptures claim to be authoritative.  In other words, to follow Jesus is to make him the boss of your life.  

One pastor described a series they did that leaned into this message called, “The Last Word.” It focused on three sermons about the Bible. 

1. The Power of Scripture
2. The Reliability of Scripture
3. The Authority of Scripture 

ReBuilding a Life

Years ago we did an impactful sermon series on the book of Nehemiah.  We called it ReBuilding a Life.  It was incredibly practical for our people.  

Considering our cultural moment, we are thinking of rebooting this series.  Almost everyone is figuring out the new normal and what that means for the future.  This series seems very relevant right now.

While the graphics, styles, and video quality will be outdated, the sermons are outstanding, and you can check it out here.  

You’re Not the Boss of Me

One of the pastors we met described a series on mental health called, “You’re Not the Boss of Me.”  The basic idea was that emotions are good, God-given, and healthy. But, just because you feel something doesn’t mean that it’s true or you should follow that feeling.  

We fell in love with this idea and are hoping to preach a mental health series in the early fall.  

10 Questions Jesus Asked

Here’s an idea that I’m totally geeked about.  According to the research I’ve done , Jesus asked 307 questions in the Gospels.  First off, if you were wondering what Jesus’ teaching method was…asking good questions was a huge part of it. 

So, here’s a challenge for you, Google “questions Jesus asked” and read through them, and just try to tell me that a sermon series built around questions Jesus asked wouldn’t be epic!

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Peter

A series idea that we have, which is labor-intensive, is on Peter. It unfolds in three parts:  

• First, you study Peter the disciple—full of passion and well, dumb statements and mistakes.  
• Second, you study Peter the church leader, in the book of Acts—Pentecost, the encounter with Cornelius, etc.  
• Third, you study Peter the elder—his letters to churches.  

I love this idea because, over time, you could teach on the growth and development of the person of Peter.  We haven’t done this series yet, but the idea is compelling to me.  

Powerful Prayers of the Bible 

Another idea that intrigues me is “Powerful Prayers of the Bible.”  The possibilities here are endless—Jesus, David, Mary, Paul, the list goes on and on.  What could we learn about prayer, God’s character, and the challenges of life through a series like this?    

An alternate idea that we had was “Unanswered Prayers of the Bible.”  

I think there is potential here.  

Meltdown

This last one is perhaps my favorite sermon series ever.  Studying the epic meltdowns of the Bible.  

1. Moses in the desert
2. Elijah running away from Jezebel, after the Mt. Carmel victory
3. Peter denying Jesus three times and then the restoration over breakfast
4. King Nebuchadnezzar being humbled after going insane and thinking he was a wild animal  

There are so many options, and the stories are emotional, authentic and some of them, downright hilarious.  There is beauty in building a series around this idea:  How does God respond to us when we totally melt down?

Wrap Up

I hope these 11 sermon series ideas either stocked your own teaching pond, spurred a better idea, or at least made you chuckle. If you need some hacks to improve your productivity in order to successfully plan out your sermon series, check out this article. 

If you have time, we’d love to hear about a few of your favorite sermon series. Thanks for reading.