“A number of years ago when tape recording was beginning, a few students at Wildwood desired to share with friends and relatives at a distance some of the vesper talks and class studies they were enjoying. From this ‘seed’ has developed a tape ministry which has reached many hearts and homes. These recordings do not come from a professional studio presentation. Rather, the listener is simply a part of the vesper audience or class group at Wildwood. Sometimes there is participation—individual and group responses. Occasionally the sound of a passing train or a crying baby may be heard. Again, the listener may join with the congregation in song response. The subjects presented cover a wide range of gospel and health topics, the objective being to contribute our little part in the worldwide work of the Third Angel’s Message to ‘Make ready a people prepared for the Lord.'”

Sincerely,

W.D. Frazee (1906-1996)

Note from W.D. Frazee Sermons Staff:

These sermons have been recorded over a 30-year period (1950-1980) on reel-to-reel tape. They have recently been digitized. All the sermons listed in the online store have been edited. Much of the hiss and rumble have been reduced; coughs, baby cries, and other background noises have been reduced; and the sermons have been shortened by eliminating long pauses and condensing the files. These recordings will never sound brand new, but we consider the content powerful enough to release the best we have been able to repair. We pray that you will be blessed even if you find the sound quality less than pristine. We trust that the listening experience may even be enhanced by the authenticity of the recorded environment.  But if you receive recordings which you find unsatisfactory for any reason, please return them for replacement.

 

Slow Talker

Some peo­ple have said regard­ing the preach­ing of Elder Frazee: “He talks too slow!” We offer the fol­low­ing exam­ples of inspired coun­sel as evi­dence of his stud­ied adher­ence to the divine pattern.

“Min­is­ters should stand erect, and speak slowly, firmly, and dis­tinctly, tak­ing a full inspi­ra­tion of air at every sen­tence, and throw­ing out the words by exer­cis­ing the abdom­i­nal mus­cles. If they will observe this sim­ple rule, giv­ing atten­tion to the laws of health in other respects, they may pre­serve their life and use­ful­ness much longer than men in any other pro­fes­sion. Min­is­ters and teach­ers should dis­ci­pline them­selves to clear and dis­tinct artic­u­la­tion, giv­ing the full sound to every word. Those who talk rapidly, from the throat, jum­bling the words together, and rais­ing their voices to an unnat­u­rally high pitch, soon become hoarse, and the words spo­ken lose half the force which they would have if spo­ken slowly, dis­tinctly, and not so loud. The sym­pa­thies of the hear­ers are awak­ened for the speaker; for they know that he is doing vio­lence to him­self, and they fear that he will break down at any moment. It is no evi­dence that a man has zeal for God because he works him­self up into a frenzy of excite­ment and ges­tic­u­la­tion. ‘Bod­ily exer­cise,’ says the apos­tle, ‘prof­iteth lit­tle’” .
– Christian Edu­ca­tion 241 (empha­sis supplied)

“In my younger days I used to talk too loud. The Lord has shown me that I could not make the proper impres­sion upon the peo­ple by get­ting the voice to an unnat­ural pitch. Then Christ was pre­sented before me, and His man­ner of talk­ing; and there was a sweet melody in His voice. His voice, in a slow, calm man­ner, reached those who lis­tened, and His words pen­e­trated their hearts, and they were able to catch on to what He said before the next sen­tence was spo­ken. Some seem to think they must race right straight along or else they will lose the inspi­ra­tion and the peo­ple will lose the inspi­ra­tion. If that is inspi­ra­tion, let them lose it, and the sooner the bet­ter.“
–Man­u­script 19b, 1890

In addition to following the above counsel, Elder Frazee was also faced with the challenge of Parkinson’s disease later in life This is noticeable in the recordings from the late 70s and worsening into the early 80s until the disease finally ended all his personal preaching. This further slowed his preaching. This however, unlike his conscientious duty to the above counsel, was not intentional. We are thankful none-the-less, that he continued to preach despite the challenges of Parkinson’s as many are still blessed by those messages not withstanding the reduction in vocal quality.