What is the preacher doing when they preach? Sometimes that question might be asked in a concerned tone – what is this preacher doing? But even without the negative or concerned tone, the question is worth pondering…to keep reading, please click here.
Audience Analysis
Sermon Titles: So Tricky
Over three years ago, when this blog was first beginning, I wrote a post about sermon titles. I called it “Tricky Little Things” and for some reason it was the post that consistently got the highest level of hits in the couple of years that followed. So I thought I’d revisit it today with some tweaks. Let’s think about sermon titles:
I don’t find it easy to write a title for a sermon. Actually, I do . . . a bad one! I don’t find it easy to write a good title for a sermon. So what makes a title tick? Even before we get to that question, let’s consider a preliminary question – what is the point of the title?
Defining purpose for sermon titles is a worthwhile endeavour. You have to consider your own situation. Will the title be advertised publically? Will it be announced to the church? Will they only see it as they browse the notice sheet at the start of the service? Some situations will demand more of the title than others! Nevertheless, what makes a title tick?
A bad title illicits a yawn, an expectation that the message will be boring, irrelevant or distant. “Joseph’s Journey to Egypt.” Can’t imagine people purring with anticipation for that one. There have been times when I’ve sat through an introduction in which the preacher posed a question, “So what must be present in your ministry if it is to count for anything?” But I sat there unmoved by the “tension” because the bulletin had already told me the title – “Love – 1Cor.13:1-3.” I like the title Alexander Strauch used for an article on that text (and I believe, a message), “5-1=0.”
A good title stirs interest and piques curiosity. A good title gets the listener on your side. They already want to hear what you have to say before you start your introduction – bonus! So the big idea in a deductive sermon might make a good title, as long as it is going to be stated in the introduction and it leaves people wanting to know more. “I wonder what that is supposed to mean? The preacher will need to explain that!” But if the sermon is inductive, then don’t give away any tension in your title. That would be like your uncle who always gives away the punch line in the introduction to a joke, “Did you hear the one that ends with her saying, ‘no, but that’s a really nice ski mask!’… ?”
Titles are little things, but they’re not easy to write. The keywords to keep in mind are intrigue, interest and relevance.
Dumbing Down Preaching?
After my post on making sense I received the following very helpful comment from Martin:
You make good points but I am left wondering.
There is so much dumbing down in America, are your encouraging the dumbing down of the sermon too?
How do you lift the bar for the congregation?
How do you keep the focus of the bright ones without leaving the newcomers behind?
In a rhetorical sense, should pastors check their brains (and learning) at the door to appeal to the least common denominator? In so doing, do the more educated listeners leave the service longing for more meat and less milk?
In sum, how do you balance these competing elements in the congregation?
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Thanks for the comment. I am absolutely not encouraging the dumbing down of the sermon. I am encouraging making sermons understandable. The level at which the sermon is pitched should be part of the preacher’s strategy, thoroughly informed by who is listening to the sermon (which implies knowing your congregation as well as possible).
Let’s take, as an example, a tennis coach. Their job is to maximize the potential of the student by helping them improve their game. In order to achieve that goal, they have to make sure that everything they work on with the student is both understood and implemented. In reality they will make sure the basics are well-drilled, but they will also add to those basics the more nuanced elements of the game to produce a trained player who can play to the best of their ability. That will take many hours of training, perhaps hundreds of hours. But if you drop in at any point in the training, the student should understand what is being taught. A tennis coach that uses obscure language, unknown illustrations, omitted connections, rapid transitions, unclear speech, assumed knowledge and incoherent literary speech will not be effective, and unlike the preacher, will not be thanked for their “deep training.”
So to lift the bar for the congregation we must make sure our preaching is stretching them by its content, rather than missing them by lack of clarity.
I think it is possible to communicate to several levels at once. Usually there is no need to differentiate massively in our preaching, “now for the more biblically astute listeners, listen to this…” Actually we can offer extra elements without overplaying the introduction. The key is for the listeners to be able to understand what you mean. Newcomers are helped massively by simple explanations of all that is happening, so that even if they don’t fully comprehend every element of the service/message, they feel welcomed and comfortable (rather than alien and uncomfortable).
Pastors please don’t check your brains at the door. But feel free to leave your egos there. An effective communicator uses a part of their skill and learning to make sure they connect with their listeners. Obscuring speech in order to appear intelligent is a prideful and profoundly unhelpful habit. The best sportspersons are the best because they make the profoundly complex look simple. The best coaches communicate effectively so that their instructions can be understood. The best preachers profoundly communicate the scriptures, using their skill to make sure that listeners understand them.
Does It Make Sense?
It seems obvious, but it needs to be said. When we speak we need to make sure we make sense. There are various reasons why we may not make sense to our listeners. Here are a few to be aware of:
1. Obscure Language – If you obfuscate using technical, rare or archaic vocabulary, then you will lose folks. They will probably still compliment you on your “deep” message, but be alert enough to spot the implication of that encouraging feedback!
2. Unknown Illustrations – Your illustration from the world of online war games, submarine technology, chinese martial arts, Finnish cuisine, Egyptian burial rituals or first world war poetry may make perfect sense to you. But are you including enough explanation to allow them to get it? (And if it needs that much explanation, is it really the best illustration to use?)
3. Omitted Connections – The logical connection between what you are currently saying and the larger point you are offering may not be so logical if you forget to mention it. Actually, you need to state, restate and underline the logical connection, just in case they were drifting in that moment. So easy to miss bits of messages we know, but are so needed.
4. Rapid Transitions – Maybe you include something of a transition from direct explanation to explanatory illustration, but the transition is so fast your passengers fail to make the turn with you. Disoriented they look around trying to figure out where they are now, almost oblivious to what you are actually saying.
5. Unclear Speech – If they can’t make it out, they can’t comprehend it. And there’s no need to get snooty about your accent either, every accent has elements that are unclear, so try to be aware of that and speak clearly. Watch for facial signals of misfiring speech. Restate if you suspect some may have missed what you said. Oh, and be careful of rapid fire sentence finishing, or fading away when the period is in sight.
6. Assumed Knowledge – It is dangerous to assume people know things. Do they have the biblical awareness necessary for the message? Do they know the cultural, historical, political, geographical knowledge that you are assuming for your explanation of the text to be vividly received?
7. Written Notes – I’m not having a go at notes. I’m just pointing out that almost anything can make sense in written outline form, but your listeners are listening. Sometimes what is written doesn’t make sense when it is heard. Write your messages for listeners, not for your own eyes.
What’s missing? Why else do we sometimes fail to make sense? (Number 8 – Don’t speak out of your depth – If we don’t get it ourselves, they have no chance!)
Preaching and Training
I am a huge advocate for biblical preaching. But I don’t think preaching covers all the bases as far as training and equipping is concerned. It would be naive to think that a sermon or two every week for decades will equip a church
As leaders of churches we need to think carefully about the place of small groups, of seminars, of training sessions, of mentoring . . . and somehow figure out how to do that without overcrowding the weekly schedule.
Think too of subjects that probably won’t, or won’t easily get addressed, in normal preaching. How does the big story of the Bible fit together? What are the various temperaments with which God has wired us? And spiritual gifts – how do we discover and use and fan into flame? And what about practical instruction in addressing interpersonal tensions? And how do you mentor a leader, a preacher, a husband, a dad . . . with just preaching?
Preaching is critical, but it’s not everything. How are you equipping people in the local church to multiply the ministry?
Why Did the Coughs Spread?
Yesterday I shared about the contrast between the attention of the crowd one night and the significant distraction the next night – same venue, same weather, same chairs, different speaker. Perhaps something here might be helpful to you. Why were they distracted?
1. It felt like a commentary with added anecdotes. It was like a commentary explanation of a text, but with the added anecdotes of the speaker’s illustrations, and with a little something of his personality.
2. It felt like a written document was being preached. There is a massive difference between spoken speech and written language. We must learn to write in “spoken” English if we are to be preachers that prepare with literary approaches (which is only one approach).
3. The message moved between the text and third-party illustrations and back again. I felt untouched. It seems like it should be obvious that preaching should land in the lives of the listeners, which is not the same thing as sharing personal experiences, or saying things in contemporary language. In fact, when personal experiences seem aloof or “I’m an important person” they really don’t help the connection at all. Where, specifically, does your next message touch the lives of those present?
4. It was hard to tell if the speaker was passionate about the passage and message or not. Something believed but not really owned will probably be offered in an “at arms length” manner which will leave the listeners holding it “at arms length.”
5. I wondered what would happen if we all left, would the speaker just carry on anyway? It kind of felt like it tonight. Which leads to a nice closing question. What if the speaker sensed that we’d all left mentally? What if you sense that? Then what?
When the Coughs Drop
As a speaker you should be able to sense the level of focus of your listeners. Before you say they always listen well, I would encourage you to follow this advice. Try being in the crowd and listening, observing, sensing what is going on around you among the listeners. If you have the privilege of attending a conference or large Christian event, you should have the privilege of experiencing the crowd from within the crowd with different speakers.
Large crowd events are helpful because the large numbers both multiply and muffle. That is, in a small group there may be an individual who never listens – proportionately they are more of a small group than they’d be in a big group. Equally, it is quite the effect to sense distraction spread through a large crowd. What happens?
Fidget levels increase. It’s amazing how still listeners can be when the preacher captures the crowd. But when he hasn’t, fidgeting is rife. Chairs move, people change position, people check their watches, the clock, the window, the people in peripheral vision, etc.
Infectious coughing spreads. I sat in a large crowd tonight (I wrote this a few weeks before it was put on the site), and I listened as the coughing spread across the crowd. Like dogs barking in a neighborhood, like children crying in a nursery, like coughs among a crowd ready to be done already. Last night I sat in the same crowd. You could hear a pin drop. Did a mass distribution of cough drops make the coughs drop last night? No, different speaker.
At the first appropriate moment, people flee to the exits. It can be painful to feel trapped in a meeting too long. How long is too long? After all, these folks knew when the service would last until. It was too long when the preacher didn’t connect for too long.
Experience the distraction of the crowd, experience the impressive focus possible. Then go back to your own preaching. Try to be accurately aware of the level of attention you hold, and then try to improve it. Tomorrow I’ll share some reflections on why the distraction levels were so high among the listeners in the meeting I sat in tonight.
Okay, One More Spurgeon Quote
Honestly, I’m at Keswick this week, moving on Monday, and a little overwhelmed, so I am resorting to an easy source for quality thought-provoking material. Spurgeon. Following on from yesterday and thinking about preaching to save souls, here’s a blast worth receiving:
If we ourselves doubt the power of the gospel, how can we preach it with authority? Feel that you are a favored man in being allowed to proclaim the good news, and rejoice that your mission is fraught with eternal benefit to those before you. Let the people see how glad and confident the gospel has made you, and it will go far to make them long to partake in its blessed influences.
Preach very solemnly, for it is a weighty business, but let your matter be lively and pleasing, for this will prevent solemnity from souring into dreariness. Be so thoroughly solemn that all your faculties are aroused and consecrated, and then a dash of humor will only add intenser gravity to the discourse, even as a flash of lightning makes midnight darkness all the more impressive. Preach to one point, concentrating all your energies upon the object aimed at. There must be no riding of hobbies, no introduction of elegancies of speech, no suspicion of personal display, or you will fail. Sinners are quick-witted people, and soon detect even the smallest effort to glorify self. Forego everything for the sake of those you long to save. Be a fool for Christ’s sake if this will win them, or be a scholar, if that will be more likely to impress them. Spare neither labor in the study, prayer in the closet, nor zeal in the pulpit. If men do not judge their souls to be worth a thought, compel them to see that their minister is of a very different opinion.
Some things have changed ever so slightly, but the bulk of this quote is well worth pondering in respect to our preaching today. Perhaps it would be worth spending a season in prayer, asking God to make the souls of those around as important to us as they are to Him. That might prompt prayer, and preaching, as never before.
(Quote from Thielicke’s Encounter with Spurgeon, pp58-9.)
Preacher, Use Strategy
I typically teach with reference to the arrow and the target (i.e. the main idea and the message purpose respectively). In order to deliver the arrow to hit the target, strategy is necessary. This might mean preaching in the clear and logical manner of a deductive message, or it might choosing the slightly trickier, but when effective, very effective, inductive message. A preacher needs to think through how to preach the text as effectively as possible. This is strategy.
It encourages me to see this type of language used by Spurgeon. Let’s taste a bit of that:
Again, brethren, if you wish to see souls saved, we must be wise as to the times when we address the unconverted. Very little common sense is spent over this matter. Under certain e there is a set time for speaking to sinners, and this comes as regularly as the hour of noon. . . . Why should the warning word be alway at the hinder end of the discourse when hearers are most likely to be weary? . . . When their interest is excited, and they are least upon the defensive, then let fly a shaft at the careless, and it will frequently be more effectual than a whole flight of arrows shot against them at a time when they are thoroughly encased in armor of proof. Surprise is a great element in gaining attention and fixing a remark upon the memory, and times for addressing the careless should be chosen with an eye to that fact.
Spurgeon here raises an interesting thought. Not only should strategy influence our choice of sermon shape and content, it should also influence our decision about timing and target within the group who are listening. I know I tend to address the unsaved near the end. Why? I’ve been impressed with Andy Stanley’s direct approach in introductions on several occasions.
When will you target the unsaved this Sunday? What about the saved by lethargic? The excited and passionate? The naturally skeptical? The comfortable? We often think through messages from all angles of the text, but why not think through all angles of those listening. There is diversity there, a good military campaign would think through that variety. So would a sporting gameplan. Why not in the most important battle of all?
Post Preaching Logistics
What to do after preaching? I suppose it is largely influenced by your church tradition, but for the sake of prompting thought, here are a few perspectives to which you can add yours:
The Stand at Door Option. Some churches like the preacher to stand at the door and shake every right hand that passes by. It guarantees pastoral opportunity to see everyone, but also guarantees a couple of other things too. For one, it guarantees that people who don’t particularly want to interact with you will feel obliged to say something polite and potentially insincere. For another, it means that people who really do want to talk to you will be rushed and probably won’t. Personally I find this option has more negatives than positives. I would rather stand on the door on weeks when I’m not preaching, and have someone else there when I do preach (but then I have the advantage of a plural leader home church – perhaps every week preachers should consider having a back up for some weeks on the door?).
The stay at front to pray with folks option. This obviously has advantages that the last option didn’t. It does make getting to you a known quantity, but also slightly intimidating for any that don’t want to swim upstream through the aisle to get to you. Also, if it is overplayed in terms of “prayer ministry” then when nobody comes to you, it may communicate that the message didn’t touch lives, which may or may not be true!
The mill about option. This has the advantage of not being either overwhelmed with right hands rushing away, or loneliness when people don’t swim upstream for a heart-to-heart in a public setting. But those that do want to talk may find it hard to approach if you look intent on getting to someone else, or thoroughly engaged with someone else. It takes sensitivity and approachability to pull this off to its maximum potential.
The run and hide option. Probably many preachers can relate to this frequent desire to interact with nobody after pouring out heart and soul in the sermon. While this may be tempting for several reasons, it usually isn’t the best approach. Vulnerable and drained as you may feel, prayerfully engage with folks and remember to bring praise, criticism and heavy loads to the Lord . . . they’ll probably feel like too much for you to carry!
Other options? What do you typically do? Advantages? Disadvantages?
