Another Sermonic Form For Preaching

Another Sermonic Form for Preaching

If you are new to this blog, here’s where we are:  We are in a series of posts with the overall theme of what we can learn from advertising to improve our preaching.  In the last two posts we have considered the sermonic form, or how the sermon unfolds.  In this post we’ll consider one other sermonic form for preaching that comes from the world of advertising that may help you put your sermon together in an interesting way.

AIDA As Another Sermonic Form For Preaching

The term AIDA is an acronym that describes this approach to getting your message across: attention, interest, desire, action.  Here is how the authors of  Preaching and the Thirty Second Commercial describe how a commercial uses this form to get the message across to potential customers:

First, the advertiser must gain attention of consumers so that they can be aware of a potential message.  Then the message must maintain the interest of consumers to generate the next step of having a desire to want the brand.  Finally, the advertiser must provide tangible action steps for consumers to to undertake, such as purchasing the brand’s product ts or visiting the company’s website for more information.  (Location 1089 in the kindle version)

An Example Of How This Works

In 2013 the insurance company GEICO developed an award winning advertisement, one that is credited with increasing the number of subscribers.  This particular ad was shared online 1.6 million times (67.3% of the shares were on Wednesday).  I’m pretty sure you remember the commercial.  As the shot opens a real camel wanders through a business office.  At each cubicle stop he asks, “What day is it?”  He keeps this up until someone finally says, “It’s hump day.”  The camel, in response, yells out, “Hump Day!” with great joy.  The scene shifts to musicians who sing about the possibilities of GEICO, and the fact that purchasing GEICO will make you happier than a camel on hump day.

Getting Attention

The best way to get attention, advertisers say, is to use Disruption.  In other words, loud sounds, bright colors provocative imagery, humor and/or visuals that will catch peoples’ attention.

Think about that.  I’m at a point in my life where I listen to several sermons each week, partly to prepare for writing this blog.  I have to tell you, most preachers don’t get this.  Last week the sermon started with a summary of the previous 4 sermons in the series that the pastor was preaching.  I had heard those sermons and didn’t need the reflection as the first thing in the message.  I suspect that one of the reasons christians report a general boredom with preaching is this first step that preachers too often miss.  They don’t catch peoples’ attention.   You see, advertisers know they only have seconds to catch someone before they are out of their chair on the way to the refrigerator.

Most listeners in church are too nice to get up and walk out, but they will leave you in their thought life.  What can you do to catch their attention?  You can look several places in this blog to get ideas.  Let me just summarize here to say that stories, attention-getting statistics, an interview, etc.  Use the unexpected to introduce the subject.  If there is one recommendation I give to new preachers is to spend time planning the introduction.  It is vital to getting the rest of the message across.

This is the first step in another form of sermonic form for preaching your sermon.

Next Post

In the next post I’ll describe more fully the other steps.  In the meantime, here is a brief video in which a speech expert reflects more on 6 strategies to get your audience engaged.