Thanks, Rebecca. God bless you. 1. I think I got hung up on your category "stories" and missed "and metaphors." My fault. I was trained in homiletics to use lived-body long-form stories in preaching (3 per sermon) and I have moved away from that for a number of reasons (I use one story maybe every 5 sermons). But as for metaphors, yes and amen. My goal is to litter my sermons with vivid, earthy analogues left and right, laboring to grab everyday solidities to help theological abstractions "pop" in the hearer's mind and heart. That was part of Edwards' and Spurgeon's power, and it's how Christ taught. I should have read your words more carefully. 2. At the same time, I find the absolutizing statement "If you don't give them one *at least* every 5 mins, they will tune out & forget your words" to be unhelpfully inflexible. 3. Your counsel is purely at the level of content. But the other side of preaching is the way someone preaches. Matter; manner. I have heard flat, bland, lifeless preaching that uses stories and images; and I have heard lively, unction-laden, bright, joyous preaching that celebrates truth image-lessly yet with irrepressibly edifying contagion to the hearer. 4. I have a list of 39 preaching rules that I've accumulated that is a personal filter thru which I run every sermon I preach. One of them has to do with vivid imagery. There are 38 others. There is just so much that goes into preaching that connects. I wholeheartedly agree with the basic point you are making, and I join you in making it. But there's so much more, and many other ways to cause our people to "tune out and forget our words" than a lack of a story or metaphor every 5 min. And there are many other ways to keep them tuned in other than a story/metaphor every five min; for example, slowing way down and plunging a truth or application directly straight into the consciences of the hearers (I did this a few weeks ago, without story/metaphor, and the room went silent as God worked on us all). 5. I've preached about 180 sermons at the church I serve, which is my first pastorate. Tim Keller says our first 200 sermons will be awful as we work the kinks out and find our voice. So in about 20 sermons I'll move from "awful" to somewhere hopefully around average. So while I found your counsel a bit simplistic, I am really not one who should be giving sermon advice and I defer to other more seasoned preachers to correct my thoughts. 6. Thank you for your world-brightening life and heart and ministry, Rebecca. The Lord bless you.