I have been teaching adults for over 25 years now. For the first fifteen years or more, it was teaching an adult Sunday School class. The last eight to ten years have been from behind a podium as part of the teaching team at our local church. I have been a student of communicators of all types for years. It has always amazed me how easily some people can hold an audience for an extended period of time, or how quickly some can lose their audience. In attempting to recreate the former situation in my own speaking and teaching, I have turned to some of the writings of people I consider to be great communicators. Those books are listed below. Hopefully you will find these helpful if you are searching for ways to improve your own preaching and speaking.
1. Communicating for a Change - Andy Stanley and Lane Jones
This is without a doubt the one book that fundamentally changed the way I preach. It also transformed how I go about writing and structuring a sermon. With having a career in the trucking industry for so many years now, I'm especially fond of the first half of the book. It is a parable about a truck driver that teaches a preacher how to be a better communicator. The whole concept just resonates with me. In the later half of the book, Stanley goes into his ME, WE, GOD, YOU, WE formula for crafting a message that lands every time with the audience.
Simply put in my own words, the ME section is how you might struggle with the topic you are fixing to address in your message. This section creates trust and buy-in from the audience. The WE section is how all of us struggle with the topic. This section builds tension that you will resolve with Biblical exegesis and application. The GOD section unpacks the Biblical truth you are communicating and how it applies to our lives. The YOU section is a challenge to the audience. How are YOU going to apply this? The WE section is what the church and the world would look like if WE are rightly applying this truth to our lives. I have been using this method for the past 7-8 years and it is powerful. It is the method I use every time I prepare and preach a message and I absolutely love it.
2. Saying It Well: Touching Others with Your Words - Chuck Swindoll
I have always been a fan of Chuck Swindoll. He has a gift for expositing God's word in profound ways. Swindoll has a gift for interweaving stories and humor into his messages and for making complex truths easy to understand and apply to your daily walk with Jesus. There is quite a bit of Swindoll's own story in this book. He weaves a biography of sorts through certain chapters related to his calling to preach, how God prepared him for it, and his going into ministry full time. In the later chapters, there is absolute sage advise for preachers on researching, crafting the sermon itself, how to use illustrations and humor, the power of prayer when preaching, and how to make application of your text to people's lives.
The most powerful takeaway for me from this book was in the section on praying ahead of your sermon. I would get horribly nervous before preaching. At times it almost felt debilitating. Then I read these words from Chuck in chapter six:
"I now understand that Sunday's sermon isn't really my responsibility. I'm the one who must prepare, and I have been scheduled to stand before the congregation to speak, so, if I don't do what i must, Sunday will be an awkward experience for everyone. yet the sermon isn't my responsibility; in the final analysis, it's God's. He wants a great message for His people. It' not like I have to convince him to help me. He's not withholding his help until I pray long enough or fervently enough to satisfy His vanity. He wants His Word explained, proclaimed, understood, and applied more than I do! After all it is His Word that reveals His well, which is to be done for His glory. (Pg. 149-150)
As a young, would-be teacher of God's word, those words were incredibly comforting to me. They put everything into perspective for me and put me much more at ease before delivering a message. It was like having a wise father figure speak into my life and instill confidence in me. Much of this book has the same feel. All of the wisdom of a fantastic communicator and great man of God distilled into book form to help others with the same calling on their life. What a legacy!
3. Secrets of Dynamic Communication - Ken Davis
This book was a required reading text for one of my religion classes at
Liberty University. I enjoyed the book so much, I bought a copy of it for my own library for future reference! Davis has developed the SCORRE method of preparing for a speech or sermon. In working through the SCORRE acronym (Subject, Central Theme, Objective, Rationale, Resources, Evaluation), you are taught how to organize your information in such a way as to be able to deliver a focused and dynamic message every time you stand up before a crowd. The chapter on Using Effective Body Language was my personal favorite. All of us have seen speakers with a particular "tic." A body movement, or phrase repeated over and over that is distracting from the topic. Davis gives a master class in public speaking in the later half of the book. If you have never had a public speaking class, I would encourage you to pick this book up and read it.
Outside of simply observing others speak for years, speaking and preaching is not something I see a lot of people being discipled through. At least not in my sphere of influence. Such was the case with myself. So, I did what I have done the majority of my life when I wanted to learn something, I turned to books of those I admired and attempted to learn from them. If you are in search of help speaking, preaching, or communicating, I pray these books would bring the same help to you as they have for me. Blessings!
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