Would like to update you on some of the ongoing “Original or Effective” discussion. Much of what was initially captured in the very brief piece in Pastors.com was not the full expression of my thoughts. The piece was directed at church planters - not pastors who speak regularly, weekly. I later wrote a cover story for Church Report that was about 2,000 words and did a decent job of explaining my thoughts on the topic.

I am going to publish a follow up article on this in Pastors.com in the next few months to clarify this somewhat. I agree with you - exploration, new thoughts, creativity is a great thing. And yes, I am super pro women in ministry.

Somehow my point has been “lost in translation” - initially when I started speaking 25 years ago I did use other’s outlines / bits and pieces of their messages as any craftsman in any skillset will do as she/he follows the lead of their mentor. My mentor encouraged me to do this - it was great counsel. Still totally believe that is a wise way to approach the aquisition of a skillset whether it is skulpting, writing or speaking. It is the very rare person who is a protege w/o a mentor - nearly unheard of in history.

I have spoken as much as anyone you will ever meet in terms of actual times in front of an audience - between 10,000 and 12,000 times. All that to say - I have learned a lot - still am about the craft of communicating orally. I am more than honored that each weekend that many communicators lift my messages, hundreds of invented phrases - without being quoted. If these people were teaching a graduate level course perhaps that would be appropriate, but a weekend church setting is not an academic setting - thus not necessary for such.

After so many millenia of human history it is pretty difficult to claim a seminal thought. Maybe Solomon was right after all - “There is nothing new under the sun…”

Steve Sjogren

I’ve sort of already played this already, here. Want me to play again?