GOALS AND APPEALS IN PREACHING
1. The Goal of Preaching
2 Cor. 5:18-20 contains the summary purposes of preaching:
a). To communicate the revelation of God contained in His word and relate it to the needs of the people.
b). To beseech people to be reconciled to God. This means that the preacher’s purpose is to help men turn from their sins and accept Christ as their Savior.
c). To serve as ambassadors of Christ, representing Him in an alien world.
d). To stir the mind, emotions, and will of every person with the truths of the scriptures to help him become complete in Christ. (Col. 1:27,28)
2. The Aims for Each Message
a). Aim to meet the felt, perceived, and real needs of your audience through the ministry of the word of God.
b). Aim to inform, persuade, and to inspire your congregation to commitment to Christ, to the church, and to service.
c). Aim to eliminate people’s hindrances to knowing, believing, and acting on the scriptures. (Jm. 1:22) Some of these obstacles may be ignorance of the truth, prejudices, pride, laziness, jealousy, anger, immorality, dishonesty, lust, greed, devilish intrusions, temptations, or unbelief!
Don’t Aim Your Messages Above the
Heads of Your Audience
d). Provide appropriate incentives, rewards, and motivations for your listeners to want to do the entire will of God. Use appropriate balance of knowledge, emotions, and personal challenges.
e). Realize that different people are motivated differently. Allow for individual differences in the way you seek to inspire your congregation to obedience. Suggest how they can experience success (Josh 1:8); point out the consequences of not obeying God, show them the benefits that others have experienced in obedience, explain how God provided for the Lepers in 2 Kings 6,7 and how He will also provide for them if they trust God for their provisions. (Phil. 4:19)
f). Seek to have some illustrations that suit the needs of different groups in your church. For instance women’s needs, men’s needs, youth’s needs, children’s needs, elder’s needs, the sick, the destitute, the poor, the wealthy, the downtrodden, the rich people, the father, mother, and grandparents’ needs, new christian’s needs, mature Christian’s needs, the non-Christian’s needs etc.
g). Paul told the Thessalonians in I Thes. 5:14, ``Warn the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, and show patience toward everyone.’’ Learn how to approach people with a variety of messages. Don’t just use the same style of message, organization, or delivery for every sermon.
h). Seek to balance your information with your inspirational appeals.
i). Seek always to preach the word so that you can convince, teach, proclaim the truth, evangelize, edify, encourage, exhort, love, honor, appreciate, uphold, support, stimulate, comfort, heal, warn, chastise, and apply the truth in a relevant way to their lives.
Appeal to the following needs of your audience
a). People want to belong to a family. (The family of God)
b). People need to feel accepted for who they are not just who they might become someday.
c). People need to feel appreciate for their contributions (In their thoughts, words, and deeds)
d). People need friends to support, converse, and share their concerns with.
e). People need to have their faith strengthened. Share how God is working in your own life and in the lives of those around you.
f). Appeal to people’s sense of righteousness, goodness, and ethics in obeying God’s commandments. (Jn. 14:21)
g). Appeal to people’s need to overcome their fears of death, demons, trouble, adversity, poverty, anxiety, persecution, and attacks from enemies.
h). Appeal to people with the promises of God for specific problems. (2 Cor. 1:20) Learn to use a balance of emotional, logical, and ethical appeals.
i). Appeal to people’s need to be encouraged, directed, strengthened, and comforted during difficult times.
j.) Appeal to people’s needs to look not only at their own interests but also the interests of others as Christ did. (Phil. 2:3,4)
k). Appeal to people’s need to contribute significantly to the cause of Christ for eternity. Help them see that they may earn eternal rewards.
l). Appeal to people’s needs to accomplish, succeed, and achieve greatness for God. Jesus said, ``Whoever wants to be great, let him become a servant to all.’’
m). Appeal to people’s need to fulfill their duties to God. (Mt. 25:27)
n). Appeal to people’s sense of cultural and tribal motivations that do not contradict the values of scripture. (I Cor. 9:21-23)
o). Appeal to people’s history, heritage, and background as Paul did in addressing the Athenians on Mars hill. (Acts 17:16-34)
p). Appeal to people’s intelligence, rational thinking, and reasoning capacities. (Isa. 55:8,9)
q). Appeal to people’s emotions like their need to love and to be loved, their need to feel peace, their need to feel joy, their need to feel cared for, and their need to feel satisfied. Jesus said, ``Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they shall be satisfied.’’ (Mt. 5:6)
r). Appeal to people’s need to feel entertained by demonstrating the joy of their Lord is our strength.
s). Appeal to people’s need to realize that they will someday be accountable for every thought, word, and deed.
t). Appeal to people’s awareness that they are just as responsible for their sins of commission (Lying, stealing, deceiving, hatred) as they are responsible for their sins of omission (Failure to witness, to give, to pray, or to serve)
u). Appeal to special memories, emotions, and past experiences of people. For instance, people may have a fond memory of their wedding day, parallel this with the day they received Christ.
v). Appeal to factors which affect your audience most immediately. For example, their family, their occupation, their language, their culture, their area, their children, their income, their needs, etc.
w). Appeal to people’s sense of romance, love, & belonging.
x). Appeal to people’s need to be reconciled to the Lord & men.
y). Appeal to people’s sense of guilt, fear, & the consequences of failing to obey God.
z). Appeal to the biographical models of those who have exhibited emulatable traits, deeds, & words.
aa). Appeal to people’s visual stimuli by using object lessons, pictures, posters, banners, blackboards, films, etc.
bb). Appeal to people’s sense of the dramatic by dramatizing parts of the message through skits, plays etc.
APPEAL TO THE NEEDS THAT INTEREST YOUR AUDIENCE
cc). Appeal to people’s sense of curiosity about life after death.
dd). Appeal to both men & women’s sense of perceptions, judgments, viewpoints, imaginations, feelings, problems, beliefs, experiences, & interests.
ee). Appeal to ``built-in’’ tendencies of response as fuel for obedience to the scriptures.
ff). Appeal to the need to be taught with vivid concrete examples. Describe the dialogue, the intensity, the specific problems, & the applications of the scriptures in terms your people are responsive to.
gg). Appeal to the need for imagery such as auditory (Tell of the sounds heard) visual (Describe the physical characteristics of Jesus - Isa. 53), olfactory (Describe the putrid smells that Paul must have endured in his prison cell), tactile (Detail how Paul must have felt the cold biting into his brain during sleepless nights in his cavelike prison), taste (Describe how bitter the vinegar must have tasted to Jesus as He hung on the cross for our salvation).
hh). Appeal to the sense of personal & general significance of an issue, event, or idea. Do not just tell people the significance of salvation in your life, demonstrate it through your exemplary life stories.
ii). Appeal to people’s sense of excitement, adventure, safety, success, self-preservation, and relief from the monotony of life. Jesus said, ``Follow me and I will make you fishers of men!’’ (Mt. 4:19)
jj). Appeal to people’s need to experience peace & relief from stress. Jesus said, ``Peace I leave with you , not as the world gives to you. Believe in God believe also in me.’’ (Jn. 14:27)
kk). Appeal to people’s need to feel important, to have good morale, & to feel they are progressing.
ll). Appeal to people’s sense of status, recognition, & advancement. Jesus told Peter, ``You will be administering over kings.’’
mm). Appeal to people’s sense of need for security for themselves, their families, & their children.
nn). Appeal to people’s sense of loyalty to God, family, & country.
oo). Appeal to people’s interest in freedom, personally, family, country, physically, emotionally, & spiritually.
pp). Appeal to people’s sense of habit, conditioned responses, & patterns.
qq). Appeal to people’s social patterns of acceptable & non-acceptable behavior. Jesus said, ``Render to Caesar, that which is Caesar’s & to God the things which are God’s.’’
rr). Appeal to people’s sense of sympathy, empathy, & sentiments for the poor, oppressed, & afflicted. Jesus said, ``Bring the poor, crippled, blind & lame to my table.’’
ss). Appeal to people’s need to be accountable to someone for their actions. (Rom. 14:12)
tt). Appeal to people’s need for newness, variety, & new ideas. ``All things have become new.’’ (2 Cor. 5:17)
uu). Appeal to people’s sense of fairness, justice, & equality. Jesus showed no partiality.
vv). Ultimately the highest appeal that a preacher should make is, ARE YOU DOING THE WILL
