How to Tell the Story—a Simple Structure for Holy Week, Easter, and Every Sermon
A year ago I wanted to help you prepare for Easter with a series about this simple, save-you-time, quick-to-craft, sermon structure to discern and organize your message. But COVID-19 disrupted everything. I then turned my attention toward preaching into the crisis—and was never able to return to this helpful content. So now, I’m resurrecting the post to show you how to employ this simple story-structure process for Easter (or any sermon).
How to Craft an Easter Sermon that Speaks to the Truth of Our Current Circumstances
This short video demonstrates in real time a brainstorming process—utilizing story structure—to craft an Easter sermon that will resonate with our present reality. Blessings as you preach this holiest of weeks, Dear Preachers.
Resurrecting the Easter Story
You can resurrect the impact of Easter by learning to tell its story more effectively. By helping us empathize with a character’s desires, you’ll pull us in. When you tease out what’s at stake and the conflict it creates, you’ll keep us engaged. Add sensory details, and we’ll live the story with you. Then show us the resolution and the transformation so we’ll see change—a new way of living—is possible.
The Simple but Misunderstood Key to Keeping Listeners Engaged: How to "Show" Rather than "Tell"
It’s often hard work for adults to get literal when it comes to using the five senses. We tend to leap from image to meaning so fast we don’t recognize what we did. But that leap fails to draw our listeners in, to make them feel something. And the more your audience feels, the greater the impact of the story and your sermon.
How Kurt Vonnegut's Failed Thesis Can Make You a Better Storyteller
Why do we care about a story’s shape? If Christ has redeemed all, ensuring every story ends above baseline, what is the purpose of exploring what comes before? We ask different questions—and discover different answers—when we're honestly following the story's shape into every moment.