Preaching Without Notes

(Answers below.)

1. According to the quotes by Augustine, Aristotle and Quintilian, what is a crucial aspect of preaching/teaching?
2. What does "preaching by ear" mean (preach without notes)? What is it not? Practically, what is it?
3. What is the difference between preaching by memory and preaching by memorization?
4. What about using notes or reading off a script?

"For no one may benefit another with that which he does not have himself." St. Augustine, On Christian Doctrine.

"...the speaker('s)...character must almost be called the most effective means of persuasion he possesses." Aristotle, Rhetoric.

"I am convinced that no one can be an orator who is not a good man, and even if anyone could, I should be unwilling that he should be." Quintilian (35-100 AD), Institutes of Oratory.

Persuasive Preaching

Persuasive Preaching: A Biblical and Practical Guide to the Effective Use of Persuasion by R. Larry Overstreet is a helpful book for preachers, pastors, and ministers of the gospel. It is not an easy read but more like a textbook with much interaction with the Greek. But I enjoyed reading it and found it useful and practical as a bivocational preacher. It prompted me to think seriously about persuasion, and to reassess how I am to preach and teach and communicate Scripture by using persuasion biblically. This book has 4 logical parts moving from issues, need for, theology of, and how to regarding persuasive preaching:

1. Issues Facing Persuasive Preaching.
2. Biblical Basis of Persuasive Preaching.
3. Structuring Persuasive Messages.
4. Pertinent Applications in Persuasive Preaching.

What is persuasion? "Persuasion aims at change. It may be change of belief, change of attitude, or change of behavior, but change is the goal." Overstreet makes a very strong case for the utmost importance of persuasion in preaching. Preaching that was geared toward some change was the norm in the past. But persuasion in preaching has been replaced by a more reflective and contemplative style of preaching where the congregation may simply feel informed but not feel challenged or motivated by the sermon. Overstreet encourages the return to persuasion in preaching that would lead to positive change in the congregation.

Preaching By Ear

I love this book! I highly recommend it to anyone who teaches or preaches.

As one who began preaching with some regularity only a few years ago I realized rather soon that preparing and writing out a sermon during one's private study in a room is quite different from preaching the sermon before a live audience. The written sermon should be primarily for reading and study, while the preached sermon is for the listening audience, which is live. The author, Dave McClellen, explained this important difference by exploring the art and science of orality from the ancient masters Augustine, Plato, Aristotle and Quintilian. McClellan also explained Preaching by Ear in two introductory videos on youtube: Preach By Ear - What's the problem (2 min) and Preach By Ear - Beginnings (5 min).

Having attended a church for over three decades where the sermon is always read from a written script, I subjectively sensed some limitation without knowing exactly how to explain why. A few years ago, I began experimenting with preaching extemporaneously, and found it to be far more fulfilling and organic for me. McClellan's book helped confirm my suspicions that extemporaneous preaching enables you to connect with your congregation in the moment with unlimited flexibility and vulnerability. On the other hand, reading a prepared script to a live audience is "safer," but more limiting and less able to connect with the audience in the ever changing moment. At least, this was my own experience when I preached by reading from a script with little or hardly any deviation from it.

Seven Questions to Ask Before You Preach or Teach the Bible

by: Jonathan Parnell

In his message at the National Conference, Francis Chan highlighted the importance of loving the people to whom he preaches. He mentioned seven questions that he asks himself in preparing to preach. Here are the seven questions:

1. Am I worried about what people think of my message or what God thinks? (Teach with fear)
2. Do I genuinely love these people? (Teach with love)
3. Am I accurately presenting this passage? (Teach with accuracy)
4. Am I depending on the Holy Spirit's power or my own cleverness? (Teach with power)
5. Have I applied this message to my own life? (Teach with integrity)
6. Will this message draw attention to me or to God? (Teach with humility)
7. Do the people really need this message? (Teach with urgency)
   

Resource: http://www.desiringgod.org/blog/posts/seven-questions-to-ask-before-you-preach-or-teach-the-bible

To Prosperity Preachers: Commend Christ As Gain by John Piper

My biggest concern about the effects of the prosperity movement is that it diminishes Christ by making him less central and less satisfying than his gifts. Christ is not magnified most by being the giver of wealth. He is magnified most by satisfying the soul of those who sacrifice to love others in the ministry of the gospel.

When we commend Christ as the one who makes us rich, we glorify riches, and Christ becomes a means to the end of what we really want—namely, health, wealth, and prosperity. But when we commend Christ as the one who satisfies our soul forever—even when there is no health, wealth, and prosperity—then Christ is magnified as more precious than all those gifts.

We see this in Philippians 1:20-21. Paul says, “It is my eager expectation and hope that . . . Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” Honoring Christ happens when we treasure him so much that dying is gain. Because dying means “to depart and be with Christ” (Philippians 1:23).

This is the missing note in prosperity preaching. The New Testament aims at the glory of Christ, not the glory of his gifts. To make that clear, it puts the entire Christian life under the banner of joyful self-denial. “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me” (Mark 8:34). “I have been crucified with Christ” (Galatians 2:20).

But even though self-denial is a hard road that leads to life (Matthew 7:14), it is the most joyful of all roads. “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field” (Matthew 13:44). Jesus says that finding Christ as our treasure makes all other possessions joyfully dispensable. “In his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.”

I do not want prosperity preachers to stop calling people to maximum joy. On the contrary, I appeal to them to stop encouraging people to seek their joy in material things. The joy Christ offers is so great and so durable that it enables us to lose prosperity and still rejoice. “You joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one” (Hebrews 10:34). The grace to be joyful in the loss of prosperity—that is the miracle prosperity preachers should seek. That would be the salt of the earth and the light of the world. That would magnify Christ as supremely valuable.

John Piper

Resource:http://www.desiringgod.org/Blog/2447_to_prosperity_preachers_commend_christ_as_gain/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+DGBlog+%28DG+Blog%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher

Preacher-Onlys Aren't Good Preachers

15 Oct 2009, by Tim Keller

In my blog post on Willow Creek, I said that many Reformed evangelicals think of sound, expository preaching as something of a 'magic bullet.' We may think that as long as we are preaching the Word--preaching the law and the gospel rightly--that everything else in congregational life will somehow take care of itself. We may give lip service to the other two marks of the church--the administration of the sacraments and discipline--but we don't give them proper weight. Fully considered, the administration of the sacraments includes pastoral care, education, and discipleship, while the ministry of discipline means rightly ordering the community, that is, pastoral leadership.

I have often seen many men spend a great amount of time on preparing and preaching lengthy, dense, expository messages, while giving far less time and energy to the learning of leadership and pastoral nurture. It takes lots of experience and effort to help a body of people make a unified decision, or to regularly raise up new lay leaders, or to motivate and engage your people in evangelism, or to think strategically about the stewardship of your people's spiritual gifts, or even to discern what they are. It takes lots of experience and effort to know how to help a sufferer without being either too passive or too directive, or to know when to confront a doubter and when to just listen patiently. Pastors in many of our Reformed churches do not seem to be as energized to learn to be great leaders and shepherds, but rather have more of an eye to being great teachers and preachers.

I'd point us to the example of John Calvin himself. No one put more emphasis on expository preaching as central to ministry. And yet Calvin sat nearly every Thursday in the Consistory, hearing hundreds of practical pastoral cases each year brought by the elders of the city to the council of pastors and other elders. He applied his theology to the intimate details of "adultery and fornication, disputed engagements and weddings, family quarrels, incest, rape, sodomy, buggery, prostitution, voyeurism, abortion, child neglect, child abuse, education disputes, spousal abuse, mistreatment of maids, family poverty, embezzlement of family property, sickness, divorce, marital property disputes, inheritance..." (Witte and Kingdon, Sex, Marriage, and Family in John Calvin's Geneva, Vol 1, p. 15.) Also, Calvin's voluminous correspondence shows what a forceful and wise leader and statesman he was. Because Calvin was not only a preacher but also a great shepherd and leader, he built up the church in a way that changed the world.

I pastor a church with a large staff and so I give 15+ hours a week to preparing the sermon. I would not advise younger ministers to spend so much time, however. When I was a pastor without a staff I put in 6-8 hours on a sermon. If you put in too much time in your study on your sermon you put in too little time being out with people as a shepherd and a leader. Ironically, this will make you a poorer preacher. It is only through doing people-work that you become the preacher you need to be--someone who knows sin, how the heart works, what people's struggles are, and so on. Pastoral care and leadership (along with private prayer) are to a great degree sermon preparation. More accurately, it is preparing the preacher, not just the sermon. Through pastoral care and leadership you grow from being a Bible commentator into a flesh and blood preacher.

Article url: http://redeemercitytocity.com/blog/view.jsp?Blog_param=56

Hindrances in the Ministry of the Word

One great hindrance to holiness in the ministry of the word is that we are prone to preach & write without pressing into the things we say & making them real to our own souls. Over the years words begin to come easy, & we find we can speak of:

• mysteries without standing in awe;


• purity without feeling pure;


• zeal without spiritual passion;


• God's holiness without trembling;


• sin without sorrow;


• heaven without eagerness.

And the result is a terrible hardening of the spiritual life.

From: http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/Biographies/1466_The_Chief_Design_of_My_Life_Mortification_and_Universal_Holiness/

About preaching

Our people need a God-besotted* man. (*having an irrational passion for a person or thing) ... they need at least one man in their life who is radically & totally focused on God & the pursuit of the knowledge of God, & the ministry of the word of God...they need a true vision of the greatness of God. They need to see the whole panorama of his excellencies.

They need to see a God-entranced man on Sunday morning & at the deacon's meeting. Robert Murray M'Cheyne said, "What my people need most is my personal holiness. That's right. But human holiness is nothing other than a God-besotted* life."

And our people need to hear God-entranced preaching. God himself needs to be the subject matter of our preaching, in his majesty & holiness & righteousness & faithfulness & sovereignty & grace. And by that I don't mean we shouldn't preach about nitty-gritty practical things like parenthood, & divorce & AIDS & gluttony & television & sex. We should indeed! What I mean is that everyone of those things should be swept right up into the holy presence of God & laid bare to the roots of its Godwardness or godlessness.

What our people need is not nice little moral, or psychological pep talks about how to get along in the world. They need to see that everything, absolutely everything - from garage sales & garbage recycling to death & demons have to do with God in all his infinite greatness. Most of our people have no one, no one in the world to placard the majesty of God for them. Therefore most of them are starved for the infinite God-entranced vision of Jonathan Edwards & they don't even know it.

Excerpted from "The Pastor as Theologian" (Life and Ministry of Jonathan Edwards) by John Piper: http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/Biographies/1458_The_Pastor_as_Theologian/

Christ-centered (redemptive) preaching

How do you preach & teach the Bible?

• Look at people & see Swiss cheese. They have holes in them. They are incomplete.
• Fill the holes. How?
  

It's easy to become moralistic/legalistic in preaching & Bible teaching: "Do this. Don't do that." While there's nothing wrong with preaching morality, it is legalistic, & it ignores the grace of God & replaces the work of Christ with self-help. Such preaching leads to a lack of recognition that "there's no merit in keeping God's commands," since all our righteous acts are like filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6), & that after doing everything we're told, we are unworthy servants who have only done what we should have done (Luke 17:10). We should not communicate that God loves me more because I do more than the next person. Rather, God loves me simply because of the work of Christ. Thus, Christ must be at the heart of every sermon preached. If not, we are assuming the gospel, rather than preaching the gospel.

All Scripture is intended to complete us in some way (2 Timothy 3:16), by leading to salvation or advancing sanctification. The implication is that we’re incomplete. We’re fallen creatures in a fallen condition, & God’s redemptive work in Scripture is making us whole in ways we cannot by ourselves. For preaching, it means that we look at people & see Swiss cheese. They have holes in them. They’re incomplete. So, in preaching & Bible teaching, what are you going to say to fills the holes?

Many preachers approach a text with only 2 thoughts in mind: (1) right doctrine to believe, or (2) right acts to do. If that’s all I’m saying, if the way I’m saying to fill the holes is either to accept & know this doctrine or do this right behavior, you must recognize that both of those are merely forms of human legalism. It’s saying that either what you know or what you do makes you right with God. Even though what you do may be right, & what you know may be right, you must know that it’s not you who make things right with God.

If all that is in my brain is “I’m supposed to be feeding these people in right doctrine or instructing them in right behavior,” then something will still be missing. There'll still be a hole in our own preaching.

Just as every Scripture echoes our incompleteness, it is also in some manner signaling the Savior’s work that makes us whole. Our goal in redemptive preaching is to decipher these signals. Until we do so, we do not truly understand our text. It’s possible to say all the right words & send all the wrong signals.