Stand and Deliver Resources
Introduction
What are these resources about?
These resources contain a bunch of advice and ideas that can help you when you stand up in front of people to tell them something. We are particularly focused on preaching, but these resources might help you in other forms of public speaking too. These resources are being developed primarily for our preaching community - a bunch of people at Redhill Church who are currently preaching or who are interested in preaching in the future.
This is not an exhaustive guide, or a sure-fire recipe to turn you into a TED speaker! But hopefully it’s a starting point to help you feel more confident in getting up in front of people, and communicating more effectively once you’re there. There a plenty of useful resources out there if you want to learn more. We refer to some of these other resources throughout, and a full list is provided in Part D.
PHOTO: SOUL SURVIVOR ACT, photography seminar 2016
More than preaching
The skill of communicating in front of an audience is one that God can use in a variety of ways. If you are good at or are interested in public speaking, don’t limit yourself to thinking that means you need to be a preacher at church. Preaching is one way that God can use this skill. It’s important and significant, and don’t be afraid to give it a go if you’re presented with the opportunity! But it’s not the only way that God might want to use you.
Good up-front communicators are needed in all sorts of fields, including education, politics, social justice, advocacy, creative arts, media and business. And even within churches there are other roles that require good communication skills besides the person preaching a sermon. For example, the people leading a service or sharing the announcements can play an important role in helping people feel welcome and informed.
So if you have this skill, or think you might want to develop this skill, stay open to what God might want to do with it. He may surprise you!
A note on terminology
Throughout this resource we talk about the speaker and the audience. The speaker is anyone who’s up the front talking; whether you’re preaching, giving an announcement, teaching a class or hosting an event. The audience is whoever is listening. While we usually don’t like to think of our church congregations as an ‘audience’, we’re using the word audience here to keep things simple.
Copyright notice
This content is provided free, however all content is copyright Redhill Church unless stated otherwise (we refer to the work of other individuals and organisations throughout - see list in Part D). So feel free use these resources personally and in your own church, however if reproducing this content please ensure all copyright holders are credited accordingly.
