The ancients had a process for preparing to give a speech that has come down to us as the so-called “canons” (or stages) of rhetoric, which continues to be useful for orators of all kinds, not least preachers.
Too often for pastors, the process of preparing to preach is chaotic. It is catch as catch can. Grab some study time over here, listen to a podcast there, and maybe it is the end of the week already and you just have to crank something out. There are weeks in the life of the pastor that are just like that. There is a funeral (or multiple funerals!), challenges with the kids, or simply a severe case of creative block. Chaotic weeks are going to happen, but they need not be the norm.
When you are staring down at your to-do list at something called “sermon prep,” it can feel like a big, amorphous blob of busyness. Like the primeval creation, it is “tohu v’bohu,” formless and void, chaos. But God took the mess of unformed matter and molded it into our world across six days, turning chaos into cosmos. Similarly, as preachers and “sub-creators,”[1] we can shape that blob into beauty by breaking down the task of sermon creation into a series of steps over the course of each week.
The ancients had a process for preparing to give a speech that has come down to us as the so-called “canons” (or stages) of rhetoric, which continues to be useful for orators of all kinds, not least preachers. I wrote a series on the canons for Craft of Preaching a few years back (linked below), and I flesh out this process in much greater detail in my book Preaching by Heart. As we enter into a new year, though, I wanted to provide a brief overview once again so, if your preaching preparation is feeling too chaotic, we might be able to bring a little order to it.
- Day One: Study
The first canon of rhetoric is traditionally known as Inventio: “Invention” or (better) “discovery.” I think of it as the “Study” stage. This is when you are doing your research, unearthing as much from the Scripture as you can. This means reading the text in both translation and the original language, consulting commentaries, tracking down cross references, rabbit-trailing on Google searches, noting those random song lyrics you thought of that seem weirdly relevant... all of it. In the Study stage, you are simply gathering grist for the homiletical mill.
In many respects, this is an ongoing process. When are pastors not collecting present or future sermon material? But it is also helpful to have a discrete block of time you devote each week to deep engagement with and reflection upon the Scripture. Three to four hours is a good rule of thumb, recognizing you could always do much more.
But it is also helpful to have a discrete block of time you devote each week to deep engagement with and reflection upon the Scripture.
- Day Two: Structure
The second canon is Dispositio: “Arrangement.” Once again, this reflects God’s process of creation, as He begins with a big clump of stuff (using the technical theological term here), and then gives it form and shape. In this second stage for preparing to preach, you are taking all the material you gathered in Study, settling on one theme for the message, and then deciding how best to structure that message for maximum connection.
David Schmitt, of Concordia Seminary, has done preachers an inestimable service by cataloging and detailing a number of sermon structures. These are by no means the only structures possible, but they are a tremendous resource for working preachers. I would encourage you this year to try to add a couple to your repertoire. If you lean toward topical or thematic outlines, try some more explicitly expository ones. If you prefer textually structured messages, give more dynamic, hearer-oriented ones a try. Both you and your congregants will be refreshed by the change.
- Day Three: Sketch
Just as it was with the third commandment (Remember the Sabbath Day) that Martin Luther took his greatest exegetical liberties, so with the third canon of rhetoric I take my greatest homiletic ones. Customarily known as the “style” (Elocutio) stage, focusing on locutionary embellishments, I think of it more broadly as the Sketch stage.
Here you are beginning to flesh out the core content of your outline. This means, for each movement or rhetorical unit of your sermon (most generally have three to five such units), you are sketching out the key points you wish to make. This could include an exegetical insight, a theological touch point, some illustrative material, and the like. Your goal is not necessarily to write it all out, neat and clean. In fact, I think that can actually trip you up. Rather, you are just spelling out the essential ideas and images you want to convey.[2]
- Day Four: Plot
You now have the essence of a sermon prepared. How do you commit it to memory, so you can deliver it by heart rather than just read it off a page? For modern preachers, this step is often left out altogether, whereas for classical orators, Memoria was described as the “foundation” (fundamentum) of the whole project. The reason being that it is the art of memory that enables the blueprint of your message to become a solid home for the gospel in the hearing of your people.
There are various and sundry ways preachers seek to memorize their messages, but I am a staunch advocate of the classical “Method of Loci,” or “Memory Palace.” The Memory Palace is a mnemonic technique that uses places and pictures (loci and imagines) in order to deliver a speech (or sermon) without notes. If you would like to learn more about it, I would once again direct you to my previous article or the book, which goes in depth into the theory and practice of the Memory Palace.
The reason being that it is the art of memory that enables the blueprint of your message to become a solid home for the gospel in the hearing of your people.
- The Lord’s Day: Proclamation
Everything to this point, properly speaking, has not been the sermon itself but rather preparing to preach. As Thomas Long writes,
“The crucial steps a preacher takes in moving toward a sermon [include] interpreting a biblical text, creating a form, deciding about the use of illustrative material, and so on. Even though these activities have traditionally been thought of as ‘preparing the sermon,’ it would be more accurate, given the orality of preaching, to describe these steps as preparing for the sermon.”[3]
In other words, the preacher’s work is not done until he says, “Amen.”
When it finally comes time for Pronuntiatio (“delivery”), there is much that goes into effective communication, including tone, gestures, posture, and so on; more than I can touch on here.[4] Suffice it to say, if you want to truly connect with your hearers, your manner matters. Do not be afraid to watch video of your preaching. Simply becoming aware of how you carry yourself in the pulpit will improve your delivery immediately.
As preachers, we do not create the light, but we do get to speak forth God’s all-powerful Word that does. We can mimic His creativity by turning chaos into order with a purposeful process for preparing to preach. So, in the new year, resolve to make your sermon preparation positively cosmic. It will be very good indeed.
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[1] This is J.R.R. Tolkien’s classic phrase to describe how we as humans enter into God’s creative work.
[2] Perhaps the clearest connection to the traditional use of Elocutio is that it is helpful in the Sketch stage to pay special attention to concrete elements such as metaphors and stories.
[3] Long, Thomas. The Witness of Preaching, third edition. Knoxville, TN: Westminster John Knox Press. 2016.
[4] For a helpful starting point, I recommend this podcast interview with Vanessa Van Edwards, author of Cues: Master the Secret Language of Charismatic Communication. She provides actionable advice that will immediately improve your delivery.
