Contemplative Bible Reading

This post is a little different. Instead of noting a scripture, I will write about teaching and what may be happening in the class you are teaching or what may be happening with the people in the audience when you are preaching.

Speakers: Please note that your message may not be the most important thing in the life of the listeners. Their mind may be consumed by something else that is far more important to them.

A few obvious examples:

• Their grandmother is at home about to die of heart failure
• Their elderly parent is at home slipping quickly into senility
• Their son is dodging bullets in the Middle East
• Their best friend from high school is on life support after an auto accident

It is pretty easy to list other examples of things that would draw someone’s mind away from your speech.

Listeners  in a church setting are far more prone to be somewhere else in their heart and mind than in other settings. This is because in a church setting we discuss topics that are deeper than in other places.

For example:

We preach about loving that person at work who is hard to love. During such a sermon, I would hope that people listening would shut off their ears and concentrate their heart and mind on that person at work who they haven’t been loving.

We preach about ministering to the poor. During such a sermon, I would hope that people listening would shut off their ears and concentrate their heart and mind on that homeless person that they have walked past and ignored for weeks.

Hence, if you are preaching or teaching, don’t worry if someone in the attendance doesn’t remember the last three quarters of your message. You have said something that turned off their ears and turned on their heart and mind. And those latter things are far more important.