We don’t always realize just how fast our fast-paced lives are.  We live in an age of flashing images that rush by at frantic pace.  As the book I’m currently enjoying points out, “we become acclimated to distraction, to multitasking, to giving part of our attention to many things at once, while almost never devoting the entire attention of the entire soul to anything.” (p50)

But preaching a biblical text demands that we slow down and focus.  We must concentrate fully on the text.

1. Poetry – “the rhythms and cadences, the music of the language, cannot be experienced at all by scanning.” (p.50).  Indeed the dense line by line nature of poetic art demands focused reading if we are to glimpse the gold that is there.

It is not just poetry though, we must also slow for:

2. Narrative – it takes focused concentration for the imagination to engage, for the images to form, for the tension to be felt.  Characters have to be met, tension faced, resolution experienced.  Narrative will only yield superficial and petty sermon outlines if it is not engaged slowly.

3. Discourse – it takes focused concentration to follow the intricate composition of an epistle or recorded speech.  How does the thought flow?  What is the main thought?  How is it developed?  Again, discourse will preach after a superficial glimpse, but it will be poor!

Slow down.  Read the text.  Then maybe you can preach it.