On Wednesday evening I spoke at a meeting I haven’t visited before. They asked for a specific subject and so I spoke on that. They suggested having ten minutes of questions after the message. These were intelligent and helpful questions. Hopefully my answers were the same!
So I have two thoughts:
1. Why don’t we create venues for Q&A times? I’ve only heard of a very few churches that have some structure set up for people to interact with the preacher about the message. I heard of one place where the preacher goes to another room about half an hour after the service and is available for questions about the message. Why not? Obviously a Q&A at the end of the service could easily turn deeper communication times into information transfer times to be sabotaged by the curious, but thereby undermining life change for others. Yet perhaps there is a way to create opportunities for a group to feed off one anothers questions and probe the message further?
But this leads me to a deeper question:
2. Why aren’t there more questions in church? I just spent three days with a group of student ministry leaders . . . major note takers and question askers! Then the meeting on Wednesday evening – essentially a special interest group. There are questions in classroom settings and in seminar formats, but in normal church? Opportunity is already in place in that people can approach the preacher and ask a question, but typically do not. Is it learned behaviour to not probe the sermon? Is it a genuine lack of interest? Or is it just that sense of not coming across as negative or critical? Perhaps the opporrtunity would generate the interest and desire to probe messages further. Perhaps for that reason alone we should consider introducing the odd time for Q&A?
Have you tried anything along these lines? Did it work? I’d love to hear from other people’s experience.
Biblical Preaching 
Yes, we have Q&A after our evening sermons (attendance typically 50-75) on a fairly regular basis.
They work very well. The format is simple: a sermon, followed by a song or two (to allow for comfort breaks), followed by Q&A. The people in the audience just stick their hand up and ask a question. It then gets answered, and the questioner is allowed to ask a follow up question. It’s really just a conversation about the sermon.
If the sermon is of a sensitive nature, maybe allow people to write their questions down and have them collected. Although the typical attendance isn’t so big, this format has worked in larger settings too (250+).
One other thing I would say is, if the sermon is on a special topic (e.g. euthanasia), make sure the person who answers the questions really, really knows what he’s talking about.
I did my DMin project on “Connecting the Sermon to the Small Group” … “reinforcing expository preaching with sermon based small groups.” People are talking about the sermon. After church every Sunday 🙂
We should help people have conversations that are premised on the purpose of the sermon. The purpose based on the big idea will have a few, if not many, instructional objections for application. There’s always more to talk about.
In my seminars on the subject, I’ve heard of churches using Sunday and Wednesday nights for sermon extension and discussion which leads to a transformational environment.
People are talking about the sermon. We should lead in the discussion.
I’ve done this with the questions right in the middle of the sermon with groups as large as 120 or so. I’ve actually come to design my sermons so that questions are a part of how I preach. I have found that people really connect with what I’m saying when I ask them to be a part of the process.
Part of the issue going on here is the view of the preacher as the expert. That was fine just a few years ago, but there is a growing discontent with leadership and experts. Even just recently many people have felt betrayed by the experts in Washington D.C. or the experts on Wall Street.
Our messages will have a great deal more power when we admit that we are not experts with unassailable opinions, but that we are being formed into the image of Christ along with the church.
I think, though, that many preachers (including myself here) really love to know the Scripture and explain it to others. I feel a lot of pride in my study and knowledge, if I’m honest with myself. That makes it hard for me to let others participate in the process of sharing the message, but I’m reminded that it’s not my message to share. I have to become less so that God can become greater.
Keep asking that question Peter! I also find it difficult to understand why there is not more dialogue or to say it in todays vernacular, having a conversation, that people in the congregation are able enter into more interaction with the pastor. I have used the evening service to allow for questions and to discuss the morning sermon with the congregation and have had some good feedback. As well as Q and A, I will usually go into some aspect of the passage that I didn’t touch on in the sermon as well as help the congregation to think through applications from the text. I have found this to be an extremely helpful way to approach the evening service without feeling the need to exegete another passage. And as we all know there is no way to download all the information we have uploaded during the weeks preparations and this is also a way to assist our congregations to not just have another spoon fed teaching time, but a place where they can be more interactive while still teaching them good skills at Bible study and application.
It seems to me that is often a tendency in good Bible teaching churches to think that having three steak meals a day (Sunday school instruction, main service sermon and an evening message) is somehow more spiritual or at least the most beneficial way to teach a congregation. I have to wonder if what we have trained is gluttons seeking for more head knowledge while never exercising our spiritual muscles. This might be what the book of Hebrews is addressing in Chapter 5 with those who are not mature and have need of the basics again and who are not accustomed to meat. These who have need of spoon feeding need to get to the point that they are able to eat steak themselves have through practice (exercise) learned to discern the meaning of a passage. I have found that many who have been in good Bible believing churches for years often feel inadequately equipped to handle the Word of God. This, I believe is one of our most important tasks as we teach from the pulpit and lead small groups and evening service, to train our congregations to know how to handle accurately the Word of God. Thanks for your good posts. Keep up the good work. Steve