J.D. Greear on "What Counts as Plagiarism in a Sermon?"

Pastor J.D. Greear has an excellent article HERE on the method he uses to determine when to cite sources and avoid plagiarism. His main points are listed below.

1. If I ever preach the gist of another person’s sermon, meaning that I used the lion’s share of their message’s organization, points, or applications, I give credit.

2. If I glean an interpretation of a passage from someone, but the organization of the points, application and presentation are my own, I generally do not feel the need to cite. 

3. When I take a direct point or a line or the creative wording of a truth from someone, I feel like I should cite.

4. When I give a list that someone else has come up with or offer some piece of cultural analysis, I feel like I should cite. 

5. If I hear a story told by someone else that reminds me of a story of your own, and I tell that story from my own life, I don’t think I need always to identify where I got the idea for that story from originally.

Pulpit Plagiarism in 1830

Here’s a quick and fast history lesson. Back in the days of the Second Great Awakening, a Presbyterian pastor named Thomas Campbell came to America. Campbell began to teach different practices regarding communion. This led to a split among the churches and Thomas Campbell’s son, Alexander Campbell, took the reigns and partnered with several Baptists to form two new denominations: the Church of Christ, the Disciples of Christ or the Christian Church.

In 1830, Alexander Campbell began publishing a religious magazine called The Millennial Harbinger. In the very first, Campbell expounded upon what he considered the "shameful" practice of plagiarizing sermons. Here a few of my favorite quotes:  

"It must be a painful thing to an intelligent man to hear young men...repeat sermons full of rich thought, expressed in appropriate and eloquent language. It looks like the efforts of a giant put forth by an infant."

"The practice is now carried to a shameful extent -- and it ought to be exposed; the practice of committing to memory short sermons composed by others, and delivering them...with the profession...that they are extempore."

"We have ourselves heard eloquent sermons from young men who cannot spell correctly in two syllables; and who understand nothing, even the structure of a common English sentence. Nay, worse; we have heard Greek and Chaldaic quoted by a preacher who did not know a noun from a verb in his own nor any language. We guard our young men against this growing evil."

I've included an image of the original source below, and you can find the origianal sources in their totality HERE and HERE.