Relax and Take Some Time

The last six weeks I have been taking a class on Tuesday night’s at my church on preaching and teaching. I have learned a lot not only on the subject of preaching and teaching but how more to put together writings and for future public speaking.

The most important thing I found whether writing or speaking is to relax and take some time. This last Tuesday was our final class where six of us volunteered and gave a five minute sermonette. We were put into three separate groups of eight where two of us gave our sermonette. After both of us were finished those whose listened let us know what they thought of our message along with constructive criticism.

Though I was a little nervish   the whole experience I found to be exciting and can’t wait to public speak again. At this point I have no idea when that will be. I love writing this blog though every day.

The main constructive criticism was the audience thought they were a little lost in what I was saying for the first half of the message however found where I was going in the second half and loved my conclusion. I was told by a couple of them that I need to say at the beginning what I was going to talk about. I found that to be quite helpful. I had started out telling them that I was giving them the background of the author and the book which I still believe is important while they looked up the scripture I was using as my text Jude verse 24 and 25. Jude is one chapter only in the News Testament just before Revelation. Anyway I now know what they are saying. I should have started out along with giving the scripture how I was going to speak about the scripture as well.

Another criticism given I was working with way too much material.  This is where relaxing and taking more time comes in. Of course I had to only talk for five minutes so I should have kept a limit on the material being used. I tried to talk about more than I should have in those five minutes. I now realize whether I was speaking five minutes or twenty-five to keep the material to a minimum. It is really easy to say more than you should actually say especially some who writes on a regular basis.

 I guess I wanted to be sure that I had enough material to speak in those five minutes. The honest truth I had enough material to speak even if it was a small amount. Being more relax and taking the time I could expand on the material I had.

 

The crazy thing is that I went over the speech several times in a two week period so I should really have realized that I did have enough to say anyway. This really was the reason for me to do this speaking was to find out how good I was and how I can improve. I found out both very much.

My conclusion is to be relaxed and take as much time necessary to complete the speech no matter the length of time. I went over the speech in my head and doing it while walking so I should have the confidence that the speech will be done on time. Oh by the way I ended the speech right on five minutes.