Meaning Makes the Difference

Alan Baddeley, the memory expert, in his book, "Human Memory" hints that there is a connection between meaning and memory. Recently when I was doing my run-throughs for an upcoming sermon I began to see that when my brain grasped the meaning of what I had written in my manuscript I was able to speak that meaning freely. It made me see again the importance of having a focus and purpose for a sermon. I think that the point that Baddeley is making in his book is that it's harder to remember things that have no meaning such as lists of numbers etc. Once there is a meaning attached to something the brain remembers it much easier. I have always said that it is difficult to preach in the extemporaneous mode if what we have written doesn't follow and make good sense. In fact, the brain will not let us make moves from one part of what we have written to another unless what we are saying logically follows and makes sense.

Perhaps this can help an extemp preacher during the run through process. If we look at a chunk that we have written and ask ourselves what am I trying to say here it might help us be able to speak it freely more quickly.