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As we like to say, "If you ever want to know what is truly biblical, just ask us."

Send it my way Kevin.

Now we just need to get you to have a right view of what you are accepting.

I wouldn't call it creativity; I'm pretty sure it was a bit boring. I would just stick with your first thought - Craziness! I thought that verse-by-verse meant one per week - sadly misguided there, huh. My heart was in the right place - I wanted more than surface-level treatment of the passage - my method never allowed my desires to be realized however. I hope I've grown.

Chris, compared to Southern California, January will be tundra for our clan.  I have no intention of exposing them to Siberia (north of Nebraska) any time soon ;)

Hi Bill and thank you for you comments; I really value you taking the time.

As I say in the post, I am really unconvinced that length is the biggest problem with people being positively affected by expository sermons. As I mention in my comments to Duke, if length is the ONLY issue in people not tracking with a sermon, then no problem; cut the length. The length of the sermon is really not the major issue in my understanding and experience.

I'm not ready to concede what seems to be your premise: "Educationally knowing that if you exceed 34 or 40 minutes in a traditional setting, most people will not be able to recall your earliest points." First, I'm not convinced that is true. I do not think that is the case in the vast majority of undergraduate university classes. It is certainly not true in graduate school. I have not found it to be universally true in church either.

Second, if the goal is having people remember the points, and length is the most important key to achieving that goal, then ten to fifteen minutes would be more appropriate. It would be quite simple to remember the points with a very short length. As I say in the post, preachers are often trying to accomplish more than simply have people remember everything they say (or even their outline). In fact, I would say that my aim is to simply have one major point per message and that major point is parallel to the one major point found in the given text of Scripture. The points I use in the body of the message are not purely there for recall, but for explanation, clarification, and application of the one main point. If I have limited my explanation of the main point because I am chiefly concerned with how much time we are taking up in the sermon, I may not be able to show people how I came to my conclusions and thus not only will they not remember my points, but worse, they may not affirm my conclusions. I am trying to present a single point that will have an effect and be remembered. Explanatory points that assist in recall, affirmation, and application may or may not be remembered. After the sermon, I don't think most will remember the finer points of argumentation - but during the sermon, if I argue the case well, it may help people to see and affirm the validity of my point - and that will given them more confidence in recall and application.

Having said that, I'm not going to go to the mat for hour long sermons. I had freedom to preach at that length where I served in San Jacinto. Traditionally our Sunday evening services were longer than Sunday morning. I would also say that there were only a few who said much about the length of the sermon. If our church would have said to me that removing 15 minutes would have been the most important thing I could do and that more people would come if only for 15 minutes shorter of a sermon, it would have been an easy call.

There are also other things we can do to assist people with recall. I usually advocate taking notes and provide a listening outline so they can not only keep trace of where we are in the message, but use during the week to review and meditate on further. I have also often included questions and suggestions for further reading and study during the week so people can interact even more with the message later. Some have used these outlines in weekly community Bible studies and small groups.

Just a thought also on some of your examples. I did a quick evaluation of Scott Ardavanis' sermon length over the past number of weeks. Here's the lengths of seven of his recent sermons in minutes: 40, 53, 48, 49, 51, 57, 41. Interestingly, the 40 minute sermon was given on a Sunday when they were having a ministry fair so he cut down the length. I also did a quick survey of Josh Harris' recent sermons (Covenant Life Church, Gaithersburg, MD). The four sermons I reviewed for length were 46, 47, 43, and 51 minutes. If you check out the sermons at Capitol Hill Baptist Church, you will find Mark preaching almost an hour or more every week.

Yet, that doesn't mean a sermon has to be that long. I have some wonderful brothers close to me who routinely preach around 35 to 40 minutes. I value their teaching. In fact, where we attended Sunday, the pastor does not regularly preach more than 35 to 40 minutes and he is an excellent expositor (though I notice the more he gets into explaining the details of a passage the longer he tends to go). I actually found myself thirsting for him to go longer this past Sunday because I was benefitting from his explanation of the text. And, if you were to ask me what all of the points were, I could not recall them. I do recall the context and main idea, however.

All of this long response to say - I'm not a slave to the clock; and I want to be sensitive and helpful. I believe I will do what is in the best interest of the congregation, but most of all, what will best help us comprehend and apply the text.

By the way, the comfy chairs do help, so we may need to talk further about that. I look forward to seeing you soon.

Hi Roxanne.

I'm grateful to hear of your relatively new life in Christ. I encourage you to keep the cravings for biblical instruction well-stoked. I crave biblical teaching also and I hope that's what you heard more than anything in the sermons you have listened to.

In answer to your question about my sermon on election, I think if you read my answer on God's sovereignty and human responsibility in the material provided to Summit Woods members, you will find that my position has not changed over the past six years (actually much longer than that).

In terms of what I preach from the pulpit, I don't seek to preach any labeled understanding of a passage. I seek to preach the right interpretation of the passage - there is a difference in the approach. If my conclusions land where Calvinists land, it is because I have found the meaning of the passage to be the best interpretation of the biblical data. As I said in the post, many 5 pointers are uncomfortable with some of my conclusions on some passages. If you want to discuss what I believe about a specific text or a biblical doctrine in general, I would be happy to. If you want me to espouse myself as a X-point anything, I really don't want to align myself with any of the labels. They mean so many different things to different people, that in the end it really is not helpful in understanding the Scriptures themselves.

In regard to my deleted comment, I removed it. Among other factors, I did not feel that my brief statement contributed anything to the discussion beyond what was already in the post. For the record, I also prefer that commenters leave their name, but the fundamental issue is that we remain respectful of one another even if we differ with each other. I will not fight over defending a label or a caricature. Those are the very things that do indeed bring unnecessary division. I think the last 2 paragraphs of my post sum up my passions on this subject well and are points of which we can rally in unity.

I appreciate your love for the church and I look forward to meeting you this week. Please come up and introduce yourself to Kelly and me.

Duke, thanks for your comments. It is true enough, that a conference setting, in and of itself, is not a weekly worship service, and thus, possibly not the best example. However, many of the sermons delivered were messages previously delivered in their churches. I think you will find that these men are regularly preaching in similar manner week in and week out. To that degree their example is quite valid.

I agree with you, if you're losing people's attention simply because of the length, cut the length. No problem with that. I hope that I've learned to read my audience over the years. If length were the only issue, cutting it down is not a problem - as long as you are also faithfully explaining and applying the text. As I say in the post, an hour is not necessarily where the power lies. If I discerned that the majority of the congregation was tuned off to the length of the message, I'm quite sure I would make some adjustments.

However, I think that the normal objection is not really the length - but the content, packaging, and delivery of the message. If people are attending the whiz bang guy BECAUSE he only preaches 30 minutes, that can reveal something problematic also.

Again, I think the issue is far more than how much time the sermon takes up. I'm with you in that I have no interest in boring people for an hour. If that has been your experience in listening to my sermons, send me an e-mail and I would be happy to dialogue with you further on how I can do a better job - seriously.

Jennifer, thanks for these comments. Coming from a speech and communications teacher, as well as someone who has endured a lot of my past preaching (I hope its better than it was back then), is a real honor. Great to see you on here.