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WHAT'S THE BIG IDEA? Making Your Sermon More than a Meander
By Dave Redick
(c) 2000, The Preacher's Study - Use by permission only

Care to take a walk on the beach with me? Good. Let's go...

"It surely is foggy out here," you say.
Yes it is.
"I can hear the ocean out there somewhere."
Yes, I can hear it, too.
"But I can't see a thing."
Neither can I.
"Well, not exactly. I can see the outlines of a couple of things going by as we walk."
Yes, I see them too.
"I don't have a clue where we are, though."
I'm not entirely sure either.

"So what is this, a beachcomber's ezine?"
No, it's about preaching. Look there in the subject line. It says, "The Preacher's Study Ezine."
"Then what in the world are you talking about?"
I'm talking about preaching.
"Strange words for someone talking about preaching."

No, they aren't strange at all. I'm describing what happens in many churches nearly every Sunday. Preacher and hearer agree to walk together for awhile but it turns out to be a walk in the fog. The preacher isn't quite sure where he is and the hearer is even more confused about their location or destination. (A mist in the pulpit is a fog in the pew.) Things go by out there in the thick mist - an outline point, an illustration (during which everyone perks up with a sudden bit of hope that the fog will lift) but these quickly recede from view. Another Sunday. Another walk in the fog. Everyone's clothes are damp but they never got to see the ocean.

Satan loves it. Some preachers are oblivious to it. (I know because I read their sermons on the web the following week and even my clothes get damp!)

Everyone realizes something is wrong but they don't know what to do about it.

Say it however you like. Some sermons are like pencils with erasers on both ends - useless because they lack a point. A central point. A purpose. A proposition. A friend of mine with whom I have sometimes jointly written sermons calls it the "C.I." (Central Idea). Ron's constant refrain is, "What's the C.I.?" I've profited many times from his insistence. I just like to call it the Big Idea, though I surely claim no originality in that term.

John Henry Jowett wrote, "No sermon is ready for preaching, not ready for writing out, until we can express its theme in a short, pregnant sentence as clear as crystal. I find the getting of that sentence the hardest, the most exacting, the most fruitful labor of my study."

That's the Big Idea. It may be stated clearly at the beginning of the sermon or we may choose to reveal it a little at a time as our sermon unfolds but it is always there shaping, testing, correcting what we say and what our hearers hear. Every part of our sermon must bow to it or get pitched into the electronic trash basket.

If you can't state (at least to yourself) in a single sentence what it is you're trying to get across in your sermon then you're probably pumping fog.

"That bad, eh?"

Yes, that bad.

I wonder if you might stop for must a moment and guess my Big Idea for this article? What am I getting at? What am I saying? I'm saying, *You need a Big Idea!* (That wasn't so hard, was it?)

"So how does one come up with a Big Idea?"

Sometimes it derives from the reason you decided to preach the sermon in the first place. You've observe some issue that needs to be addressed. (That was the origin of this article.) You've had an insight on an important subject that you know others need to hear. This is often the clearest and easiest way to find a Big Idea because you usually have a direction in your head before you start. But beware. Recognizing an issue that needs to be addressed isn't yet a Big Idea. You must still decide exactly what it is you want to say about the issue.

Sometimes we think we have a clear picture of our Big Idea when in fact it isn't clear at all. We have direction but not specific purpose. A big idea glimmers in the distance but its precise details aren't yet clarified. Therefore you must write it down! Re-read Jowett's statement above. If you can't write it down then it isn't clear.

When your Big Idea develops from seeing a need, you then go to the Scripture seeking the means to make your point. You ask, "Where in Scripture is this subject seen or illustrated?" Be careful here. We've all seen some pretty fanciful sermons where the Bible is made to say things it has never said or even hinted at. In fact, at this point your Big Idea may go down in flames for lack of support. If so, either let it die or adjust it to fit what the scripture says. Don't bend and twist God's word. Some of the strongest condemnation of the Bible is reserved for those who do.

Here is an example of the development of a Big Idea. Please forgive my use of personal material. It's just that I'm the world's foremost expert on the things I have written. :-)

The following remarks are based on a sermon on my website that you may view at the following URL:

http://preacherstudy.com/hades.html

Several years ago I was becoming increasingly aware of the lax attitudes in some of our young people. (Nothing new there, right?) I was hearing through the grapevine that some of them regretted they had become Christians so early in life because they were missing out on the things their other friends were experiencing. I needed to say something to sober them up a bit. So what should I say? It had been awhile since I addressed the issue of hell so finally I decided I would head in that direction. A Big Idea? No, not yet.

I perused some of the obvious passages and finally decided I would cover the most obvious statement of the reality of hell in the Bible: Luke 16:23-31. A Big Idea? No, not yet.

I studied the passage in depth once again, reading and rereading it, looking at the original language, recording any observations that I made. I studied the commentaries. In time I had several pages of notes and a pretty good idea what the text was saying. A Big Idea? No, not yet.

So, now that I know what this passage teaches, what am I going to say about it that will sober up my hearers? What jumped out at me was the utter desperation of the rich man there in hades. His situation could have changed so easily during his earthly life but he ignored the opportunities God put before him. He was too busy having fun. He thought only of himself. Now his situation was hopeless. His terror was real. His condition was irreversible. A Big Idea? No, not yet.

What do I want my hearers to see from this passage? After wrestling with it for several hours, my Big Idea statement went something like this: "Hell is a place of terror, desperation, and hopelessness and surely you don't want to end up there!"

Kind of simple, isn't it? That's OK. It needs to be simple. In fact, I often visualize myself cornered at the entrance of the church building by someone who just spent 40 minutes listening to my sermon who says, "Just what was it you were trying to say to us, Dave?"

As I structured my sermon, I wanted to make points from the text that fit this Big Idea. Notice how each main point relates back to the Big Idea statement. Notice also that the exhortations underneath each main division reflect the "surely you don't want to go there" part of the Big Idea.

In this passage we see:

1. A Man Caught in a Terrible Circumstance. ("Hell is a place of terror...")

"My friends, we dare not allow ourselves to be caught in such a terrible circumstance!"

2. A Man Whose Situation Was Desperate. ("Hell is a place of...desperation...")

"Listen to the words of Jesus Himself in Matthew 10:28: 'And do not fear those who kill the body, but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.'"

3. A Man Who Needed Help but Couldn't Get It. ("Hell is a place of...hopelessness...")

"Do not make the mistake of thinking that comfort here will insure comfort there. It won't."

4. A Man for Whom Nothing Could Be Done. ("...hopelessness..."

"Once a person gets to Hades, there will be nothing anyone can do to help him."

5. A Man for Whom It Was Already Too Late. ("...hopelessness...")

"Don't interpret God's goodness toward you today as an indicator that everything is all right."

In this message I didn't "go everywhere preaching the word" as I might be prone to do without the Big Idea statement. I didn't meander. My Big Idea statement kept me on a laser-beam path pointed at my goal. (Guess you'll have to read the sermon to see if that is really true.) There were many things I could have said in a sermon about hell. Some of them were pretty clever in my estimation and might have drawn a laugh or a tear. But they had to be discarded because they did not fit my Big Idea. Note the flow of the main divisions. It is always wise, once your rough draft is finished, to step back from your message (perhaps wait a day) then look again to be sure your main divisions both flow and reflect your Big Idea.

When you take the time to formulate a Big Idea statement and then make everything you say subservient to it, you'll find that people perk up when you stand up to speak. They'll get your point - because finally you'll have one!

That's the Big Idea.

(c) 2000. Dave Redick - The Preacher's Study. All Rights Reserved. Reprint by permission only. Please do not cut articles out of this ezine and paste them anywhere else. You may, however, forward the entire Ezine to friends freely.

We're in the midst of appointing additional deacons in our congregation so two new messages were added to our Premium area lately to cover that topic. The first was mentioned in our last issue. You need to have Premium access to view these and other sermons on the site. For more information about Premium access, go to:

http://preacherstudy.com/subinfo.htm

Here are the latest additions:

"Seven Men Who May Have Saved the Church"

http://preacherstudy.com/premium/deacons1.html

"Let These First Be Tested"

http://preacherstudy.com/premium/deacons2.html

"Deacon Nomination Form"

http://preacherstudy.com/premium/nominate.html

There is also a new message called, "Your Life in the Stars? A Biblical Look at Astrology."

http://preacherstudy.com/premium/horoscop.html

New material is added to our website weekly. There is also a free section that can be viewed without a password at:

http://preacherstudy.com/free.htm

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