It is so difficult to preach, with passion, something that you do not personally live. Why? (1) Because your conscience bears down on you in your preparation (if it hasn’t been seared by prolonged hypocrisy). You have to fight through feelings of condemnation and guilt and that saps you of your confidence. (2) Because you lack the experience necessary to not just inspire but to actually be helpful. It’s semi-easy to get up and inspire people to do something that you don’t do, because you’re inspiring yourself at the same time. It’s the difference though between someone inspiring you to climb Mt. Everest with vague, abstract words (“It’s beautiful. You should do it. There’s nothing like it in the world.”) and someone actually being helpful to you in knowing how to climb. Someone who has climbed it many times can tell you exactly how to pack for the weather, how it will feel when the low-altitude air hits your lungs, how you should adjust your breathing, the discouragement you’ll feel at 15,0000ft. Someone who hasn’t can only describe a picture of a place that they, at best, long to visit.
Ezra, the scribe, gives us the process for great preaching: "For Ezra had set his heart to study the law of the Lord and to practice it, and to teach His statutes and ordinances in Israel" (Ezra 7:10).
Note: I should add that a preacher is always faced with the reality of preaching something that he/she doesn't live perfectly. But there's a difference between not applying something perfectly and not applying it at all. I'd also add that if you find yourself about to preach something that you haven't personally applied, confess it to God, take joy in the confidence that you're accepted by God because of the gospel, make serious plans to apply whatever you're preaching to your life and/or don't preach it yet.
Updates to this post
"No pastor lives up to what he preaches. If he does, he is preaching too low." John Piper
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