As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
You’ve seen it. A preacher runs back and forth through the Bible, jumping from passage to passage in the sermon. They build up an intricate structure of 4 or 5 points. With each point having 3 or 4 sub-points.
Nobody knows where you are in your sermon and, more importantly, when their back is against the wall next week they won’t remember.
Even the preacher often can’t keep up with where they are in the sermon.
Instead of that, preach a story.
Yeah…A Story…
One story…
And derive your sermonic structure directly from that Bible story. The main points of the story are the main points in your sermon. And then place your points into the parts of the story.
As you retell the story, you will place the points into the story at the natural places and features of the story.
When you do this, the whole sermon will become easier for you and the people to remember.
But not just remembering, it also will help your people to apply. One of the most important things about all teaching is that you should apply the points to a real life situation. And sermons are no different.
The nice thing about a sermon based on a Bible Story is that the application is built in. The story itself becomes the first application of the points.
Yes, take a Bible story, one story. And apply that story. And in your application, please remember those who are having challenges and struggles in the story.
Yes, the challenges and the struggles make this very thing explode in the minds of the people as they see themselves in the sermon. Go to SoulPreaching.Com to see me talk about this approach to preaching.
But hey back to our point, sure, you can refer to other parts of the Bible. Sure, you can look at history and the like, but the primary structure of the sermon is that story. And if someone asks one of your members what the sermon was about, they can clearly articulate it.
Amazon and the Amazon logo are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc, or its affiliates.
