Experienced preachers often get asked by young preachers to give them advice on their craft. How do I preach better? Should I preach longer? Or shorter? Should I use illustrations? Should I use a full script or just notes?
Each preacher develops opinions on these things, and before long the young preacher is offering advice to the even-younger preacher.
There are certainly techniques and approaches to preaching that can be learnt. There is also an element to it that seems to spring more naturally from the personality. A combination of learning techniques and listening to your mentors will most likely help you to achieve the goal of faithful, thorough and motivating Bible preaching.
Below is a list of seven tips for those who are beginning to preach. They are not an exhaustive program for preaching effectively; rather, they are simple ideas that I have found to bring more success than failure. They are focussed on one question: how do I keep it interesting?
Here is an outline of his seven tips:
- When you preach, be as good as you can
- Fledgling preachers tend to be boring
- Work out how long you can preach for and still be interesting
- Avoid commentaries [JT: read the whole comment for context!]
- Find the logic units of the book; don’t just preach on chapters or paragraphs
- Young preachers should start with bigger sections
- Expository preaching is worth fighting for (but a lot of other things are not)
I liked this one in particular:
If you’re not boring when you emerge from Bible College, you probably didn’t learn anything. Your head will be full of theology, Greek phrases, the latest ideas on running a service, and whatever else has grabbed your intellectual fancy.
Five years out of College, if you’re still boring, you have a problem.
You can read the whole thing here.
Phillip Jensen and Paul Grimmond have a new book out on preaching—a sort of follow-up to The Trellis and the Vine—which looks very helpful: The Archer and the Arrow: Preaching the Very Words of God. (You can read the preface and first chapter here.)