Homiletics

One Thing Worth Copying

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

There seems to be an epidemic of copycat mentality in church ministry today.  I’m not referring primarily to pulpit plagiarism, although that is a real issue (only exacerbated by the availability of online sermons from the very good to the very poor – all of which are readily copied by some).  I’m thinking more generally.  If a church is successful (measure that however you choose), then methodology is deemed worthy of mass representation for the benefit of others who in some way seek to reproduce something of that methodology or vision in their own local context.

By the way, please don’t think of this simply as a feature of one brand of Christianity.  I have heard the sneers and comments at the expense of Willow Creek or Saddleback, but some who sneer in that direction would affirm and delight in, for example, Redeemer Presbyterian’s Church Planting Center, just to cite one example.

While some are quick to mock some of this, it is certainly not bad.  Many churches have been helped and strengthened (not just in numbers) by learning from other church leaders in respect to methodology and ministry vision.  Some of the contemporary attacks on Christian consumerism have an element of irony about them inasmuch as there seems to be a band-wagon of consumerism-bashing.  Nevertheless, we should ask ourselves after the next seminar we attend, or “this-is-how-we-did-it” book we read . . . am I copying the right thing?

I’m not condemning all the seminars and books on methodology.  We can, if we are discerning and aware of our own context, learn from what others are doing in theirs.  We should certainly think carefully about that if we are inclined to use methodology as a short-cut, a cut and paste approach to doing church, a photocopied church program from another place, another culture, another context.  Learn from others, but recognize their context, and implement prayerfully in recognition of your own context.

But the greater focus, the one so often missing today, is the one Jethani points to at one point in his book, The Divine Commodity, an engagement with the pervasive consumerist distortion of Christianity.  “Rather than reproducing a leader’s ministry methodology, we ought to focus on reproducing his or her devotion to God.” (p98)

Why don’t we give more attention to that?  Why do we look at “successful” church leaders and copy their method, but not yearn to reproduce their spiritual devotion?  If they don’t have that, then what is the method really worth?  If they do have that, what is it about us that fails to be stirred by it?  Look around for a great Christian leader, one with a deep devotion to God.  Don’t cut and paste.  You can’t fake that, although you may be tempted to try.  Don’t fake.  Don’t ignore.  Don’t methodologize.  In the right sense: Copy.

Ten Commandments for Clarity

/ Peter Mead / 5 Comments

Some preachers focus their attention on the world of the Bible.  Others focus their attention on the world of the listener.  These are the two worlds of a preacher, right?  Faithfulness to the text: biblical accuracy.  Connection with the listener: contemporary relevance.  Both matter, but don’t forget the one who is linking the two worlds together so that the Bible speaks powerfully to the listeners – the preacher.  As well as being biblical and relevant, make sure you are clear.

Where does clarity come from?  Here are ten quick hints or reminders for us to consider as we prepare our next message.

1. Clarity comes from preaching the one big idea of the text, not several ideas. Preach one idea and preach it well.  Don’t preach multiple ideas and confuse everybody.

2. Clarity comes from well-structured thought. Well-structured does not mean infinitely complex, but rather a clear, simple, logical progression of thought that remembers itself.  If they know that you know where you are going, there’s more chance listeners will travel with you.

3. Clarity comes from expulsion of unnecessary content. Every message needs some time in the cutting room.  Remove anything that is extraneous or unnecessary for the goal of communicating the main idea effectively and clearly.  Good content will be omitted!

4. Clarity comes from choosing words that communicate. Your goal is not to impress with your erudite, sophisticated and learned vocabulary.  Your goal is to communicate.

5. Clarity comes from repeating and raining down words to unify the message. Give listeners the repetition and consistent wording that provides unity to the ear.

6. Clarity comes from restatement of important sentences. When you have a key sentence, restate it so they have another chance to get it.  For those important statements in a message, run it by them again in different words so they don’t miss it.

7. Clarity comes from carefully planned and executed transitions. As has been said before (Mathewson?) – we tend to lose people in the turns, so drive slowly.  Make transitions obvious and clear, pause, re-engage, get people with you before you move on.

8. Clarity comes from effective use of variation in delivery. Vary the vocal elements of delivery – the pace at which you speak, the pitch at which you speak, the punch with which you speak.  Practice adding emphasis through various vocal means.

9. Clarity comes from effective use of physical movement. I didn’t mention variation in non-verbals, although that is important (don’t distract with monotonous or bizarre gestures).  But especially consider using your movement to clarify the content or progression of the message.

10. Clarity comes from effective engagement with the listener (energy, enthusiasm, etc.) All the best “technique” won’t communicate clearly if listeners are bored or disinterested.  An often overlooked key to clarity is simply to make sure listeners are engaged and with you as you speak!

More Thoughts on Homiletical History

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

Following my post yesterday, I’d like to share some thoughts from Austin Tucker (Liberty Seminary).  It is his conviction that homiletical history is ignored, in part, because homiletics professors are appointed by seminaries based on skewed criteria.  According to Tucker, seminaries will choose somebody based on the model of dynamic delivery they provide, secondarily based on academic criteria and only then any sense of homiletical training or background.  Personally I suspect that any “skewing” also relates to budgets: after all, many Bible schools are limited once the main positions are in place – New Testament, Old Testament, Languages, Theology, History, etc. – so surely someone can just “cover” homiletics, or perhaps a local pastor can teach his personal approach?  Either way, homiletics background is often lacking in formal training.

So what does Tucker suggest?  He mentions a friend who picks a preacher each year to read a biography and read available sermons.  The benefits are four-fold:

1. It adds homiletical variety to our preaching, keeping us from becoming Brother Obvious.

2. It allows us who preach to others to sit at the feet of those who can preach to us for our spiritual enrichment.

3. It provides a golden vein of possibilities to enrich our own preaching. He quotes Grady Davis’ caution regarding the hijacking of illustrations from others.  Such illustrations are like “‘brightly colored kites pulled from the wind of somebody else’s thought’ and entangled in the branches of our sermons.”

4. Diligence in this pursuit restores the perspective that preaching really is a pastor’s priority in the midst of the numerous demands.

Please don’t read this post as being advice from me.  I can’t speak with authority on this since I have not diligently studied preachers of yesteryear.  But perhaps I’m convincing myself by these posts!

At Least A Minor Study in History?

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As those who preach, we have a whole raft of subject areas worthy of our study.  Central, in my estimation, is the ongoing engaged and dynamic personal study of Scripture.  We also must be studying the people to whom they preach, what they struggle with, their life experiences, how they think, etc.  Then there are numerous other areas of study, some of which might motivate you to buy books and read, others of which might only serve to cure insomnia.  But what about the subject of the history of preaching?

I know some reading this are avid readers of biography, church history and even preaching history.  I am also sure that some are definitely not.  Here’s a brief quote on the subject from David Larsen, writing in the Journal of the Evangelical Homiletics Society:

The history of preaching can encourage our hearts (as in the providential appearance of significant Biblical preaching in the most unlikely places and at the most unexpected times) as well as warn us about the perils and pitfalls which surround the practitioner of the craft at all times. Our times call for the wise and judicious balance which attention to history provides.

So for those less inclined to the history of preaching, where to start?  There are several (often multi-volume) series of books that address the subject directly.  Yet in many cases they, like most historical writing, tend to focus in one area, but remain blind to another.  Perhaps the best place to start is with biography of a preacher you find intriguing or encouraging – a Spurgeon, Sibbes, Luther or Edwards.  Perhaps it would be worth getting David Larsen’s A Company of Preachers and starting there.

One thing seems clear though, to ignore the past would be naive and might condemn us to repeating errors unnecessarily, or perhaps to leave our hearts weakened by missing the blessing offered by some of these great preachers.

(Here is an accessible starting point – take a look at this introductory article to Richard Sibbes that was just posted over on theologynetwork.org – click here)

Preaching As Invitation

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In our zeal to do our best, sometimes we might over deliver in a sermon.  For example, we might over deliver on the content of the passage so that listeners get the sense that they have no exhausted that passage and so have no need to return to it.  We might over deliver on the application of the passage so that listeners get the sense that the work of the passage has been done and they have no need to ponder further how they might live in light of it.  We might over deliver on the “experience” of the passage so that listeners get the sense taht heir encounter with God in that passage is now done and they have no real invitation for further engagement with Him.

Let’s be sure to prepare and preach a passage to the best of our ability.  The process may be exhausting at times, as well as a delightful privilege.  However, the sermon must not exhaust the listener’s sense of invitation.  Let’s present the passage in such a way that we invite people into the passage and the Scriptures more.  Let’s present the message in such a way that we invite people into the delight of relationship with Christ more.

One example.  This Sunday I am preaching the Mary and Martha incident in Luke 10.  What a tragedy it would be if I thoroughly satisfied listeners with the key distinction of the priority of relationship with Christ and service for Christ.  If people left that sermon happy that they had seen the difference and know what the passage is saying, but do not feel the implicit invitation to join Mary at Jesus’ feet and enjoy that relationship for themselves . . . if that happens, then I may have over-preached.

Preaching is an invitation into the text, more than that, an invitation into the delighted relationship offered to us as God offers His heart in the Word by His Spirit.

The Feelings of the Preacher

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Allow me to quote from Arturo Azurdia’s Spirit Empowered Preaching (p126):

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In a manner of speaking, [the preacher] can say, a la Eric Liddel, “When I preach I feel His pleasure.”  However, it is also importrant to acknowledge that there are occasions when, to the preacher, the presence and power of the Spirit of God seem absent in any sensible way.  Distraction rules his mind.  Words come slugglishly.  Passion seems forced.  It is not uncommon for the gospel preacher to feel as though he has failed miserably in his attempt to deliver the word of God. On not a few Sunday afternoons I have been filled with such deep personal disappointment I have declared to my wife that I will never preach again.  One seasoned preacher has said aptly:

The pulpit calls those anointed to it as the sea calls its sailors, and like the sea it batters and bruises and does not rest.  To preach, to really preach, is to die naked a little at a time, and to know each time you do it that you must do it again.

To be sure, there will be Sundays when the man of God will have no sense of the operation of the Holy Spirit in his preaching.  Nevertheless, he must learn that any lack of the Spirt’s ‘felt presence’ on his part is not the infallible barometer of divine work among the congregation.

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How true this is.  We must learn not to measure the work of the Spirit by the feelings we have after going through the experience of preaching.  Nevertheless, let’s not swing to the other extreme and neglect all awareness of feelings.  It is easy to become mechanical in an attempt to avoid being driven by emotionalism.  Surely the God who made us as heart-driven creatures in His own image longs for us to know the fullness of every life experience, including preaching, with feelings engaged rather than disengaged.  Don’t trust the feelings in judging the work of the Spirit through your preaching.  Equally don’t neglect the feelings, part of which are designed to function in our personal engagement with a loving God who pours out His love into our hearts by the Spirit whom He has given to us.

Some preachers are too easily swayed by battered and confused feelings.  Others act like robots, dutifully resisting all things affectionate.  Let’s be truly engaged with God at the heart level, pouring out our ministry as a fragrant offering to Him, experiencing the rollercoaster times and the calm times, loving God with all our hearts, and mind, and bodies, and loving others fully too.


Private Prayer

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I would never claim to be an expert in prayer.  I wish I was.  In fact, I repeatedly feel the urge to become one.  However, personal inadequacies in prayer do not mean that I dismiss it as unimportant in ministry.  I really appreciate this brief quote from Calvin Miller:

Preaching, in one sense, merely discharges the firearm that God has loaded in the silent place.

Yesterday I wrote about the concept of seeking prayer support and prayer cover for the ministry that we are involved in.  As vital as that is, it can never be a substitute for personal, private prayer.  I am a little sad at the changing of the season, because this summer I have grown to love an outdoor location nearby where I can go and pray, and dream, and think, and pray some more.  Perhaps it will still work without leaves and with rain, we’ll see.

It is important to find a way, a place, a time, for regular uninterrupted communing with the Lord.  A time to dream together about the future, to think together about the present, to weep together, to worship together, to be together with Him.  I remember the comment of one faculty member at the seminary I attended concerning another – he is a real man of prayer.  I’m not sure how that could be known, but actually it does show, doesn’t it?

In three or four decades time I hope people might say that about me . . . but for that to happen I need to be a man of prayer now.  What can we give up to free up time for prayer?  What else has the same sense of weightiness as fellowship with our Lord? Personal, private prayer.  Nothing else comes close.

Covered in Prayer?

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“It is no marvel that the pulpit is so powerless and ministers so often disheartened when there are so few who hold up their hands …. O, you blood bought churches, your ministers need your prayers!” (Gardiner Spring)

Is there any inconsistency between what we say and what we practice in regard to prayer and preaching?  If we, as preachers, genuinely believe that our preaching is dependent for its power not on technique, ability, skill, etc., but rather on the power of God Himself.  If we, as preachers, are aware of the spiritual battle that rages among believers and not-yet-believers during the weekly routine of church life.  If we, as preachers, are aware of our own struggles and weaknesses in the complex experience of life and ministry.  Well . . . shouldn’t the pursuit of prayer for the ministry be paramount in our many lists of priorities?

Do we diligently seek out prayer partners and ask them to stand with us?  Not because we are somehow special individuals, but because the ministry we are involved in is itself a special task for which we are inadequate?  Do we express to our listeners our need for prayer, or do we give the impression, even inadvertently, that we have it all together?

And finally, what about intercessory prayer meetings before and during and after the preaching of the Word?  In some circles this is standard practice.  In others it is unheard of.  Why?  If it is a spiritual battle, if it is by God’s strength alone, if it is a task too great for us to handle in our strength, then why not?  As I look back on last Sunday’s ministry, perhaps my greatest regret is that I didn’t request a simultaneous prayer gathering – even just two or three people praying for those listening, for the one speaking, for God’s power in it all.

(And just to be consistent with what I have written, here’s a link to our last couple of mini-updates . . . if you can spare a couple of minutes, I’d really value your prayers – http://pouredout.org/?page_id=580 – let me know if you’d like to receive our prayer letter regularly.)

Are We Rushing Headlong?

/ Peter Mead / 4 Comments

I can’t get away from the fact that Mondays are strange days for people who preach.  Whether you earn your living through preaching/pastoral ministry, or whether you earn your living in another line of work, Mondays are strange.

It’s not that Mondays are particularly unique in themselves, it’s just that they come after Sundays.  Profound, I know.  After all the giving out on a Sunday, Monday comes with its strange mix of physical weariness, emotional vulnerability, spiritual mixed-feelings, and yet also a sense of subdued excitement about the week ahead, the opportunities to come, the adventure of knowing Christ and serving Him continues.  I’m very excited for this week and all that it holds, but tired too, probably not super productive in some respects today.

Whatever your approach to Mondays, it’s good to be aware of all that is going on.  Some people just rest, others do mindless admin tasks, others jump into new and exciting projects, others have no choice but to lift themselves for work.  Whatever your approach, recognize the complexity of the person God made you to be.  Recognize the physical needs for rest, relaxation, exercise.  Recognize the emotional needs for refreshment, fellowship, alone-time, laughter, or whatever else.  Recognize the spiritual needs for time with the Lord, alertness to temptation, renewed vision.  Recognize the mental needs for down-time, for reading, for something different, something stimulating.  Recognize the complexity of you, and prayerfully handle today well.

A Monday well-handled seems to make for a productive and energized week.  Somehow it’s not possible to rush headlong from a busy Sunday into Tuesday – we need a Monday first!

Time To Process?

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I have been enjoying listening to Howard Hendricks lately.  I’d like to intersperse some of his comments with my own.  It’s almost like an interview, except that I’ve never met him and it doesn’t quite work as a pseudo-interview.  Nevertheless, his words are in “quotes.”

“My great concern for my students is that they don’t have enough time to process what they’re getting at seminary . . . the firehose.”

This is a good point, for any seminary students reading this site, be sure to carve out some half-days or full-days during the year to reflect, to journal, to process, to pray, to think.  I’m not saying all of this can be done on a few days spread out through the year, but I am saying it cannot be done simply through daily devotions and journaling when the pressure is on, when the hose is blasting!

But what about the preacher?  Do we have preachers preaching when the well is dry?  What would Prof.Hendricks like to do for preachers and pastors?

“After every seven years, I would invest to have you come back to seminary for one year.  We’ll pay all the costs, transportation, food, etc.  You don’t have to pass anything, you just have to process.  I think we could transform the ministry!”

I tend to agree, although I haven’t found the seminary offering this form of sabbatical program yet.

“Because we’re not doing it, and that’s why we’re suffering.  We’re dumbing down the gospel, we’re dumbing down the Word of God.  Every year the basic knowledge drops.  Our churches are not teaching Bible.”

That’s a bit of a generalization, how do you support that?

“Their product is demonstrating that they’re not teaching the Bible.  Because people need time to process what’s going on, and what are you planning to do about it.”

Ok, good point.  This means we have gone from seminary students, to pastors, to people in the pew.   Are they getting time to process what they receive?  Is there space to process during the service?  Is there space to process during the church week?  Do we jump from one message to another, from one passage in preaching to another in home groups?  Where’s the time to process?

Perhaps we should consider the processing space in our own lives, and in the lives of others in the church.