It’s All in How You Tell It

Finally, it’s not just old preachers who tell the same old stories over and over. Repeating favorite stories is tempting to us all. Most preachers know they can repeat a sermon to the same congregation if the narrative illustrations are different. On the other hand, the preacher can deliver an entirely new sermon, different text, different title, different organization; but if the preacher repeats a story in that sermon, numerous members of the congregation will remark about having heard the sermon before.

If you repeat a story, introduce it in a way that acknowledges it is a story revisited. "You might remember the story of Mr. X, Olympic swimmer, etc." Or, "I told this story to some of you a couple of years ago, but it is worth hearing again in the present context."

Keep records on when and where you told this story. And go easy on that "old preacher" stuff. If you live long enough, you will be an old preacher yourself someday!

From The Preacher as Storyteller, by Austin B. Tucker, pp. 140-147. Copyright © 2008, Austin B. Tucker. Published by B&H Publishing Group, Nashville, Tennessee. Used by permission.

1. You may have notes in the pulpit if they comfort you and spare you the anxiety that may cause you to freeze up and go blank. But I warn you, until you have become comfortable with your own method of sermon delivery, having notes will be like an alcoholic carrying a little bottle in his pocket just in case he needs a drink.  

2. Margaret Read MacDonald, The Story-Teller’s Start Up Book (Little Rock, AR: August House, 1993) offers a similar plan in chapter 1, "Learning the Story in One Hour."

3. George M. Bass, "The Story Sermon: Key to Effective Preaching?" Paper presented at the annual meeting of the Academy of Homiletics, Princeton, NJ, Dec. 5-8, 1984, 2, 5.