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First Tuesday of October, 2000

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IN THIS ISSUE:

[1] Greetings from the Editor

[2] Featured Article: TO MSS OR NOT TO MSS

[3] On Subscribing to Our Website

[4] Contact Info

[5] Subscribe to this Ezine

[6] Copyright Info

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[1] *=*Greetings from the Editor

A special welcome to new subscribers and a hearty greeting to those who have been with us for awhile. Thanks for reading.

If I may be so bold once again as to interject some of my preaching opinions for your consideration, this issue is devoted to the practice of manuscripting sermons. I'm a believer in this kind of preparation which, though perhaps less commonly used than other methods, offers some great advantages. If you can benefit, and don’t do it currently, try it. If you see it differently and can teach me something I don't know, I'd love to hear from you.

BTW, if you find you are not receiving issues of this ezine regularly, or have had to re-subscribe because you were dropped, it is probably because of our system that removes bounces when your mailbox is full. If Listbot fails to deliver after several days of trying, due to a busy server or a full mailbox, it will simply drop your email address. If this happens you must re-subscribe. Sorry 'bout that. I have to rely on this automated feature due to the size of the mailing list. I gave up trying to keep up with such bounces a long time ago.

Remember, please, that you may forward this ezine to friends and associates freely if you consider it worthy of their perusal.

God bless.

-Dave

[2] *=*Featured Article

TO MSS OR NOT TO MSS

By Dave Redick

With several gifted men in charge of training me to preach, I cannot remember any of them ever actually telling me what format to use for the purpose of carrying the sermon from study to pulpit. Oh, there were some fine examples of how to do it, as varied as the men who used them, but I and my fellow trainees were left to ourselves to discover which method worked best for us.

Should we go to the pulpit with only an outline for notes? Should we pencil the notes in our Bibles? Carry cue cards? Preach without notes? Carry a full manuscript? For that matter, in the task of preparation, should we work through the thinking process in outline form only or write things out? Few preachers that I know are capable of impromptu speaking week after week to the same group of people. Most need to carry some kind of notes.

I suspect my mentors believed that this part of the preaching process would vary so much with each preacher, subject to his unique gifts, abilities, and habits, that they should fairly well stay away from telling us exactly what we should do.

Like you perhaps, I tried each of different methods until I settled on the one that works for me.

Today I manuscript my sermons and carry the manuscript to the pulpit when I preach. I’ve been doing this for years and it works well with my personal style of speaking. If you do it another way, and it works for you, I wouldn’t necessarily suggest that you change, but let me give you some pros and cons of the manuscripting method. By manuscripting, I mean that you write out the sermon word for word, ahead of time, then stick fairly close to it in your delivery.

***Cons

I’ll start here because many who dismiss manuscripting as impractical do it when they can’t get past the seemingly cumbersome disadvantages.

1. It takes too long to prepare.

It is true that manuscripting can take longer than other forms of preparation. This criticism is especially valid if the writing is done by hand or by the venerable “hunt-and-peck” method at the keyboard. Manuscripting requires the sermon writer to fully think though each point and ponder not only the concepts, but also the specific words that will be used to express the concepts. Yes, it takes extra time, but there are some redeeming factors. Please keep reading.

2. It tempts preachers to read rather than speak.

There is something about reading a sermon that says "canned" or perhaps conveys that a speaker is unsure of what he is saying. Don't just read the manuscript.

While the temptation to rely on reading may be there, it is also possible that the mental effort needed to produce a manuscript will make the preacher so familiar with what he has prepared that he will need only an occasional glance at his notes. This is true for me. Though the manuscript is right there in front of me, having spent all week working with it, I need only an occasional glance down to refresh my mind.

3. It stifles the Holy Spirit.

Today's preachers are not inspired as were the first century Apostles and prophets. It is my understanding that the miraculous gift of prophecy (the ability to speak the word of God as He reveals it directly) ceased about the same time the New Testament scriptures were completed.  (See Corinthians 13:8.)  Passages like Matthew 10:19 ("But when they deliver you up, do not become anxious about how or what you will speak; for it shall be given you in that hour what you are to speak.") were written to Christ's Apostles, not to all preachers in general. This is also true of promises like the one found in John 14:26 ("He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you.") These were not spoken to Christians in general. Neither were they spoken to preachers in general. In each context, Christ was speaking to the twelve who would be His special spokesmen and who would also be empowered to write scripture. (See 2 Peter 3:14-16.)

I will not deny that the Holy Spirit is active in preaching, and may at times operate on the preacher as well as the hearers. I’ve just never quite understood why some believe He shows up at the pulpit but not in the study. If He can prompt us in some way at the moment of our preaching, can He not also do it during the hours of our study and preparations?

4. It is too much work.

Yes, manuscripting requires extra work. That is because it forces a preacher to do what he may not already be doing. He must think through the words he is going to say. This is bad?


***Pros

1. It forces clarification.

This is, to me, the single greatest benefit of manuscripting a sermon. It is quite possible for a preacher to think he is clear on a concept, only to arrive at the pulpit unable to adequately make his point - or perhaps unable to help his listeners understand the point. When sermons are written out word for word ahead of time, there is much less chance of this muddiness of understanding. Or, if the understanding is muddy, at least it is discovered soon enough to correct it before delivering the message.

2. It allows for a more precise choice of words.

Words are powerful things. They should not be used hastily (Proverbs 29:20.) Fitly spoken, they are "like apples of gold in settings of silver" (Proverbs 25:11.) Taking time to think them through sharpens their edge and makes them even more valuable. Such contemplating of words also helps us eliminate awkward expressions and learn better ways to say things.

3. It provides a bit more security for beginners than a skeletal outline.

While today I don't feel particularly insecure with only an outline, early on I was terrified that I might forget what it was I wanted to say. Having the manuscript there provided a fallback for me, just in case.

4. It preserves the sermon for easier use at a later time.

Pick up a two year old outline, set of cue cards, or marginal notes in a Bible and try to remember just what it was you said when you first spoke the message. In many cases you won't be able to recall. I still have sermons in my files that were merely outlines with scriptures and notations to remind me of illustrations. Perhaps they were effective at the time, but they're useless to me or anyone else now. The thoughts behind each point are forgotten. For instance, one sermon has a point between major outline markings called "Bret's large dog." Obviously it was a flag to remember some illustration, but today, for the life of me, I can't even remember who "Bret" was, much less what I may have said about his big dog or what it may have illustrated.

By contrast, I can pick up a sermon manuscript I wrote two years ago and, with an hour or so to look it over, be ready to preach it again. (No, I seldom do it this way. Such a message is usually reworded a bit.) This is a great payback for having spent extra time in the original preparation.

5. It allows the message to do double and triple duty.

Since a manuscript is a written communication as well as a spoken one, it can be distributed for effective reading to those not present when it was preached. Messages can be printed in booklet form for distribution to shut-ins and absentees. They can be carried into prisons, mailed to servicemen and servicewomen in far flung places, and kept on hand for reoccurring counseling issues. Snippets can be taken out and used for devotional talks, emailed to people with particular questions, or used as short radio spots. A well written main division of a sermon on a pertinent topic can, with minimal reworking, become an article for your bulletin or a contribution to an email discussion. You can't do that with only an outline because you won't be there in person to fill it in.

As with most of the articles in this ezine, these words are simply one man's opinion. If your method serves you better, far be it from me to talk you out of it. Manuscripting has delivered good results for me in the task of preaching. It may do the same for you.

Copyright (c) Dave Redick, The Preacher's Study, 2000. All Rights Reserved. Reprint by permission only (which will probably be granted if you just ask.) Please do not cut articles out of this ezine and paste them anywhere else without permission. You may, however, forward this entire Ezine to friends freely.

[3] *=*On Subscribing to Our Website

This ezine, The Preacher's Study Ezine, is actually an extension of our website, The Preacher's Study. The two entities work hand-in-hand to promote what is unashamedly my greatest passion: promoting accurate, interesting, relevant preaching of God's Word. If you enjoy these articles, please do visit the website. You'll find the same quality of material there. Yes, there is a modest subscription fee for access to part of it, namely the Premium area, but I believe that, as our current subscribers testify again and again, you'll find good value there. All of us purchase books and commentaries to enhance our understanding of the Bible and improve our preaching. Some of these simply become inert additions to already crowded bookshelves. A subscription to The Preacher's Study will not likely become shelfware. Come see for yourself at:

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