Since many of us have jumped on the train of going digital with our church services, it is a great idea to utilize any type of gadget, or in this case, an iPad for preaching. Instead of going the traditional way by using papers, it could help you be more organized and store all your sermons into one place.
For those who are thinking of making this change, our Facebook group members have some tips and tricks on preaching from an iPad for you to try out!
Power-saving, Airplane Mode, and the Internet.
“Turn off the power saving feature. Turn on airplane mode while using it. Download notes directly to the device – don’t rely on an internet connection.” Dan Sweaza
Turn off Siri.
“Turn off Siri….nothing worse than her responding in the middle of a message. Let’s just say she responds to Assyrian or Syria as well…” Joe Marshall
Use Do Not Disturb
“Do not disturb mode, set auto-lock to never, lock orientation either portrait or landscape for preference, download your notes.” Lyndsay Stratton
Utilizing Apple’s Pages
“If you’re using an iPad, utilize Pages! The ecosystem from MacBook, to iPhone to iPad for pages is incredible. You can work on sermons from everywhere.” Daniel Betancourt
Save as a PDF
“I type my sermon on the word and then save it as a PDF, so when I open it on the iPad I can open it in Reader and then you don’t scroll, you swipe by page, and I have found that to really work for me” Kim Hernandez Leatherman
If you’re really feeling fancy, use SplitScreen.
“I use the split-screen mode. Bible on one side, notes on the other. Either Google Docs or OneNote. Google docs it great because I can save it to the device, and it’s just scrolling all the way down. And it doesn’t enter editing mode unless you tell it to specifically.” Tosh Miller
Podium Mode in Sermonary
“Podium Mode in Sermonary is beautiful on iPad.” Justin Trapp
Using Evernote
“My dad always used Evernote to preach from! I also used it many times on my iPad throughout my college career as well. The reader mode on it is great and it doesn’t require an internet connection, but there weren’t a lot of editing options if I remember correctly.” Erika Yates
Utilizing Apple’s Keynote
“I have used the iPad for years, I now use Keynote with slides and presenter notes. You can draw live on keynote too which is cool” Michael Greaney
Using Notability
“I have been using an iPad for about four years. I use the app Notability. I can write on my notes all the way up until preaching time. I do save as PDF, but I could use a word file if I wanted.” Allen Orr
Using Dropbox
“I write it up in words and save it to my Dropbox folder and read and preach from the Dropbox app on my iPad. Been doing this for 5 years or longer. Works great. You can download the document for offline use but once you have opened the document it’s there no matter if you lose connection etc. I used to open it at home where I had WiFi and then it would be ready to go to church with no internet hours later.” Andrew Bates
Conclusion:
The key to all of this is to do what works best for your situation. An iPad, or really any tablet, is a great tool to help you preach and there are hundreds of apps to make life easier for you. One of the most important tips from today is this, do NOT rely on the internet. Make sure you have your sermon downloaded, just in case. Also, be sure to turn on Do Not Disturb so you don’t get any notifications about what you’re having for lunch during your sermon.
