perspective

Awhile ago, I attended a lecture that I thought was, well, horrible. The lecturer assumed I knew things I didn't, covered the material too fast (I felt), and was confusing in general. In short, I got little to nothing from what he said.

A year later, I re-attended the same lecture. Same lecturer, same topic, same slides. But this time, I thought it was one of the best lectures I'd ever heard. But nothing really changed, it's just that, I finally understood what he was saying!

I'm sure some professors are bad teachers, no way around it. But there might be some lectures that really are phenomenal, but seem otherwise because they fall on deaf ears (or maybe I'm just being overly optimistic)?

Random thoughts:

1) Part of the art of giving a good lecture comes from knowing your audience?
2) The audience carries some responsibility for a good lecture?

3) God's word might be an example of this, i.e. something that is hard to fully appreciate because of our lack of (spiritual) maturity?