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How does one grab the moment and preach effective sermons? Many of us who teach preachers spend a lot of time talking about sermonic preparation. We discuss how to effectively exegete a scripture and then turn that exegesis into a sermon. However, many of us leave you there without much discussion of how to preach after you have prepared.
In the next few posts we will look at it from a high level point of view. The first, and perhaps most important idea to keep in mind when preaching, is that the preacher should embody the message.
The preacher should become the message. There should be a consistency between what the preacher says and how the preacher says what the preacher says. So if you are speaking about the goodness of Jesus, then there must not be a frown or scowl on your face. When you are speaking of a particularly heavy point, the preacher is not running around doing a “holy dance.”
In short, there should be a correspondence or consistency between the preacher and the message. If this is done correctly, the people will not only hear, but see the message as it is being preached. So if we are to preach effective sermons, we must seek to use all of our being to preach the message that God has given us to give to this people at this time.
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Mr. Cox,
On becoming the message in our sermons: I was told (or advised) by an older more seasoned preacher maybe 20 or more years ago that a preacher can’t effectively preach were he hasn’t been. His point was that one must internalize his experiences in life in order to
apply the Word of God to them to the end that the hearer is helped. I have learned that there is some truth to his statement. We all have what God has given us. We may differ in delivery and even understanding the same passage, but I think we become the message when we’re honest and forthrightly willing to communicate what God has said. If we could minimize the MESSENGER and hide him behind the cross, then we might do some good.
Truth seldom needs anything from us except to say it.
Hello and thank you for your continued interaction,
What I am calling for is to really understand the scripture before presenting it. to do that you need to understand it more than just intellectually. When you see the hurting one in the story, I am encouraging you to think of the issues that that one has to deal with…
I hear the idea of minimizing the messenger, but don’t’ minimize the messenger to the point where you don’t experience the story and thus can’t apply anything. I think our differences are in the difference between preaching as “teaching truth” and preaching as fostering an experience with truth.
After having said that, I don’t necessarily think our differences are as great as they may appear at first glance…At any rate, keep on posting…
God bless….