Prepare Well

I greet you in Jesus’ precious name! It is Saturday morning, the 20th of May, 2023, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today. 

“The preparations of the heart belong to man, But the answer of the tongue is from the Lord.”
Proverbs 16:1  

“But when they deliver you up, do not worry about how or what you should speak. For it will be given to you in that hour what you should speak; for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you.”
Matthew 10:19-20

I want to speak to you about extempore preaching. Now what does that mean? Well, what happens is, the Lord will give you a scripture verse, like Romans 1:17: 

“The just shall live by faith.” 

And then you preach on that for maybe an hour or two without using any notes. Now, the great giants of the faith, men like John Wesley and John Whitfield, would get up on the platform, open-air, and they would preach for hours without any scripture notes, they would preach from their hearts. People think that's amazing. No, it is not amazing, what it is is the work that has been done before the men get on the platform or into the pulpit. It is times of prayer, fasting, and heart preparation before they speak, and then when they get onto the platform, they open their mouths wide and the Lord speaks through them.

Many a time, I have been addressing a large group, open air, that is my favourite place - it might be a sports field, a stadium, an open-air place, and I would stand up and as I open my Bible, a huge wind would come and blow all my notes away, and then I realise the Lord is saying to me, “I am speaking. All you have got to do is open your mouth.” But you see, fortunately, I have done my preparation before I get on the platform. I want to say to you today, prepare well, prepare your heart well and God will give you the words to speak. Now, it might be at school, at university, at your employment, or even on the sports field. You do your preparation beforehand and God will undertake for you. When you just try and wing it as they say, it doesn’t work, it falls flat and people can see straight through you.  

Today, do your part and then Jesus will do His part.
God bless you and goodbye.