image by Jen Kahanek from Unsplash 1. It helps you stay awake during the sermon. Embarrassing as it is to have this as the first reason, it's nevertheless the most obvious one. Let's not get defensive on this. Even if you managed to go to bed before midnight on Saturday night, chances are your body is still going to think it's naptime as you sit there in that too-comfortable chair, in air-conditioned surroundings, the peaceful atmosphere only broken by the preacher's murmuring voice...aaaaand the next thing you know you're struggling to just keep your eyelids open. Sure, have your coffee, but try taking notes. 2. You're able to see and piece together the sermon's content progression--how this point ties in to one made at the beginning, how all the points work together to address the different issues presented at the beginning... If you're just listening to it as it comes, you tend to forget what came before--you don't realize how important it is that this point was covered, perhaps, or what's the significance that it gives to the main theme. Passively absorbing in our default Sunday-morning-sponge style might allow you to gain a few insights on good days, but it seldom enables you to grasp and appreciate the sermon as a whole, as a carefully structured argument/discussion; to see those insights and points not only individually, but in context to the rest of the sermon. 3. You can look back and have a fresh experience of benefiting from that same sermon, even years later; in summarized form--handily rephrased in the way most suitable to your own learning/reading style! Talk about getting the most out of it. I have a box of old sermon note books under my window, which still benefit me when rereading them. Also providing concrete proof that my handwriting, bad as it seems now, used to be worse. 4. It challenges you to listen attentively (this is, by the way, a whole different thing from simply staying awake as in point 1) and trains you to actively process what you hear, since you're not simply transcribing verbatim what the preacher says. You have to pick out the main meaning of the sentence, determine whether it's the next point or a supporting point, and where it belongs on the page. 5. You learn to better appreciate the work and dedication that goes into preparing a sermon. We tend to take it for granted, don't we? Turn up at church every week and plop down, ostensibly to listen--in reality, try not to fall asleep--criticize the random fragments we remember hearing, because they don't make sense, they sound disjointed, you know I think I could do better than that if I tried... And we walk out feeling vaguely dissatisfied, as if the sermon vending machine didn't give us a run for our money. As a pastor's daughter I've observed how much effort and labour goes into that one hour plus sermon which we take for granted, every Sunday for years and years. Seemingly so simple, yet so unquantifiable the way other kinds of work is. Preparing a sermon is most definitely a creative process, though that's not often what we tend to think of it as. (From my own, if comparatively insignificant, experience of running this blog I know how baffling it can feel to sit down, facing a weekly deadline, and a desire to write something fresh, relevant, helpful, insightful, and yet at the same time have your brain completely blank. It's demoralizing and frustrating. Sometimes you spend hours working away at an idea, only to eventually realize it has to be scrapped. There goes all your work and time, and you're still no closer to finishing. And that's just the logistical side of the actual writing process. The spiritual aspect can be just as big of a barrier as well. You've been feeling low and disappointed in yourself recently; you question whether you've grown spiritually at all, whether you're still qualified to try and edify others after lapsing into sin or falling back into unhelpful habits...) Let's not take every sermon for granted.
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