WRITTEN SERMONS | AdventAI

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Nov 17, 1881

WRITTEN SERMONS.

THEY who write, or in any manner stereotype their sermons, are often brought into strait places, because of their inability to adapt themselves to the occasion. Some have not the shrewdness of the minister who, with his companions, was caught in a terrific storm. When one suggested that he pray, he replied that he knew a number of prayers, but none suited to those circumstances. The preacher of stereotyped sermons seldom thinks of this; his sermon is good, and if not exactly suited to the occasion, why—it is all the worse for the occasion. As instances of this kind, an exchange relates this:—

"One minister invited to preach to a congregation, mostly sailors, discoursed for full forty-five minutes against horse-racing; while we know of another minister who preached in an Old Ladies’ Home against sowing wild oats in one’s youth."

A speaker should expect to find something in his present surroundings and the present occasion to deepen his interest in his subject so as to make a forceful application, and in order to do this, he must give room for his mind to act, and wait for the leadings of God’s Spirit, which is impossible where one uses written sermons or stereotyped essays.