FAQs

Accessibility. A transcribed sermon simply increases the accessibility of God’s Word.

But also, for those desiring to study the sermon further, a sermon transcript can be highlighted and marked with comments and notes. A transcribed sermon also serves as a verbatim record for future reference.

Those who are hearing impaired can read a sermon transcript if they cannot hear the sermon preached. Those under time constraints can read a transcript more quickly than listening to a recorded sermon.

If a church can afford the additional ministry expense, these are just some of the benefits of providing sermon transcription to your congregation and conference attendees.

Our normal charge for transcribing sermons, conference presentations, and workshops with one person speaking is $2.99 per audio minute. Please note that this is about 20% less than comparable transcription services that are available.

A transcriptionist of God’s preached and taught Word should have a certain set core competencies in order to produce a quality, readable transcription of your sermons or workshops.

First and foremost the individual must be well versed in the Word of God and be a skilled English grammarian. But the individual must also have a background in the Biblical languages. The sermon transcriptionist must also have a rich Biblical and theological vocabulary. Also, it would be a tremendous benefit for the sermon transcriptionist to be both a rapid and accurate typist.

We are sticklers for detail and have earned degrees in Bible college and seminary. Our transcription philosophy is conservative formal equivalence. What this means for our customers is that our sermon transcriptions are near verbatim. We do not transcribe what we think you intended to say, but rather what you actually said word-for-word.

Having said that, we will attempt to correct words that are clearly misspoken, mistaken verse references, and awkward grammar. We will also exclude colloquialisms, such as “You know…”, “Man,…”, “Well,…”, as well as vocalized pauses (“Uh…”, “Um…”, etc.) and unrelated comments (“Dave, would you turn the mic down a bit?”)

The sermon transcription you receive will be a clean, readable document that will reflect well on Christ, His church, and you His servant.

Every sermon we transcribe goes through two “passes” before it is Emailed to you the client: transcription and proofreading.

Transcription is the initial process of listening to the audio sermon while typing what is said. During the transcription process, footnotes are added where Scripture is read, citing the book, chapter, and verse(s). During this first step, research is also done when unfamiliar words, names, or places are encountered. If English transliterations of the Greek or Hebrew are mentioned, the spelling is verified.

Proofreading is the second pass, where awkward grammatical is corrected, paragraph breaks are adjusted, and where the transcription is given a detailed review to ensure it accurately represents what was preached or taught.

We certainly can! And with complete confidentiality. The transcription we Email to you will be password protected and a confidentiality cover sheet will be included on the front.

There is an additional charge for transcriptions with multiple speakers. This can be found on our Pricing page. Also, the sound quality of the audio may incur an additional charge.

Using transcription software, usually called dictation software, is not effective, and this is why.

Though dictation software has come a long way in recent years, and may work fine for some types of recordings, biblical preaching, by its nature, has a vocabulary of its own. This unique vocabulary forces the software to “guess” at the spelling of many words. As a result, much manual listening and editing is needed to make corrections where the software has incorrectly guessed.

In the end, it is much more efficient for a live person to transcribe sermons and conferences manually without using dictation software.

Yes we can! Please make a copy of the CD and mail it to us. We will handle it from there.

We are willing to transcribe as many or as few sermons as you wish, as frequently or infrequently as you need. Of course, we are also willing to provide you with transcriptions of your sermons each week.