Simple Communication: Planning a Sermon.
If you’re preparing a message, sermon, presentation, devotional, I’m about to help you out big time!
How do you make sure the message, sermon, presentation is making an impact on people? How do you efficiently put together content without constantly revising and changing direction?
Here’s a simple format for sharing a simple message or devotional.
Right off the bat, here’s what your structure is going to be:
My Story - sharing a personal story
God’s Story - God’s Word
Your Story - Application to the audience.
To back up a little bit, you have to start with One Point
One Point
If you’re not clear about what you’re trying to say, I guarantee your audience won’t be clear about how they’re supposed to respond. You can talk on and on and jump from one good thing to another, but if you’re not communicating clearly, then you’ve lost. You need to land on the one point that you want to share and repeat it over and over again. You may have 3 points or something like that, but nobody is going to remember 3 points BUT they’ll remember that one thing if you communicate clearly.
Example: Learn God’s Word and DO IT.
That one point that’s going to be repeated in 3 segments.
After deciding on a convicting One Point, we’re going to structure the message into 3 segments My Story, God’s Story, and Your Story.
My Story
Does your audience connect with you personally? Share a personal story that relates to the people you’re speaking to AND connects them to the main principle that you’re sharing.
Example: I may share about when I was a kid and I would cram for a vocabulary test on the bus on the way to school. I would get an A+, but if I had to take the test the next day, I’d be lucky to get a C-!
Sharing a relatable story draws the audience in.
Then I would introduce the content in this story about how God’s Word changed me as a teenager when I memorized 2 Corinthians 5:17 If anyone is in Christ…” Hearing a sermon about it was good, but it transformed the way that I thought when I knew it, studied it, memorized it, and acted upon it. It’s not enough to just hear God’s word, we must Learn God’s Word and DO IT.
God’s Story
The first segment of My Story was to connect with the audience and introduce the main concept. Here’s where you’ll pivot to God’s Story, the base of what you’re sharing. The anchor of your message. Are you sharing “just a good idea” or are you sharing a timeless principle that can change the trajectory of someone’s life. You’ll want to pick one main scripture reference for this segment. Don’t keep people busy by hopping around the Old Testament and New Testament, don’t present an idea that is so complex that you have to justify it with a bunch of backup material. For my example, I would share 2 Timothy 3:16 “All scripture is God breathed and is useful….”. If my message is longer, I could pick this verse apart with different points like
Scripture is Inspired by God, Scripture Changes us, and Scripture Equips us.
In this segment, you’ll want to be sure to reiterate the main point “Learn God’s Word and DO IT.”
Your Story
How does this great truth that you’ve just shared relate to the person you’re speaking to? If you share a powerful principle but don’t help someone connect with it on a personal level, then you’re missing out on huge impact. You need to transition from talking about God’s Story to how it applies to the audience, the Your Story segment. Take some time to share about how this principle affects them directly.
For my example, I might start with the hook of “If God’s Word is so powerful and we can hear it so often, why doesn’t it seem to be that effective in the lives of believers?” The power isn’t just in the hearing of God’s word, but we need to Learn God’s Word and DO IT. James 1:22 says that if we just listen to the word, we’re deceiving ourselves into thinking that it will make an impact. We must do what it says. When you have struggles in your marriage, are you strengthening your marriage with God’s Word, or something lesser like an inspirational saying, or even worse, letting your emotions and thoughts run wild? I would encourage people to commit to learning God’s Word by having regular quiet time, choosing one scripture to memorize, and committing to doing what Scripture says.
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