The secret of a good sermon is to have a good beginning and a good ending, then having the two as close together as possible.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
A good sermon should be like a woman's skirt: short enough to arouse interest but long enough to cover the essentials.
A bad sermon is like a car wreck - everyone slows down to see what happened.
If I had only one sermon to preach it would be a sermon against pride.
When it comes to sermon writing, generally there are two problems. Some preachers love the research stage but hate the writing, and they start writing too late. Others don't like doing research, so they move way too fast to the writing part.
A beautiful homily, a genuine sermon, must begin with the first proclamation, with the proclamation of salvation. There is nothing more solid, deep and sure than this proclamation.
You can preach a better sermon with your life than with your lips.
Biblical movies need not sermonize, just be honest to the foundational story. As powerful as the message is for people of faith, it's really great storytelling.
I try to tell a story that's good enough to win the right to integrate eternal themes into it. If it's poorly written or comes across as a sermon, then obviously you don't reach people, because they're aware that you're imposing something on a story that isn't innate to it.
I realized that every sermon I preached should be designed not to 'teach' or 'convert' people, but rather to encourage them, to give them a lift. I decided to adopt the spirit, style, strategy and substance of a 'therapist' in the pulpit.
The devil will let a preacher prepare a sermon if it will keep him from preparing himself.