What The Blues Teaches Us About Preaching
Have you ever really analyzed your illustrations? I suspect most preachers don’t. I did it one time and found that the vast majority of my illustrations were largely about men. …
Illustrations and the Whole Congregation Read More
The other day I was listening to a preacher close a sermon about pain. The sermon talked about the pain and struggles of this life. In typical African American style, the preacher closed the sermon with a “celebration.” Here the preacher resolved the pain by pointing to being “hooked-up.”
The Easy Sermon Resolution – Don’t Preach For The Easy Shout Read More
In the African American Preaching Tradition the ability to “tell the story” is highly prized. It is also helpful when preaching to any ethnic group. There is something about stories that captures the imagination of the hearer in ways that no other method can. Stories grab the people and place them in the Bible story as they recognize parts of the story playing out in their own lives. Stories are powerful especially Bible stories.
Telling the Story and Making Your Points while Preaching Read More
I was critiquing a sermon for a client the other day who demonstrated a very common and real problem in his sermon construction. The preacher told me that he just …
Follow Your Sermon Outline Read More
I wanted to talk a little bit more about a thought described earlier. One of the biggest ways we preach more than one sermon is to attempt to bring a …
Answer Your Question in Sermons Read MoreOne interesting question came up a little while ago. “Elder Cox, how do you advocate ‘three points and a poem’ while at the same time you advocate ‘one point in …
Video – How Do You Preach With One Major Point? Read MoreHow Do You End The Sermon When You Want To Have A Challenge?
Video: End With A Celebrative Challenge Read MorePreachers who preach from a full manuscript have no choice but to answer yes to the question. However what about those of us who preach from an outline or from even fewer notes? Must we prepare a full manuscript? This is a good question. I think that the benefits of preparing a full manuscript whether you use it or not far outweigh the liabilities. I want to describe a few of the benefits.
When people ask me about preaching without notes, many assume that you must write out the whole sermon and then memorize the sermon. These preachers are looking for a method that will help them memorize such a large amount of material.
Methods for Preaching Without Notes – Memorize an Outline Read More
I feel like starting with the quote from Mark Twain who said: “The rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated.” There are many who think that the three points and a poem deserve to fall off the landscape of possible sermonic choices.
Three Points and a Poem – Revisited Read MorePeter Mead, at Biblical Preaching.Net, gives two options for turning a text into a half hour sermon in this article. Mead provides two options. The first is to carefully plan how to drive the main point into your people. This would include tactically deciding how you will present the idea. Mead succinctly summarizes this option as follows:
What to do with Your Preaching Time Read More
In the Winter 2003 edition of the African American Pulpit there is the sermon The Worms Got Him by Dr. Caesar Clark who is one of the great African American preachers.
We will look at this sermon at another time in that there is much in it to learn about the genius of the Black pulpit. What I want to look at here is the interesting device that Clark uses in his first move of the sermon. Here Clark summarizes a lot of information and background data for the hearers.
When you have a main question or a thesis, you need to translate that thesis into a sermon outline. There are Seven Interrogatives that you can ask of your thesis to help you flesh out an outline.
The final source of Biblical Preaching is imagination. Charles Koller notes that imagination alone can turn a dull sermon into one that comes alive. Imagination helps you create connections between the past and the present in interesting ways.
Sources of Bible Preaching – Imagination Read More