 |  Preaching to today's fragmented congregations.
Winter 2000
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The Great Delivery Debate
January 1, 2000
Performing Without a Net
Why I practice the discipline of paper-free preaching
Jerry Andrews
No manuscript. No outline. No notes. These guidelines have made me a better preacher.
I wasn't always a paperless preacher. In seminary, I was trained to prepare manuscripts, conditioned to believe that writing out my sermon would help me think more clearly.
My first pastorate shook me. It was a rural church in western Pennsylvania; most of the people were farmers. Fresh out of school, I was eager to share the fruit of my two master's degrees. Within six months, it became painfully obvious that the congregation didn't care for my polished, scholarly manuscripts. I failed to connect.
I consciously began reducing my manuscript to an outline, my outline to a page of notes, my page of notes to a three-by-five card, and my three-by-five card to nothing. The process took nine months, but once I was manuscript-free, it was much easier to engage my people.
Today, I still believe paperless preaching is the best way to nurture that weekly conversation between the preacher, the congregation, and their God. Here's why.
I want to preach, not read
The pulpit is made for preaching; the lectern for reading. When I am in the pulpit, I need to preach, not read. Preaching is urgent. It is God's Word spoken to my congregation. I want to look people in the eye and change their hearts by reforming their minds. That's less likely to happen if I'm reading to them.
Certainly, an argument can be made for writing out a manuscript and then memorizing it, but I don't know many preachers who can actually do that. What they typically do is write out a manuscript that helps them think through their sermon more clearly. By the time they step into the pulpit, they've abandoned ...
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