8. "The Minister's Private Life": five personal qualities important to the success of a minister's work.10

On the Preparation and Delivery of Sermons makes clear Broadus' commitment to the Aristotelian rhetorical tradition, one often dismissed by today's homileticians in favor of inductive and narrative preaching. In the preface of the first edition, he asserted that preaching "ought to be largely composed of argument, for even the most ignorant people constantly practice it ... and always feel its force."11 The purpose of preaching was, in his mind, to effect change and generate action. His primary criteria for judging preaching were truth and effectiveness. Contemporary critics may have missed some of the finer points of this school of rhetoric with an assumption of a disproportionate stress on rationalism.

Neither Aristotle nor Broadus advocated calibrated lectures or bare syllogisms in the public arena. Broadus was praised for his ability to make the profound simple. He pointed out that the Greek homilia and Latin sermo should both be rendered "conversation" or "discussion." Broadus' emphasis on reasoning was balanced by recurring stress on the importance and power of imagination. The subject of imagination comes up in a number of different places in Preparation and Delivery. He cited imagination as a primary characteristic of eloquence and suggested ways in which the preacher might cultivate personal imagination.

Broadus argued that most of Scripture is narrative which "possesses an unfailing interest, for old and young, cultivated and ignorant, converted and unconverted."12 He agreed with a popular preacher of his day that one "who would hold the ear of the people, must either tell stories, or paint pictures."13 He urged preachers to lead hearers to decision. They should "stimulate the hearer's imagination into seeing for himself."14 W. H. Whitsett observed that Broadus "invariably concealed the processes, but the processes were always elaborate and helpful."15 Broadus himself said that that "the best application of a sermon is that which the hearers make for themselves."16

Broadus' preaching power may well have developed as Aristotle's rhetoric did, from observing people and what moved them. He directed his considerable talents toward the ministry goals most important to him. He was sensitive to relationship and preaching to human need. He did not rely on power or position to influence society. When urged to seek the presidency of the Southern Baptist Convention in Memphis in 1889 he declined, saying that there were two things that he would never accomplish: riding a bicycle and presiding over the Southern Baptist Convention.17 And yet his views usually prevailed on the floor of the Convention. Whitsett called Broadus the "most potent leader of the Convention in his generation."18 His practice as a statesman within his denomination embodied his philosophy of preaching. He wrote that homiletical theory is "piety" which supplies "motive," plus natural gifts which "furnish means," and knowledge which provides matter, and skill which constitute the art of preaching. These, he taught, are the requisites of effectual preaching.