Great Preaching Caught or Taught? | Soul Preaching Ministries

by Sherman Haywood Cox II on February 3, 2010 – 11:56 am

When I was in my twenties and was attempting to learn to play Jazz, one writer said, “all the answers are in the music.” What the author was saying is that we often ask many questions that can only be found by listening to great musicians “play” the answer. One jazz teaching instructor said that he had a student who was having a hard time playing jazz. The instructor asked the student, “How much Jazz did you listen to last week?” Thestudent said that he hadn’t listened to any the past week. Then the instructor told the student, you will never be a competent performer if you don’t listen to others perform.

Great preaching, I believe, is just like that. You can learn the fundamentals through books, courses, and websites. You can find different things to look for from mentors. SoulPreaching.Com can help you, but if you are not listening to preached sermons of pastors and preachers then you will not grow as a preacher the way you wish to grow.

How do you end in a celebrative challenge? I can point you to CL Franklin, but he is gonna show you what I am trying to say. How do you preach a three points and a poem sermon? I can delineate the sections of a 3 points sermon, but when you listen to Frederick D. Haynes III you see exactly what I am talking about. On this site, I can tell you about embedding points in your sermon as you preach, but Jerry D. Black illustrates exactly what I am attempting to teach. In short, great preaching is both taught by homiletics instructors and caught from listening to preachers.

One must have a solid grasp of the text. One must engage the text and apply it to the context of the listeners. And one must have a solid connection to the Spirit if one is to be a solid preacher, but I would also argue that if you will get better you will listen to and learn from others.