| A recent sermon on my iPad |
I'm in the middle of delivering my sermon from my shiny new iPad. I'm focused on making the point and communicating God's truth from His Word to His people. Then my preaching device sings a loud "ding!" Up pops a notification badge: "Want to get away from it all? Cruises for as low as $399!" It took every ounce of self-control not to break out laughing. The funniest part was watching some of my older parishioners looking around to see which kid in the congregation was playing a game. I never told them the kid was me.
For the past 15 months I've been preaching from my first-generation iPad. It truly has been a gift from God, a tool that helps me be even more effective as a communicator. I use my iPad rather than paper notes for 3 reasons. First, it saves me time and money. Connecting the word processor from my laptop to my iPad through iCloud means no more printing and cutting. Second, it provides me the opportunity to make last minute edits right on my iPad.
Third, and this is the most important reason, it gives my parishioners permission to use their smart phones and tablets to follow the sermon, published in their YouVersion Bible apps. When they see their pastor opening his Bible on his iPad, they know it really is ok. Just yesterday Pastors.com reminded us how much Apple is changing the church. As a pastor I can choose to lead these changes rather than react to them.
Here are 5 power tips I have learned in the last 15 months for how to preach with an iPad.
1. Use the power of the iCloud. I've read that many pastors preaching from an iPad write their sermons on their computer's word processor, save their document as a PDF file, then email it to themselves, then open their email app on their iPad, and then open their sermon document with a PDF reader app like GoodReader. There is an easier way! I write my sermons using Pages on my MacBook, then drag the file over to the iCloud in Safari. When I open Pages on my iPad, voila! My sermon is waiting and ready to go.
2. Use the power of Pages. One huge advantage for pastors using Pages on the iPad is that it is a fully functioning word processor. I have the ability to make last-minute edits right on my iPad. In the photo above from my sermon on June 24th, you'll notice that the first paragraph begins with, "Dismiss the children..." I wrote this note to myself in the tech meeting an hour before our worship service began.
3. Use the power of YouVersion LIVE. I believe that the YouVersion Bible app is the greatest development for pastors since the Gutenberg printing press. The YouVersion Bible is now installed on over 50 million devices and the installation curve is growing exponentially. I want all of my parishioners to install the Bible app, and read from it throughout the week. When their wait-in-a-line moment happens and they grab their smart phones, I want them to read their Bibles rather than playing the latest version of Angry Birds. I can help smooth the way if I also use the YouVersion app on my iPad when I'm preaching. This is also why I publish every sermon I write for YouVersion LIVE.
4. Use the power of wider margins. I use 2-inch margins when I type my original sermon document. Then, when I use this same document in my iPad Pages document, I can use the two-finger zoom gesture to make the font size up to 30% larger in portrait mode (my preference) or up to 70% larger in landscape mode. This is so much better than actually typing my original sermon document in a larger font.
5. Use the power of the P-R-E-P-A-R-E checklist. After that first experience of my iPad chirping away during my sermon I have developed my own PREPARE acrostic checklist to make sure I have remembered to configure my iPad for preaching mode.
Power check the battery. I'd like my iPad as fully charged as I can get it before stepping into the pulpit.
Reduce the sound to zero. No more iPad singing in the middle of the sermon!
Enlighten the brightness to 100%. I love the backlit screen. In poor lighting conditions or in the opposite extreme like at Church Requel, where we use lighting to video record the talk, the backlit iPad is so much easier to see than paper!
Portrait Mode lock. Flip that little switch on the side to "lock" and make sure your iPad doesn't change orientation when you pick it up.
Auto lock set to Never. I don't want my iPad powering down in the middle of a talk. I don't want to have to enter a password to start my iPad while I'm communicating with my audience.
Radios set to Airplane Mode. No more vacation notifications popping up in the middle of my sermon. Temptations eliminated! And I save iPad battery life as an added bonus.
Enlarge my fonts. It's easier to do the 2-finger resizing before the talk rather than in the middle of it.
These are the five power tips for preaching from an iPad that I've learned, sometimes the hard way, over the past 15 months. Want to know even more? There's a thriving community of iPad toting preachers on Facebook. Join this community and learn how other communicators use their iPads. How about you? Do you have a tip you could share? I'd love to hear your suggestions in the comments below!
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