Brain Rules- Something to Consider

Brain Rules

08/26/2013 BY KEITH BURNETTLEAVE A COMMENT

Brain Rules. Educators know it.  Advertisers employ it.  Infants and toddlers live by it.  Humans learn and retain more from seeing than hearing. Poets know it, I’d rather see a sermon than hear one any day, (Edgar Guest).  Humorists know it, Actions speak louder than words but not nearly as often, (Mark Twain).  Does the Church know it?

If a sermon lived is what the world wants to see, then cultural decline would be proof of poor ‘preaching.’   A sermon lived is exactly what God ordered, Let your light so shine before men that may they see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.

What is the goal of acting out a sermon?   Some want the ‘sermon’ of their life to tell others what to believe.  

Some want their ‘sermon’ to tell others how to behave.  Still others want their ‘sermon’ to proclaim their own “godliness.”  They are kind of like the Pharisee who prayed and thanked God he wasn’t like other men (especially the ‘sinner’ beside him who wouldn’t lift his eyes to heaven).  Still another group wants their ‘sermon’ to detail the correctness of their theology.  These ‘sermons’ miss the mark and communicate poorly.  This is the stuff of which Paul wrote in I Cor. 13, If I preach eloquently, if I heal the sick, or suffer as a martyr but don’t have love, I am a noisy distraction and no one pays attention (my paraphrase).  May I suggest the world is not paying attention?  When our ‘living sermons’ show a desperate world we love them, and God loves them, they will listen.  They don’t  need better eyes, we need better ‘sermons.’

Yes, we do learn more from seeing than hearing, but we learn even more if we see and hear the same thing!  Think about it.

Soli Deo Gloria!

Brain Rules, by John Medina, examines why we learn as we do and its implications on the future of business, education, and the internet.