Delivery of the Sermon
We have a responsibility not to dull the Word’s sharpness with our poor style. So if you’re serious about not dulling our Lord’s sharp, two-edged sword, work hard at purging your sermons of poor style (Jerry Vines, Power in the Pulpit, Chicago: Moody Publishers. Kindle Edition, 253). The most important way not to be dull is to be a sharp instrument in the hand of God. Charles Spurgeon in his Lectures to my Students before he wrote about preaching techniques, challenged his preaching students to be holy men of God:
Robert Murrey M’Cheyne, writing to a ministerial friend, who was traveling with a view to perfecting himself in the German tongue, used language identical with our own:
“I know you will apply hard to German, but do not forget the culture of a then inner man – I mean of the heart. How diligently the cavalry officer keeps his saber clean and sharp; every stain he rubs off with the greatest care. Remember you are God’s sword, his instrument – I trust, a chosen vessel unto him to bear his name. In great measure, according to the purity and perfection of the instrument, will be the success. It is not great talents God blesses so much as likeness to Jesus. A holy minister is an awful weapon in the hand of God” (Charles Spurgeon “Lecture 1. The Minister’s Self-Watch” in Lectures to My Students).
C. John Miller taught homiletics at Westminster and was listening to a taped sermon that one of his students had preached at a nearby church as an assignment::
“He was not exactly reading the manuscript, but he was heavily dependent on it. I could feel that his interest was not in his listeners but in the ideas in the manuscript. He droned on in a wooden tone when suddenly loud, booming voices began to break into his message. A true-life adventure was taking place! The recording equipment in the church was picking up police radio calls. The radio messages revealed that a robber was trapped by the police in a fast-food drive-in restaurant.
Every word the police said had a clear purpose. They meant to capture this man or know the reason why not. I can remember many of the words of the policemen. One of them was yelling to his partners, “Come on! Come on! Over there!” These men, out there on the street with drawn weapons, knew what they had to do. Their whole enterprise was focused on a single purpose: to capture the man. I think that is our purpose in preaching too: to capture the man for Christ when we preach! Permit nothing in the message that does not serve this master purpose” (C. John Miller, Preaching by Faith, 124). Which do we desire to preach like, the student only concerned about his grade or the passionate police officer determined to arrest his fugitive?
Charles H. Spurgeon in a sermon Soul Saving Our One Business (click to open) spoke of Mr. George Whitefield’s chapel at Moorfields [as] “The Soul Trap.” Whitefield was delighted and said he hoped it always would be a soul trap. Oh that all our places of worship were soul traps, and every Christian a fisher of men, each one doing his best, as the fisherman does, by every art and artifice to catch those they fish for.
In other words, Spurgeon desired when an unsaved soul came to the Metropolitan Tabernacle, that soul would be trapped and must accept Christ as Savior. Jesus called Peter and Andrew to be fishers of men in Matthew 4:18-20. Then he next called James and J0hn as they were mending their fishing nets in 4:21. The word mending or repairing [καταρτίζω katartizo] was used by Paul to describe his ministry to the church at Thessalonica in 1 Thessalonians 3:10: “Night and day praying exceedingly that we might … perfect [καταρτίζω] that which is lacking in your faith.” Paul was repairing the holes in the fishing net at Thessalonians through which the fish were escaping. Paul identified the holes in chapter 4. The hole of immorality in 4:1-8, laziness in 4:9-12, and sorrow over dead loved ones in 4:13-18.
To capture a man for Christ we must use every weapon at our disposal including the voice God has given us, facial expressions, and gesturing ability empowered by God's Spirit.
“A worthless person, a wicked man, is one who walks with a perverse mouth, who winks with his eyes, who signals with his feet, who points with his fingers” (Proverbs 6:12-13 NASB). For evil purposes, the worthless uses every means possible to persuade his victims. We preachers must not do less!
Psychologist Albert Mehrabian broke communication down into a formula: Only 7% of a speaker’s message comes through his words, 38% springs from his voice and 55% comes from his facial expressions (Haddon Robinson Biblical Preaching, 203).
We use methods of persuasion but we depend on the Holy Spirit to persuade
While we do not depend on the following methods for spiritual results, we do depend on the Holy Spirit to use us and our best effort to effectively communicate the Word. Paul expressed this motive in 1 Corinthians 2:1-5.
D. A. Carson explained this point well: “What Paul avoided was artificial communication that won plaudits for the speaker but distracted from the message. Lazy preachers have no right to appeal to 1 Corinthians 2:1-5 to justify indolence in the study and careless delivery in the pulpit. These verses do not prohibit diligent preparation, passion, clear articulation, and persuasive presentation. Rather, they warn against any method that leads people to say, ‘What a marvelous preacher!’ rather than, ‘What a marvelous Savior!’” (D. A. Carson, The Cross & Christian Ministry: An Exposition of Passages from 1 Corinthians, Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, and Leicester, England: InterVarsity Press, 1993, 49).
Paul used the methods of his day to persuade his listeners, but he did not depend on them for results. At Corinth, Paul “reasoned” (Acts 18:4) [διαλέγομαι, dialegomai] frequently translated as “reasoned,” “disputed,” or “argued.” We get our English word dialogue from this Greek word. Paul employed dialogue in his preaching. NET Bible notes, “This sense comes from its classical meaning where it was used of philosophical disputation, including the Socratic method of questions and answers.” Net Bible adds, “However, there does not seem to be contextual evidence for this kind of debate in Acts 18:4.” Paul was using a common method to persuade with total dependence on the Holy Spirit so “That your faith should not stand the wisdom of men, but in the power of God” (1 Cor 2:5).
John Calvin, who was called by some the Rhetorical Theologian, was trained in rhetoric and saw the use of rhetoric in preaching as useful: But what if someone in our day speaks in a somewhat more polished fashion and makes the teaching of the gospel sparkle with his eloquence? … I answer first of all that eloquence is not in conflict with the simplicity of the gospel at all, when free from contempt of the gospel, it not only gives it first place, and is subject to it but also serves it as a handmaid serves her mistress” (Was John Calvin a ‘Rhetorical Theologian’?) (click to open).
How can we make our sermons sparkle with persuasion? We can start by communicating through our body language.
Dress:
The principle in 1st Corinthians 9:22 is that we become all things to all men in order to win them without compromising the message.
Preaching expert Haddon Robinson had an excellent chapter in Biblical Preaching entitled "How to Preach So People Will Listen." I will refer to it often in this post. He stated, “A fundamental rule of grooming and dress is that they should fit the audience, the situation, and the speaker. As a general rule, a public speaker will dress one notch higher than the audience. In the final analysis, dress should not call attention to us but should help us call attention to the Word of God” (Biblical Preaching 206, 207).
Tony Merida offers this advice: What is appropriate for your setting? What does not distract from the message? Is it clean and modest? These are the questions that you should think about. Remember that your freedom in Christ should not be abused. Do not put a stumbling block in the way of the gospel (Tony Merida, Faithful Preaching (B&H Publishing. Kindle Edition), 179.
We should not have the reputation as the best-dressed preacher in town.
Eye Contact:
When you preach aim for the white of their eyes. Robinson gives this advice: Even though you address a congregation as a group, you talk with them as individuals. Talk with one listener at a time for a second or two. Choose listeners in every section of the sanctuary, and keep eye contact long enough so that they know that you have singled them out for an instant and are speaking to them (Biblical Preaching, 212). Preaching without notes helps eye contact.
We will be tempted to fix our gaze on a very interested head-nodding church member to their embarrassment.
Vocal Delivery:
Writers have many different ways to emphasize what they write. They can use exclamation points, commas, question marks, underlining, italics, indentations, and boldface type. Speakers, on the other hand, emphasize what they say in only four ways----by a variety in pitch, punch, progress, and pause (Biblical Preaching, 215), and now we can add PowerPoint but not as a substitute for the “ps”. The use of these or a combination of them becomes the punctuation of speech.
Steven Mathewson gives a caution, "As a general rule, you're not being as dramatic as you think you are. For example, if you are moving from loud to soft, it may seem to you like the volume drops from level 9 to level 2. When your audience hears it, however, or when you listen to yourself on tape, the volume level only drops from level 9 to level 6. The pause that seems like four seconds to you only takes one second. So don't be afraid to over-exaggerate your contrasts" (Steven D. Mathewson. The Art of Preaching Old Testament Narrative. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2002, 156). Haddon Robinson, asserted, what some might think controversial, “While the preacher is more than an actor, he should not be less” (Biblical Preaching, 207).
Here is the practice of Donald R. Sunukjian to loosen up his homiletic students: "I place a three-by-five card upside down in front of about fifteen different people. Each card has a number on it, the name of a biblical character, and a passage of Scripture that describes that character in some action or situation. Examples of such cards are:
1. Zacchaeus meeting Jesus (Luke 19:1-6)
2. Peter walking on water (Matt. 14:28-31)
3. David slaying Goliath (1 Sam. 17:38-51)
4. One of the disciples participating in the feeding of the multitude (Mark 6:35-43)
I tell those who have received the cards that when we return after a brief break, they are to pantomime or charade the person on the card, doing the action described. Simply by their movements and expressions, without using any words, they are to act out the scene in such a way that we can guess who their character is. The following fifteen to twenty minutes are a riot, as each person creatively and humorously mimes the character and event." After this exercise, Sunukjian teaches three truths:
1. "First, they see how much information can be communicated without any words.
2. Second, they see how interesting it is when the speaker is alive, moving, and animated.
3. Third, they see that they can do it. They can move, bend, raise their arms, hug their stomachs, or simulate climbing, rowing, slinging, or marching" (Invitation to Biblical Preaching, 300).
Pitch:
The working rule is that your best average pitch is the lowest you can use without strain. To reach this think baritone, not tenor. Read a chapter in a book, raising and lowering your pitch to get a new feel of how your voice works. Then practice volume, keeping the pitch down; try it louder and softer (Robert Delnay, Fire in Your Pulpit, 2001, 80). Video on pitch (click to open)
Because Matthew 16:13 is a question, the pitch goes up at the end, not the volume. Practice reading “Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?” and make your pitch go up [from baritone to tenor] on "am?”
Because Matthew 16:16 is not a question the pitch goes down at the end of the sentence. Read “And Simon Peter answered and said, You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” and let the pitch go down at the end of a sentence.
Punch or loudness or volume:
“Few people like to be yelled at; only the hard-of-hearing will be grateful” (Delnay, Fire in Your Pulpit” page 81).
Here is a video on volume (click to open)
Using Psalm 23:1, emphasize the first word in the first sentence and then the second word in the first sentence, etc., and when each word is punched the emphasis of the sentence is changed. Punch “THE Lord is my shepherd” or The Lord not another god. The LORD is my shepherd” or the Lord, not my career, possessions, family, or hobbies is my source of comfort or meaning. You can go through each word of the verse using punch to change the meaning of the verse but the application.
Rate or progress:
Using 2nd Samuel 18:33, read at the same rate. Then speak the first six words rapidly and the rest slowly with feeling as David must have sobbed over the news of the death of his rebellious son Absalom. Sentences spoken more slowly stand out because they are in strong contrast to the content surrounding them (Robinson, 217).
The well-worn proverb comes to my mind: "Pray as if it is up to God to accomplish His will and work as if it is up to you." We must painstakingly study the passage to be preached and fervently pray that God will enable us to preach in the power and demonstration of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 2:4). Then practice and rehearse with His God-given tools we just taught so that the listeners' "faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God" (1 Corinthians 2:5). Here is video on rate (Click to open)