St. Pauls Almonte

Submitted by Alex Hughes
According to your congregation, there are bad sermons and short sermons. But, there are no bad short sermons.

A life saver mint will last 22 minutes exactly, if left laying between the cheek and gum during the normal course of talking. This is a helpful hint to time your sermon. Just don't make the mistake of putting a button in your mouth, instead of a life saver, before you get up to preach.

It never fails that when an "Awesome Sermon" is preached, members of the congregation cannot remember the scripture citations or what the sermon was about when the service is over.

When you reach a weak point in the sermon, raise the pitch and volume of your voice to compensate.

Have the congregation stand for the last hymn before the message, to assure everyone starts out awake.

The purpose of a great sermon is to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. The latter is preferable to the former.

Whatever scripture you quote and whatever your sermon outline, remember that your verbs HAS to agree with their subjects.

When the congregation starts to lose interest and doze off, you can awaken them by saying, loudly, "And Finally" or "In Conclusion." This will only work about four times per sermon.

No matter how hard you may try, sometimes, a scripture just will not fit in the sermon you wanted to use it in.

Analogies in a sermon, sometimes, fit like feathers on a snake.

If you have repeated yourself more than three times, in a given sermon, it is time to quit.

Have a good opening point. Have a good closing point. Keep the two as close together as possible.

The quality of a sermon can be judged (1) by the number of people who walk the isle and (2) by the number of people who are willing to stand in line for 15 minutes, after the service, to shake hands with the preacher and tell him what a great sermon was preached.

Take advice from the rooster. One day, a hen expressed the ultimate ambition of her life, which was to lay an egg in the middle of a busy expressway. So, the rooster took her there. When they got to the edge of the road, and traffic was whizzing by, the rooster gave her this advice: "All right now! Make it quick, and lay it on the line!"

You know your sermon is not connecting when the choir begins their final number and you haven't reached your last point yet!

Always remember, those nods of agreement, from our silvery-haired friends, may just be nods!
A good sermon is similar to a good sandwich. It has two ends: the bread and lots of meat in the middle. However, unlike a sandwich, the two ends of a good sermon should be as close together as possible.