Developing The Listener's Palate

Audiences don't come ready-made. They're groomed as listeners.

I grew up near Ginghamsburg Church in Ohio where their Saturday night service trained me to listen with a pen.

At Catalyst, we can tell our business speakers they'll get a receptive audience because we've raised them on mixed content.

When my pastor Tony McCollum speaks, I listen with an expectation to laugh because he uses humor as a tool for disarming hearts.

Mark Dever said that he's trained Capitol Hill Baptist Church to listen for exact phrasing in sermons because he preaches from a manuscript.

Next time we complain about our audience not bringing their Bibles or not laughing at our jokes or not taking us seriously or listening intently, we have to remember... we raised them that way.

Comments

[Billy]

Ben, Thanks for kicking me in the face first thing on Monday morning! Appreciate the helpful abuse!
Billy

[gina]

I love this. Got some thinking to do about HOW I can groom my listeners.

[Phillip Gibb]

very good point, question is how do you find out that you are grooming in the wrong direction and then correct your actions.

[Antwon Davis]

Wow.

Never thought of it that way before.

REMARKABLE insight!

[Tim]

nice post - very true. I'll post a link to this if you don't mind :)

[John Wright]

Wow. This is one of the most sobering blog posts I've read in a long time. Thanks for putting it out there!

[Paul Wilkinson]

Of course, this means that churches must choose appropriate guest speakers when the key pastor is away. You could bring in the best person from another "preaching genre" and have it misfire with an audience that has other expectations.