Sometimes preparation grinds to a halt.  You feel like you’re drowning in a sea of paper, half-finished thoughts, words and scribbles everywhere.  Even with a good system for organizing your pre-sermon study and message notes, it is still possible to feel stuck.  You’ve gone from a sprint to crawl and the open expanse before you now feels like a brick wall in a cluttered alley.  I don’t think I am alone in experiencing this roadblock in preparation.

There are lots of tips that people share, but one stands head and shoulders above the others from my perspective. Of course you should pray, it may be wise to do something else, perhaps get some exercise to clear the brain jam or even sleep, the natural thought organizer.  But head and shoulders above them all (or at least one always worth trying in combination with some of the others) – use oral preparation for oral communication.

It’s not surprising that words on paper sometimes feel overwhelming when we are actually preparing for an oral form of communication, not a written one.  So stand up, Bible in hand, and preach it.  It may still feel jumbled and confused, but it is amazing how quickly a flowing and organized message can form when it is formed orally rather than on paper.

Then you can shift into reverse and write your notes and/or manuscript!  It is worth going back to paper for a couple of reasons.  Sometimes you can really nail it orally, but then be unable to do so again.  The discipline of going back to paper helps to cement the preparation.  If you understand that an outline is simply a representation of thought structures, then it should be straightforward to outline a series of thoughts that have formed in the oral presentation.  Furthermore, even if you preach without notes, the discipline of writing the outline or manuscript will provide a focus for further preparation, and a record for future re-preaching of the same passage.

Oral preparation need not replace paper preparation, but it can act as a turbo boost to the preparation process!