It's been too long since my last rant.
Did you know my first ever real post was a rant? Maybe I'm just an angry young man.
--BEGIN RANT--
How long is too long when it comes to sermons? Or am I already asking the wrong question? Is there a right length? Is it possible to be too short?
A few thoughts;
Chappo thinks for every minute over 20 you lose four minutes of effectiveness. Therefore by 25 minutes you've erased your sermon.
More wisdom from Chappo; If you want me to speak on a passage for five minutes, I'll need a month to prepare, if you want 20 minutes gimme a fortnight, or if I can speak for as long as I like, I'll start right now.
I overheard a student minister from another church the other day saying all the feedback he got from the rector for one of his sermons was, '25 minutes and 20 seconds. Too long.'
That same student when asked how his sermon went last Sunday. 'Five people came up to me after the service and said, "18 minutes. Great work." That's the only thing anyone said. I swear I could tell them Jesus is evil and you only get to God through Buddha and as long as it comes in under 20 minutes they'd be happy'.
Preachers who teach preachers, like Phil Campbell, swear by a less-is-more philosophy. From memory, Phil is a 22 minute man.
Oftentimes the great preachers have a style and method (and length) you should never try to emulate.
If you have a foreign accent, you can guarantee at least 30% more attention.
My experience tells me I've hooked people for 40 minutes from go to woe, and yet at other times I've bored them within the first minute. There are times I've gotten the vibe from the front that, 'Though it was short, it felt long' and I've been told on other occasions of critique, 'It was long, but it felt short'.
What is the right length for a sermon? Should we just speak for as long as people are able to pay attention? I mean, there's no value in purely heaping words upon words. And yet if people are used to 10 minute sermon-ettes, surely I would want to be weaning them up to a greater tolerance for hearing from God's word. So is the point to always be just that bit above what people can handle?
Is it more to do with the giftedness of the preacher? The so called 'big-names' can easily hold my attention for an hour, and these are the most popular preachers in the world. Yet others bore me no end, pretty much from the first sentence.
I've come from a university context where people are used to sitting in lectures for an hour and concentrating, but this isn't a morning congregation with babes in arms, and tired shift-workers. I re-learnt this Sunday week ago. How long should we preach?
As a general rule, anyone who sits timing a sermon is spiritually immature. You have not prepared yourself to listen to the word of God. If you comment on the length of the sermon it says more about you, than it ever will the preacher. Get rid of your watch and look at your Bible.
As a general rule, preachers who want to preach for longer - especially after being repeatedly asked to shorten it - are experiencing an overestimation of their preaching abilities. You need to care enough for your people to not force feed them your ramblings. Go and edit your sermon again.
--END RANT--
And the people in the pews said "amen"...
ReplyDeleteAlso, when you're telling them not to look at their watch also tell them not to be too fussed with your eye contact...
You mean if they're looking at their Bible's and taking notes they won't really notice?
ReplyDeleteYeah. That.
ReplyDeleteAs a general rule, anyone who sits timing a sermon is spiritually immature. You have not prepared yourself to listen to the word of God. If you comment on the length of the sermon it says more about you, than it ever will the preacher. Get rid of your watch and look at your Bible.
ReplyDeleteAwesome. Agreed.
I think you nailed it when you said that its due to giftedness. People should preach as long as they are able to hold a crowd.
Luke
I like your rant. Be as crabby as you like. I think we are all so comfortable and nurtured that we get nitpicky. We've got it good in Australia. Shut up and be appreciative.
ReplyDeleteLooking at Ship of Fool's Mystery Worshipper is always interesting in this regard.
ReplyDeleteLiturgical churches seem to preach 5(!)-12 minutes, evangelical churches seem to preach 25-35.
Length of sermon can be part of cultural expectation. I preached at a pentecostal friend's church once and he gently encouraged me that the folk would be expecting about forty minutes.
Length of sermon can be impacted by other factors such as the overall duration of a service.
When our local expectation was for a sixty minute service it pressured the sermon length, when we relaxed to seventy-five/eighty the pressure went off.
That being said, if you're going to err, err short.
When you're learning the craft, don't worry about attaining a length of time. Concentrate on content and communicating it as concisely as you can.
Thanks for your thoughts,
Gary.
Agreed. Cheers bro.
ReplyDeleteGentlemen, thank you for your thoughts.
ReplyDeleteIt feels good to vent. Though Sarah would say your heartfelt amens only serve to encourage me in my cranky old man verbal tirades.
@Luke
It is indeed good to know your own capabilities. But honest self-assessment is not necessarily a strength all preachers possess.
@Gary
You make some really helpful observations (or at least pertinent recollections), especially regarding the way expectations help shape experience. Now challenging or changing those expectations is a whole other kettle of fish.
I can tell there's a lot of wisdom and experience behind your words. Concise communication is a really helpful way of thinking of it. Because there's nothing worse than a preacher doing a lot of work and then feeling he has to share EVERYthing he learnt. That is a mistake I make way too often.
More Chappo; And with preaching, like most things, the first 50 years are the hardest.
Sometimes I think that if the sermon was first up in a service, rather than after a few songs, a barrage of announcements, a ministry update, and a DVD featurette, people could handle more. Often we're already tired by the time we get to the meat of the service! From a babes in arms perspective this is especially true. My 18mth old copes quite nicely for the first half hour of church and then cracks it just as the sermon begins.
ReplyDeleteThanks Louise. I have had little experience in this area but it seems to ring true! Though where would you put all that other stuff in the service? There's some benefit in finishing up with the sermon so its the last thing in our mind. And we can't get rid of all the other stuff. Maybe we could just stop the announcements altogether seeing as though most people tend to repeat them in great detail during their press-release prayers,
ReplyDeleteI recently preached for 35 minutes at a service I'd never preached at before.
ReplyDeletePeople noted to me that the sermon was longer than it usually was at that service - but they were far from negative abut that;
A woman came up to me at the end and said: "Thanks so much for that...usually I can't pay attention the whole time, but I did today."
Goes to show there's no such thing as the perfect sermon length. I think Phillip Jensen's perfect sermon length is at least 2 hours long (at last year's MYC). I couldn't stop listening. He could have gone for 3 for all I cared.
Matt, glad to hear there's some good that comes from comments about sermon length!
ReplyDeleteIf it's a choice between looking at the clock or looking at the preacher... oh wait a second..
ReplyDelete'The word of God' and 'sermon' aren't interchangeable, so I don't think we can equate people's 'stomach for the word of God' with 'stomach for the sermon'.
ReplyDeleteI think it's helpful to look at it from the other end: how much can people retain from what you say? It'll help shape not just the length of your teaching time, but also the format.
Thanks Stuart.
ReplyDeleteIt is helpful to keep stating;
the word of God doesn't equal sermon
However, hopefully
the sermon = the word of God.
And with that in mind, those who love reading God's word I generally see have a greater desire for the word of God explained through the sermon, and the word of God read privately, and the word of God studied with others and the word of God listened to, and if they really listen - the word of God lived out.
Thus in terms of sermons, those who love God's word in my experience tend to engage with the person preaching on the content of the sermon much more than the amount of time they speak for.
And I take the 'teach up' view with God's word. That is, if I only ever read and studied what I could remember or be able to state clearly the next day I believe my understanding of God would be much the poorer for it. I would tend towards only reiterating what I already knew and reinforcing my prejudices. That said, it is a horrible thing to make unclear what is clear from the Scriptures. But then again to make simple what is profound is also a mistake.
I feel I'm rambling so I will stop before I say anything else I will probably disagree with on further reflection.