To Manuscript Or Not To Manuscript?

      I wish I knew how to save a 24-second video uploaded to Facebook that I watched yesterday. It is a video of the late John MacArthur with Phil Johnson, in which MacArthur said at the beginning of the clip, "I think great preachers write their sermons." Oh, how I wish I could show it to you.

     Granted, the short video's purpose was not to present a coherent philosophy of homeletics, but to show the great chemistry MacArthur and Johnson shared on camera. That said, there is a great deal of truth in what MacArthur said. It is, in my opinion, after delivering about 10,000 sermons over the past fifty years, a common error that most preachers make when they forgo preparing a manuscript of the complete sermon they are preparing to deliver.

     It is a short-sighted approach to sermonizing to decry the development and use of a manuscript whenever possible. And I say this despite the fact that I have delivered thousands of sermons with as few as three phrases jotted down as my main points and a proposition decided on before beginning. I am a propositional preacher (the subject of a future blog).

     Allow me to illustrate with some examples. While pastoring a Church with a Christian school, it is entirely appropriate to approach the school's chapel service with the barest of sermon outlines because #1, my audience of children needed the simplest of Gospel messages, using the most basic Bible vocabulary and concepts. And #2, my relationship with the youngsters was so well-developed that I could rely on them to trust me enough to provide me with honest and helpful feedback as I delivered the message to them. It is entirely possible that the facial expressions of one or more students would provide a valuable indication of a direction to proceed with the sermon you had not anticipated. And this without a manuscript, but with the intentional eagerness to read facial expressions and body language for pertinent feedback.

     George Whitefield is an example of a Gospel preacher who did not use a manuscript, having only 30-40 sermons, well-developed and frequently delivered, to a great variety of audiences as an itinerant evangelist. With so few sermons and with such a varied audience, Whitefield had no need for manuscripts. In like manner, it is sometimes the case that missionaries and those who speak at Bible conferences can deliver a few well-rehearsed messages without manuscripts because of their concentration on similar messages delivered to a wide variety of audiences.

     But what about a pastor who delivers three messages per week to the same audience? Does he have the luxury of preaching, preaching yet again, and re-preaching the same sermons like itinerant evangelists typically do? He does not. He needs a fresh spiritual meal to serve his audience every time they gather. The midweek service that is not carefully studied and prepared becomes quite obvious over time.

     My first pastor was a very credible evangelistic preacher who had planted six Churches before I came on the scene. 82nd Airborne, he was a man's man, and I was devoted to him. That said, I noticed three things about his preaching. 

     First, his delivery was terrific, with energy and conviction. He was an excellent Gospel preacher.

     Second, about 18 months into my time there (before God called me to the ministry and I followed his advice to go to Bible college), I knew what he was going to say before he said it. I surmised that he had a year and a half of sermon outlines prepared before recycling them. The problem, of course, was that I paid attention and picked up on that right away. That approach served him well when establishing the first five Churches, but at this place, he stayed so long he served leftovers. 

     Third, without using a manuscript, he did what many preachers who do not use manuscripts do. His habit is best described as leaving his house and taking a different route each time, while always returning along the same path. Thus, in his typical 40-minute sermon, though the initial portion of the message would vary, the final twenty minutes were always exactly the same, almost verbatim.

     Did he realize he had fallen into that predictable pattern? I do not know. Had he prepared a sermon manuscript, such a pattern could not have developed.

     Another tendency that accompanies the absence of a manuscript is the length of a sermon. The primary reason I began preparing manuscripts was to shorten my preaching time, to get it under control, and to say, in forty minutes with a manuscript, what would usually take me an hour to put into words without a manuscript. And in our day of diminishing attention spans and audiences who don't have the listening skills their grandparents had, that is a very significant factor. I am persuaded that one reason some preachers resort to entertainment-style deliveries is to offset their audiences' shortened attention spans. I am not persuaded that it is the appropriate remedy for shortened attention spans, but that is the subject of another blog.

     Granted, God raises up the occasional C. H. Spurgeon, who typically prepared his Sunday morning sermon outlines on Saturday night after excusing himself from his dinner guests. However, I am no Spurgeon, and neither are you in all likelihood. So, while some preachers are quite skillful at delivering sermons without manuscripts, I am persuaded most of us are not, though we should strive throughout our preaching years to improve.

     You might be thinking of preachers you are certain do not use manuscripts. Let me mention three, two of whom were great and the third extremely well-known.

     W. A. Criswell was the extremely well-trained and longtime pastor of the First Baptist Church in Dallas, Texas. Trained at Southern Seminary in Louisville, he was not only proficient in Greek but was also a master pulpiteer who never preached with notes. He was also famous for encouraging preachers to preach without notes of any kind (and, by implication, without manuscripts). However, it is not precisely accurate to say he did not use a manuscript. Having an almost photographic memory, Criswell studied diligently and wrote out his sermons, without ever taking the manuscript to the pulpit. And if you ever watched him preach, you could almost see him read in his mind what he had written. He had no written manuscript behind the pulpit because he had a picture of his message in his mind as he delivered.

     A. V. Henderson is another of those great Texas preachers who preached without notes. Henderson was known for delivering quite abbreviated but potent sermons. What few realize is that every one of those short and potent messages had been written out, edited for brevity, and then committed to memory. Thus, his approach was very much like Criswell's, with a stronger commitment to brevity.

     My final example will stir things up a bit. Jerry Falwell was the most well-known Baptist preacher in the second half of the twentieth century. But he would be on no one's list of great preachers, and he would have admitted that himself. His spiritual equipment package did not include what God gave to Whitefield, Spurgeon, Criswell, or Henderson. Yet he used no manuscript. This is because Harold Wilmington, his colleague for scores of years, prepared every sermon outline Jerry delivered for thirty years! This, according to Harold Wilmington! He handed Jerry his sermon outlines before each Church service, without enough time to familiarize himself with the outline and the verses to be cited, and would give him sermon outlines for conferences he spoke in before leaving Lynchburg.

     The point I seek to make is that while notables such as Jonathan Edwards and John Gill used manuscripts, missionaries such as Carey and Judson did not. Whitefield and Moody's approach to evangelistic preaching of a relatively small number of sermons to a great many audiences meant their sermons were typically memorized. And when a sermon is preached again and again, it is refined and sharpened and edited on the fly.

     Pastors do not have that luxury. The first time through a sermon, mistakes will be made, better wording has not been considered, and new insights will not have arrived at your thinking. The benefit of a manuscript is that in developing a written sermon, you think through the entire message, consider and revise your remarks (sometimes many times to make sure you say it just right), settle on key words (another blog) and transition sentences, and end up making fewer mistakes.

     Don't tell me you have not engaged in conversations in which you later wish you had said something you didn't, didn't say something you did say, or that you had turned a phrase differently at a crucial point. The same is true of sermons, which are one-sided conversations, only with fewer regrets when using a manuscript.

Prayer Request

 My wife Pam and I have realized a dream by moving to Zakynthos, a Greek island in the Ionian Sea.

Starting Sunday at 9:00 AM, I will begin the English-language service at https://www.facebook.com/watch/100076211865088/.

Please consider praying for us and recommending anyone you know in Greece or visiting Greece to meet us there.

An Unusual Day For An American Overseas

      I make no pretense of knowing with any certainty what the life of a missionary or outside the USA pastor is like. That said, I have experienced one very interesting day today, now writing as the sun sets. Interesting, by way of contrast to the expectations of someone who has grown used to the instant gratification provided by Amazon Prime, Grubhub, SpaceX, and the other logistical superstars that are the entrepreneurial grandchildren of the industrial powerhouses of World War Two that outproduced and outperformed all of the other countries involved in the conflict, both Allies and Axis. Make no mistake about it, it was our factories and farms that prevailed from 1941-1945, with 1.7 Americans falling in the European theater for every individual German military fatality. Let me back out of the rabbit trail and return to my day today.

     Last night, after the midweek Bible study taught by Pastor Taki Korianitis, I was informed that the plumbing supplies needed at my place needed to be paid for, and Spiros would take me to the hardware store to make the purchase. At nine o'clock, my ride showed up, my friend, Spiros, the happy whistler.

Yes, I rode on the back of his scooter to the hardware store, without a helmet. You should have seen that guy negotiate the bumper-to-bumper snarl of cars, motorcycles, and scooters in the small town of Zakynthos, tucked into the east side of the Ionian Sea Greek island by the same name.

But we arrived safely at the hardware store, like hardware stores used to be like, like hardware stores are supposed to be like.

     Spiros took me halfway home and invited me to walk the rest of the way, which was fine. And one of the hardware store guys delivered the three bags of washers, faucets, flex hose, and other items about 10 minutes after I got home. Different experience #1.

     A couple of hours later, I received a call from a nice fellow laboring in English because I am a Greek-language incompetent. The new refrigerator and clothes washer purchased five days ago would be delivered in two hours. Great! Because the street we live on is both very narrow and on a hillside, this promised to be an interesting event, especially with the narrow and winding stairway to the floor we live on.

Notice the white car on the left parked against the curb and the curb on the right side. That is how narrow the street is. Now they have to wrestle the refrigerator and washing machine out of the truck and up the stairs. Easier in Greece than in the USA because the appliances are relatively small and comparatively light. But the stairs are something else!

Nice fellows. Very efficient. And they were on their way to other deliveries. Different experience #2.

     Now comes the refrigerator setup, which must be left unplugged for several hours for the refrigerant to settle so the compressor isn't damaged during initial startup. That done, the fact that only two electric outlets are available presents a problem. To position the refrigerator where we want it will require an extension cord about six feet long. But that problem cannot be addressed until tomorrow. But we want the refrigerator on tonight. We have been without a refrigerator for almost two weeks! The solution? The refrigerator is in the middle of the small kitchen floor! What else is there to do? The extension cord will wait until tomorrow.

     The refrigerator is a Morris. The only Morris brand I recollect in Europe is a now-defunct British automaker. This appliance was built in China. Different experience #3.

     Next came the top-loading clothes washer, made by Whirlpool, under license in Slovakia. To get it operational, Pam and I had to borrow a screwdriver to remove a stamped-metal shipping guard, a much more challenging task than I would have predicted. But we did it. Adjusted it for wobble. Plugged it in. And then I did the almost unforgivable! I cross-threaded the water hose! Arg! Now it sits in the bathroom in its assigned space, useless until I can borrow pliers to remove the copper nipple and thread it properly. Different experience #4.

     My final experience is the culmination of what has developed over several days. It begins with my CPAP machine, which requires only distilled water. Fine. Distilled water is available only in Greek pharmacies, and then only in plastic bottles designed for intravenous use.

Unless you punch a hole in the plastic, the distilled water is only accessible using a syringe! After several days of trying to open the bottle without success, I resorted to the steak-knife approach and punched a hole in the side, then poured the distilled water into an empty plastic bottle that had contained drinking water (the water here is very hard). From that repurposed drinking water bottle, I will dispense my distilled water as needed to my CPAP. Different experience #5.

     Too much information, I know. But I had to express my small realizations to put into words my increased appreciation for those who live outside the USA and deal with the multiplicities of inconvenience that American citizens, on the verge of Elon-supplied robot butlers and maids, never face.

     Everything about life and service to God is more challenging outside the USA. All of life is inconvenient, but especially so elsewhere. But God so planned it. Living for Him, serving Him, glorifying Him, seeking to exalt the Savior, and following the leadership of His Spirit requires that choices be made, challenges be responded to, options be evaluated, and acted upon. But we exist to glorify God, Revelation 4.11!

     Thus ends my recounting of what was for me an unusual day.

Before You Say Anything!

According to GROK, “James C. Humes (full name: James Calhoun Humes) was an American author, presidential speechwriter, professor, and public speaker. Born on October 31, 1934, in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, he graduated from the Hill School (1952), earned a B.A. from Williams College, and an LL.B. from George Washington University. Early in his career, he served briefly as a Republican member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives (from Lycoming County, 1963 session) and later as executive director of the Philadelphia Bar Association. He became best known as a White House speechwriter, contributing to speeches for five Republican presidents across several administrations:

• Dwight D. Eisenhower (initially),

• Richard Nixon (notably involved in drafting the Apollo 11 lunar plaque message: ‘Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the Moon July 1969, A.D. We came in peace for all mankind,’ alongside others like William Safire and Pat Buchanan),

• Gerald Ford,

• Ronald Reagan,

• George H. W. Bush.

Humes was renowned for his storytelling style in speeches—often incorporating heartfelt, anecdotal ‘soul shakers’—earning him the affectionate nickname ‘Schmaltz King’ among colleagues, though presidents like Nixon valued his approach. He authored over 30–40 books, many focused on history, leadership, public speaking, and quotations from great figures. Popular titles include:

• Speak Like Churchill, Stand Like Lincoln: 21 Powerful Secrets of History's Greatest Speakers (a widely referenced guide on oratory and charisma),

• Churchill: The Prophetic Statesman,

• The Wit and Wisdom of Winston Churchill,

• Confessions of a White House Ghostwriter: Five Presidents and Other Political Adventures,

• Books on Abraham Lincoln, Ronald Reagan, Benjamin Franklin, and more.

He was one of the last living Americans to have met Winston Churchill personally and occasionally performed impersonations of him. Later in life, he taught as a professor of language and leadership at the University of Southern Colorado (now Colorado State University Pueblo), served as a U.S. State Department lecturer abroad, and advised corporations like IBM and DuPont on communications. James C. Humes passed away on August 21, 2020, in Philadelphia at age 85, due to a heart infection.”

I provided the GROK biography of James Humes because he was a rare combination of brilliant writer, captivating speaker, and gifted teacher, having written thoroughly readable and informative books that you preachers and teachers should read, sadly having died so you can no longer hear him deliver in person to an audience, and who but a master teacher can succeed with the challenge of teaching five presidents how to deliver speeches more effectively?

Since most pastors, sadly, do not read much (much less write), give little attention to the improvement of their communication’s skills (as evidenced by their white ties, red or black ‘dress’ shirts, or blue jeans and untucked shirts on the platform), and are hardly teachable except about manipulative techniques to increase Church attendance, I desire only to drop an easy-to-master practice I learned from James C. Humes that improves every audience’s willingness to listen to a preacher or teacher. What communicator doesn’t want to improve the audience’s attentiveness?

Some speakers are astonishingly effective in the face of adverse circumstances. Imagine early feminist Susan B. Anthony standing before a theater full of United States Senators and Congressmen who had no desire to hear anything the petite woman activist had to say. Or imagine Adolf Hitler about to address more than a hundred thousand rabid Nazi fanatics who were mad as hatters with their cheering and arrogance.

However, both Anthony and Hitler, and most truly skilled speakers and preachers, had discovered a principle Humes wrote about at length, the benefit of attention that is surrendered to the speaker rather than demanded. You have likely been in situations where you are expected to speak, to teach, or to preach, but the audience is for some reason distracted, excited, or inattentive for some reason. What is to be done? Most who find themselves standing before their audience are guilty of impatience and call for their listener’s attention. But the fact is, you are given less of someone’s attention when it is called for, when it is commanded and demanded, than when it is voluntarily surrendered.

Humes writes of Susan B. Anthony, a tiny woman, standing before the seated politicians with their cigars, cigarettes, and pipes filling the room with smoke as they chatted with each other. She could not have commanded or demanded their attended, not those men and not at that time in our nation’s history. She wisely stood in front of them motionless, and silent. Seconds passed with nothing happening. Then, slowly at first, but gathering momentum, those powerful, influential, important men surrendered their attention to her. And only when she had their attention, their undivided attention, she seized the moment and delivered her well-prepared speech.

Next, we have Hitler. Humes wrote about him, but there is also the video record of his infamous speech in Nuremberg. Say what you want about the little Austrian corporal. Evil. Wicked. Mean. Nasty. All true. But he was a genius communicator, a brilliant orator. No informed person will deny that.

So, what did he do with more than a hundred thousand followers whose attention he could have summoned in an instant? Genius in that he was as a speaker, he chose the surrender of his audience’s attention as preferable to demanding their attention. How did he secure the surrender of their attention to him? The same way Susan B. Anthony did. He stood before the frothing, excited, agitated multitudes without saying or doing anything. Normal posture, natural expression, and silence. His silence did not command their attention, but requested it.

It was the first session of a Bible college course I had been asked to teach to first year students. I had been assigned a course text written by a geeky university professor whose appearance was unserious and could not have conveyed that he was serious about his topic of expertise. So, I handed out reading assignments in the course text, but throughout the course I heavily depended on James Humes’ books, the man who made a living speaking, and teaching five presidents how to speak more effectively, with clarity and gravitas.

The best lesson I learned from Humes and put into practice in my preaching and teaching ministry? What I have observed ever since with extraordinary politicians delivering exceptional speeches? What you will invariably notice with an effective Ted Talk speaker? What adds immediate seriousness to a speaker they have never heard before? What they will come to expect as evidence of gravitas from someone declaring the unsearchable riches of Christ? The power pause.

The impact of the power pause is subtle but real. It is the mechanism a skilled and serious speaker uses to provide his audience with the opportunity to surrender their attention to him rather than unwisely presuming he will get their full attention by demanding it or commanding it. And the benefit grows over time, there is a learning process. The audience, the crowd, the class, will gradually respond more and more quickly to your silence before speaking. It really is, as Hume properly identified it, a power pause.

If you do not already make use of the power pause, I encourage you to do so the next time you are in front of people, and every time thereafter, unless you are a comedian or in some other way unserious, since the power pause would then be deceitful. Think of the power pause as a sincere request to your audience before speaking to them about matters of real importance, matters of eternal consequence.

Just. Stand. There. Until. Their. Attention. Is. Surrendered. To. You.

Remembering My Baby Sitter

What seventy-five-year-old retired preacher writes about the woman who babysat him for three years, beginning when he was only weeks old and newly arrived in Cherry Creek, South Dakota, from Wheeler County, Texas? That would be me, filled with profound gratitude on these days after she would have celebrated her ninety-ninth birthday had she not been promoted to glory a couple of years ago.

Four men served in the United States military during World War Two, married after the war, and obtained college degrees using the G. I. Bill. Having graduated along with so many other veterans, they found job opportunities scarce and so, left the great state of Texas to begin their careers in the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Department of the Interior, on a remote Indian reservation in a very isolated region of South Dakota.

My dad and my mom were one of the four couples, with my mom having been the first of the four wives to deliver a child, me. We three were also the last of the four government employee families to arrive. When we arrived, my babysitter approached my mom and said, “Iris, whenever you need a babysitter, I will take care of that boy for you!” My mom took her up on the offer, and for almost three years, she was the go-to babysitter for yours truly.

Her name was Yvonne Little, married to Joe Bill Little. Her maiden name was Scott, so her friends in Amarillo, Texas, naturally called her Scottie at Amarillo High School. Whether she was friends with T. Boone Pickens at Amarillo High, being a year or two older, I do not know. But she certainly was a beautiful gal, both as a teen and as an aged woman.

Her husband and my dad both remained in government service throughout their professional lives, with my dad working with different tribes in South Dakota, North Dakota, Florida, and Oregon and her husband operating out of Washington, D. C. It was while we were living in Fort Lauderdale with my dad the superintendent of the Seminole reservations that the Littles visited from D. C., now with a daughter and a son. The year was 1963. I remember their visit with the embarrassment that comes from an adult reflecting on his conduct as a thirteen-year-old some sixty years earlier.

My first encounter with Scottie Little was from 1950 to 1953, when she was married but not yet a mother, and I have no recollection of it. My next encounter with her was at a single dinner at our home in 1963, when she was a wife and mother of two. It was my third and final encounter with her that was life-changing, during the summer of 2018 in Norman, Oklahoma, August 7 to be precise, after she had been widowed by her beloved Joe Bill. Her devoted daughter was on a mission trip with her Church group, so I could not meet Scottie’s soul’s delight in a meaningful way.

Precisely why and exactly how Scottie Little and I connected in a meaningful way after 65 years had elapsed, I do not know, but I am profoundly grateful that God prompted me and granted me success, because what I learned from her overwhelmed me.

About eight years ago, my wife and I drove to the Norman, Oklahoma, senior complex where she lived, her daughter and son-in-law just a couple of miles away. Lively, energetic, with a sparkling personality, I quickly learned my Aunt Scottie (as she was always referred to in our home growing up) was a deeply committed Christian, confirming the impressions she made on me when we chatted on the phone and exchanged emails leading up to our visit.

I was full of questions accompanying our reminiscences of a bleak part of South Dakota, where my dad had made friends with the last survivor of the Battle of the Little Bighorn and the last survivor of the terrible slaughter of innocents at Wounded Knee. My overriding question to her was “Why?” Why did she offer to babysit me? And why did she babysit me so faithfully before our families parted ways through promotions and transfers?

She looked at me with that captivating smile of hers and said, “Steve, I knew that I would give you what your mother would never give you. I prayed for you. I read the Bible to you. I sang Christian songs to you.” My name is John Stephen Waldrip, named after my grandfather, John Conner. However, until I started school, I was always Steve.

What she said was true, insightful, and perceptive. I loved my mother, but she never prayed with me, and I presume she never prayed for me. I loved my mom, but I have no memory of her reading God’s Word to me. I loved my mom, but she never in my hearing sang anything, much less a Christian song or hymn. Yvonne ‘Scottie’ Little is the only woman known to me who ever prayed for me, read God’s Word to me, and sang Christian hymns to me.

It was in 1956, on the Fort Totten reservation in North Dakota, that God began to answer Aunt Scottie’s prayers for me, when Miss Peabody and Miss supp presented the Gospel to a Vacation Bible School group explaining John 1.29, “The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.” Eighteen years later, the Spirit of God brought that verse home to me the night I turned to Christ.

So, you see, a godly wife and eventual mother, living in what most of us would describe as the middle of nowhere, may very well have been the most impactful woman in my life. And a few days ago, if she were still here with us, she would have celebrated her ninety-ninth birthday.

But she is not here. She is with the Savior. I know her daughter misses her mother terribly. I certainly miss her.

The takeaway? Anyone can, at anytime, anywhere, engage in a God-honoring and Christ-exalting relationship with someone. With my Aunt Scottie, it was a babysitting ministry with a high-strung, rambunctious little boy who grew up to know Christ, to then spend a half-century in the Gospel ministry, and who is now, after retiring from the pastorate, with my wife on the island of Zakynthos, in Greece, engaged in a faith ministry.

Of course, I am grateful to God, from Whom all blessings flow. Of course, I am thrilled to represent the Savior! What right-minded person would not be thrilled to exalt the King of all glory! Of course, I am thankful for the Holy Spirit's leadership and provision.

But I am also grateful for my Aunt Scottie. Humanly speaking, where would I be without her? What she did in seizing an opportunity to be a blessing, anyone can do. But will you? I sincerely hope so. Be someone's Aunt Scottie.

 

Cherry Creek, SD, around 1952

My mom holding me, Aunt Scottie & Joe Bill

During retirement in Norman, OK

 

Aunt Scottie and me August 7, 2018

The End Of An Era

     For the first time since 1978, I am not engaged in pastoral ministry. Just over a week ago, I submitted my resignation from Calvary Road Baptist Church, where I served since November 1985.

     It is very challenging to withdraw from a congregation you have loved for forty years, so the flock can follow the spiritual leadership of another man. My successor is Anthony Kim, a young man I have known for more than twenty years. I am excited for him and for the Church.

 

     I am thrilled that my wife of fifty years is 100% with me and our future together. Our goal and heart's desire is to retire from the pastorate but not from active ministry. We must contend with issues of age, but the future looks bright.

     As our plans unfold and our prayers are answered, we will keep you updated. We can still be reached via email and by phone, and we are relatively active on social media. Please connect with us on WhatsApp to ensure you can reach us. My WhatsApp address is my cell number.

     As Pam and I transition, and as Calvary Road Baptist Church transitions, please pray for them and us.

     Until next time ....

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

 

Hang gliding in the Himalayas.

Last year in the Church auditorium.

Considering Your Introduction

It is a near-fatal error for a preacher, teacher, or speaker to attempt to communicate without a well-planned introduction. Allow me to suggest to pastors and others engaged in training future pastors, missionaries, and/or Bible teachers that they give thoughtful consideration to their introductory remarks. These first words come out of their mouths when standing before their audience.

Why read this? I can think of several reasons why you should invest a few minutes reading something that will help you train communicators, the first of which is that it is a sin to bore people with the truth. This article will help you avoid that.

Crucial to any lesson, sermon, speech, or talk is your introduction. Suppose you divide your delivery (sermon or lesson) into three parts: the introduction, the body, and the conclusion. In that case, your introduction is the critical bridge your audience crosses to travel from where they are (mentally, emotionally, spiritually) when you begin to where you want them to be when you arrive at the threshold of what you intend to say to them, your sermon, your message, your lesson.

But you already know that if you are an experienced Gospel minister or Bible teacher who has been successful over time. The challenge is to teach the importance of the introduction to future preachers, teachers, and trainers who might imagine their only task is to begin speaking, expecting their audience's attention.

I will pass over (at this time) the tendency of preachers, teachers, trainers, and other communicators to stand before their audiences dressed not only casually but disheveled, with one hand in a pocket and an untucked shirt. I am writing to draw your attention to the introduction.

A sermon, a Bible lesson, or a discipleship training session is a specialized form of speech, a topic of such importance to the ancients that the Greeks and Romans placed great emphasis on speaking, which they called rhetoric. That said, there are traits common to both speeches and sermons, as well as to lessons and training.

Here is a link to a YouTube channel I came across and wanted to share with you. The presenter summarizes and encapsulates features of a good introduction that you have indeed used in your ministry and will help you pass on valuable principles you have already learned.

Enjoy.