During my time in The Fellowship Residency Program, I read a long list of powerful books. To read more about my residency experience click here. One aspect of my assignments is to summarize and write key takeaways from each of the books. This is a summary of "Communicating for a Change". by Andy Stanley.
Part One: How’s My Preaching
Sometimes God will ask up to do things that we don’t truly understand. The only way we will ever understand is to simply obey.
Every time Andy Stanley gets the opportunity to communicate, he hopes to take a simple message and write it on the hearts of his listeners.
The first step to improve your ability to communicate is to listen to yourself. You will never get better if you don’t know the reality of your ability to communicate.
The most important time we will spend in sermon prep is the time we spend asking God in prayer to direct us towards our one point.
Part Two: Communicating for a Change
We must remember that every single person in our congregation may be one moral, legal, financial, or ethical decision away from destruction.
Once we listen, there are seven imperatives for healthy communication development.
Determine Your Goal
Ray’s goal was to teach people the Bible. You have to determine your own goal. I think that my primary goal is to help people move from salvation to sanctification.
While we need to consistently work on our performance on the stage, we must also consider the outcome of the audience listening.
If our approach to communication does not match our goals as communicators, then there is a disconnect.
There are three goals that people typically have for their teaching:
Teach the Bible to people. This is seen when people break down passages verse by verse and only worry about whether or not they covered the material.
Teach people the Bible. This communicator takes the audience into consideration when planning his approach. It asks whether or not people understood and remembered the information.
Teach people how to live a life that reflects the values, principles, and truths of the Bible. This goal goes a step further and considers whether or not people know what to do with the information they have. It isn’t content unless there is life change and transformation in the congregation.
***We must ask ourselves, “Which concerns you more, how you did on Sunday or what your people are doing on Monday?” We must preach the burden on our heart as if our child’s salvation was contingent on that one message alone.
Pick a Point
People feel better if they know where they are headed. Our goal should be to pick everyone up at the same place and deliver them to the same final destination.
The best messages are one-point messages that have a short and simple statement that summarize the entire sermon. If we give people too much to remember in our teachings, then they will not be able to remember any of the message.
Preaching multiple points is not an accurate depiction of the world we live in. We live by emotion not points.
If we cannot even remember our points without an outline, then how can we expect anyone else to remember.
Every story, illustration, question asked and answered, and every application given should all point towards the one point.
The one point is either an application, an insight, or a principle.
To find your point, ask what is the one thing I want the audience to know and what do I want them to do about it?
Sermon Preparation is a discovery process. We keep digging until we find the point.
Let the text speak for itself.
Once you determine the point, build everything around it and make it stick.
Create a Map
It requires finding “the best and most effective course for arriving at your destination.”
Outlines are informational and all about content.
Instead, we should work towards relational outlines that are built based on the relationships between you as the speaker, the audience listening, and, finally, God.
Internalize the Message
Having a map and knowing where we are going are two different things.
It is the idea of having a “burden” that is weighing on your heart to share.
You aren’t ready to preach until you can stand up and teach the message as if you are telling a story.
We must own the message with both authenticity, authority, and genuine conversation.
Occasionally it is a good idea to manuscript your introduction as well as your conclusion. These sections are crucial to engaging your audience and communicating messages that lead to life change.
It is better to miss things from your notes and engage the audience than vice versa.
Engage the Audience
You have to make sure your audience is with you. This is done primarily in the first “we” section seen in the outline information below.
“Attention and retention are determined by presentation, not information.” Tension itself creates attention.
You have to raise something personal within them that makes them want to listen to you answer their question or concern.
Part of keeping the audience engaged is ensuring that you take the turns slowly.
When writing your introduction, ask yourself:
What is the question I am answering? What can I do to get my audience to want to know the answer to the question?
What is the tension this message will resolve? What can I do to make my audience feel that tension?
What mystery does this message solve? What can I do to make my audience want a solution?
Rules of Engagement
Watch your speed. The pace communicates the importance of your words. However, too slow is boring and too fast exhausts people. The best place to land is slightly faster than average.
Slow down in the transitions. It is easy to lose people here.
Navigate through the text. It should be the most engaging part of the message. If anything doesn’t communicate or facilitate the journey, cut it out.
Add something unexpected to the message.
Be direct when telling the audience where you are going.
Find Your Voice
There is a difference in talking to people and talking at them.
Authenticity covers a multitude of mistakes.
Clarity is always more important than style.
When working on your personal development, ask yourself first what works and then what works for me?
Find Some Traction
When you get stuck, you have to find a way to get started again.
A good way to start is through prayer.
Getting stuck reminds us that God is the only one who has the power to change lives.
Then, you can ask yourself a set of questions to open your eyes to the passage.
What do they need to know? Information
“In light of what I’ve discovered from the text and the insights I’ve gained along the way, what is the one thing they need to know?
Why do they need to know it? Motivation
What is at stake for the person who doesn’t capture this truth?
What do they need to do? Application
Be specific and creative in how they can respond to the message.
Why do they need to do it? Inspiration
How can I help them remember? Reiteration
ME-WE-GOD-YOU-WE Outline
ME
Explain who you are and what you are about.
This section is designed to keep you humble and avoid rushing right into the material.
If your congregation already knows you, then you can spend more time introducing the idea or topic.
Introduces a dilemma I have faced or am currently facing
WE
Takes us from what we are thinking or feeling and connects it to what the audience is thinking and feeling.
The intention is to spend time developing a tension with as many situations as possible and with as broad an audience as possible.
Don’t transition until your audience is asking a question that they are dying for you to answer.
The goal is to raise a felt need with as many people as possible in the audience
Finds common ground with the audience around the same dilemma I’ve been expressing.
GOD
Connects the emotional common ground into the Biblical truths on the matter.
Avoid staying surface level without explanation or allowing the audience to drown in deep theological discussion.
Transitions to the text to learn about what God has to say regarding the tension or question that has already been introduced.
YOU
Once we know God’s view on the topic, it is easier to transition into what the audience is going to do about the topic and how they can apply the information practically.
This is where you answer the “So what? & Now what?” questions.
You can either apply this to various situations, stages of life, or believer’s vs nonbelievers.
This is where you build trust in answering the question or tension that was proposed earlier in the WE section.
Challenges the audience regarding how to act on what they have just heard.
WE
This WE section is to build a common vision with between us and the audience.
What would our life, our church, or even the world look like if we would follow through on the proposed application piece.
Close with statements about what could happen if people embraced God’s truths.