Musings on Spiritual Matters

What is the purpose of an introduction?  I believe most people think that the introduction is an attention getter.  You are seeking to grab the attention of the audience or worshippers.  Other people might believe that the introduction is to inform the audience of the purpose of the sermon.  It flows the “tell them what you are going to tell them, tell them again, and tell them what you told them” approach.  These seem to be the typical models that you see in an introduction.

But really the introduction is more important than these methods.  It is not a funny story or an attention getting illustration.  There are two keys to make your introductions powerful and purposeful.

Create some tension.  In the introduction, you are creating some tension so that there is some larger purpose to listening to this sermon than because you have too.  There is a problem to resolve or a situation that needs to unravel.  You need to create ambiguity in the introduction.  This tension must connect to the other parts of the sermon.  In fact, it is best to write this section last not first.

Make a promise.  This is a rarely used tactic.  You are wanting to make a promise that the listeners want kept.  You are promising an answer to some problem or situation that the gospel presents or culture presents.  You are promising a key that will make life better or your walk with god deeper.  Make a promise that is important and the congregation will listen for the answer.  Just make sure you answer it or the congregation will feel tricked.

Use your introduction as a deeper way to bring people into the text or the story of God, not as a trick to get attention or be more creative than “telling them what you are going to tell them.”  It is really the second most important part.

Related posts:

1. The Key to a Great Sermon
2. A Great Birthday Party with a Great Church Family
3. A Process for Preaching
4. A great day of fun
5. A Great Friends and Family Day

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This entry was posted by Matthew on Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010 at 5:13 pm and is filed under Church News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.