Page 3 - Homiletics I Student Textbook

Homiletics
By John Jewers, M.Div./Kris Bjorgen, Ed.D.

Study Section 1: What is Preaching?

1.1 Connect

Have you ever thought about how many sermons you’ve heard in your lifetime? For the
average church in America, three sermons a week (Sunday Morning, Sunday Night,
Wednesday Night) for 30 years equals 4680 sermons! This doesn’t include Sunday School,
Vacation Bible School, Revival Meetings, Youth Activities, Conferences, Chapel Services,
Camp, etc. The exposure many of us have had to preachers and preaching is outstanding.

With such exposure, you would think we could determine what constitutes good and not-so-good
preaching.

What would you say is good preaching? What would you say is not-so-good preaching? Let’s see if we
can begin to answer these questions….

1.2 Objectives

1. The student should be able to define what a sermon is.

2. The student should be able to explain what expository preaching is and why it is so
important.

1.3 What is preaching?

We typically think good preaching takes place when the preacher shouts and yells, stirs our
emotions, has us fearfully sitting on the edge of our seat one minute and then rolling in the
aisle in laughter the next. But is this true? Do these elements of delivery alone constitute good
preaching?

In order to determine what good preaching is we must look at the sermon itself. What is it?
Hopefully, we will have a better understanding of this at the end of this session.

A sermon is an oral address to the popular mind
upon religious truth contained in the Scriptures and
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elaborately treated with a view to persuasion.

A Sermon Explained

1 Phelps, Austin, The Theory of Preaching, (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1895), 1-27.
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