06.06. Chapter 6: The Genesis Of A Sermon
Chapter 6 THE GENESIS OF A SERMON IN OUR previous lectures we have dealt entirely with the preacher. We have sought to set before you (1) the divinity of his calling, (2) the menace of trying to form him according to a mold, (3) certain secrets of success, (4) the present-day demand, (5) the preacher and his professional ethics! Important as it is to have at once a clear and Biblically-correct idea of this high calling, our lectures, until now, have dealt with the profession entirely; but in all professional callings, the ministry included, practice must follow preparation, and we come now to homiletics proper and present for your consideration “The Genesis of a Sermon.” In this process there are three essential steps, namely, Decide the Sort, Prepare the Outline, and Complete the Work.
DECIDE THE SORT! By this statement we mean, Determine the kind of sermon to be preached. As you know, there are many kinds of sermons; in fact, too many to mention them all. Sermons should be like people, each absolutely individual. Although there are billions of people in the world, twins are rare, and identicals are almost unknown. So it should be with sermons. Each should carry its individuality. But as the world’s populace is arranged—five recognized colors and the still larger number of nations—so sermons may be catalogued. For instance, we have the theme or subject sermon, the textual sermon, the expository sermon, etc. In the form of specials, the number multiplies—the funeral sermon, the ordination sermon, the anniversary sermon, the installation sermon, the revival sermon, sermons to children, etc., etc. In fact, special occasions may require special character for the sermon to be prepared. It is absolutely essential, therefore, for one, before he enters upon the process of preparation, yes, even before he selects his text or formulates his subject, to decide the sort of a sermon that is required. The occasion will aid your decision. There would be little kinship between a funeral discourse and the deliverance of a jubilee address, and there would be no close relationship between a college baccalaureate sermon and an ordination sermon. In other words, if one is going to build a structure, he must decide before he begins whether it is to be a cottage or a cathedral. The foundations to be laid will be different; material to be employed, different; the whole form, even to the finial, will be so different that nothing but failure and disaster could follow without pre-decision. So in sermonizing! The objective will influence the whole endeavor. To illustrate by example, in my volume, Revival Sermons, published by Fleming H. Revell, the second sermon discusses “Six Essentials in Soul Winning.” Its reading will reveal that in arrangement and in appeal it is intended absolutely to move Christian men and women to the overt act of soul-winning, to stir them to the point of ardent personal endeavor to win the unsaved. We here present the text and outline and recommend that you secure the volume and carefully study the sermon.
Subject: SIX ESSENTIALS IN SOUL WINNING
Outline:
I.Get God’s Conception of the Soul’s Worth II.Consecrate Self to Soul-Winning III.Surrender to the Spirit’s Counsel IV.Employ the Sword of the Spirit—The Word V.In This Divinest of Work, Be Direct!
VI.With Whatever Success Be Dissatisfied The same volume presents a sermon intended to bring the convicted to an open confession. You will find it on page 97.
Subject: THE OPEN VERSUS THE SECRET DISCIPLE Text: Luke 12:8-9.
Outline:
I.A Reasonable Requirement II.An Essential Act III.An Absolute Demand The first of these sermons is addressed entirely to Christians; the second, to convicted sinners who have never openly confessed their Christ; then from the text to the final appeal the preparation is influenced by the objective.
Having decided the sort of sermon, chosen the text, then PREPARE THE OUTLINE This is the next and most important step. An outline sustains to an intended sermon the same relation that the architect’s preliminary sketch sustains to the finished structure. In the building profession it is well understood that no great progress can be made until that preliminary sketch meets the approval of the investor. No intelligent man will put his money into a proposed structure that does not represent his desire, and no effective preacher will invest hours of study upon a discourse, the frame of which is offensive to both his tastes and his intent. In the judgment of your teacher the creation of a satisfactory outline requires at least as much time and thought as the rest of sermon completion, including writing or dictation, should demand.
It is probably true that in building, where we have the most striking parallelism, the foundation can be laid and the frame of the entire building erected in shorter time than will be consumed in finishing processes; but it is absolutely certain that until the framework is a completed thing and is found satisfactory, the further expenditure of time and money is well nigh a waste of both. So with the sermon.
Into it, then, should be put painstaking study.
If at any point in the whole procedure the minister should f strive to be at his best, it is in the hours when making the outline. A full stomach affects sluggishly the intellect; and for many years on the mornings when I intended to create the outlines for the Sunday sermons, I purposely omitted breakfast and found my slight sacrifice requited a hundredfold. I am not setting this forth as a prescription to be slavishly followed by others (there are individual differences in the intellect as distinct as those in the features of the face), but I am reciting it to impress the theological student with the absolute importance of intellectual activity in the sermon planning.
Owing to repeated absences from my office in evangelistic campaigns and Bible conference addresses, it was usual to arrive home on Saturday or even on an early Sunday morning train. Oftentimes three secretaries were called in order to complete a sermon in two to three hours, and if on Sunday, not later than ten-thirty o’clock. Having dictated a few pages to the one, I would take another for additional pages while the first was writing what had been given, and a third for still further dictation while the first and second were so engaged; making it possible for the first to be ready for another sitting when the third had received her portion of dictation. Under such circumstances I did not dare swallow one bite of breakfast, knowing the dulling effect of a full stomach upon intellectual endeavor. When an outline is finished, it should be a perfect frame. In looking upon the construction of homes and other building, it has always seemed to me that the workmen, when once the frame was up, could go about their task of completing the planned building with assurance. There are technical problems ahead of them, but from then on, it is a case of bringing material into its planned place. Whether the building, when finished, would be absolutely satisfactory would depend now solely upon the intelligence and energy with which each workman performed his part. If one of them is dull or unconcerned, and performs his task in a careless and slipshod manner, the finished building will show the defects. If, on the other hand, he is careful, conscientious and efficient, beauty and satisfaction will be the result.
It is equally true in the preparation of a discourse.
Having created the outline, COMPLETE THE WORK
Study each division with a view of development. An outline is, of course, only the skeleton of a sermon. These bones must be covered with flesh, and into the finished product must be breathed the breath of life; consequently, the procedure is to go back now, and taking up each portion, develop it in its turn. Study carefully what you want to say by way of introduction and set it down. You have the main divisions with clearly defined subdivisions. Think them through in turn and jot down your own thought of what ought to be said under each. Having finished that process, return again and consider what scriptural proof-texts can be added to strengthen each assertion or claim, and jot those down under each main division and subdivision. The second step, search for the most fit of illustrations.
There are some men whose style is so dramatic, or whose figures of speech are so individual and attractive, that they could get on with few illustrations. For instance, the sentences of O. P. Gifford scintillated and those of DeWitt Talmadge attracted by their dramatic phraseology. But the average man can better point what he has to say with an apt illustration than in any other conceivable way.
There are people who oppose the use of illustrations; give them a deaf ear! The one thing that is most deadly to a sermon is to be “dry” Effective illustrations not only lubricate; they enlist, impress and convict—the very things you must do, or be set down as dull.
Finally, make your last point an effective appeal.
Harwood Pattison, in his Making of the Sermon, quotes Longfellow as saying, “A sermon is no sermon in which I cannot hear the heartbeat.” But even more than that is required. The preacher must not only communicate his own heartbeat to his audience, he must stir the heartbeats of his hearers to the point where they will act.
Bishop Joyce once said to me, “Riley, I know when a man is preaching. It is when the chills run up and down my spine.” But perhaps a better expression of the same would be, “It is when my heart is so warmed by what has been said that I must go out and do what has been suggested.” That is the objective of preaching and is also the necessity of having the last point in a sermon profoundly effective.
BIBLIOGRAPHY Broadus, John A. On the Preparation and Delivery of Sermons (New and Revised ed., New York: Harper & Bros., 1944).
Pattison, T. Harwood Making of a Sermon (Philadelphia: American Baptist Publishing Society, 1898).