Preaching

The Wrong Kind of Uncomfortable

/ Peter Mead / Leave a comment

You’ve probably heard it said that good preaching comforts the disturbed and disturbs the comfortable (or something similar).  While this may be true, it is also possible to make listeners uncomfortable in the wrong way.  Here are a couple of examples:

1. Pushing naturally unresponsive people to verbally respond your way, rather than theirs. For example, I’ve been in congregations when the preacher has asked, “do I hear an amen?”  Upon hearing nothing more than a murmur, the question has then been repeated with greater zeal.  Eventually one person overcomes all personal angst and shouts an amen (essentially delivering all from the tension of the moment).  Some people reading this are wondering how any group could be so unresponsive.  Don’t condemn them without knowing them.  And don’t worry about it (unless you end up preaching to this kind of culture, denomination, age range, etc.)  A good preacher will be sensitive to those listening and not force them to behave in a way that may fit the preacher’s personality, but doesn’t fit theirs.  (Also, I’ve been in situations where the people may be willing to respond, but only the speaker knows what was just said that deserves a verbal response – don’t ask for response if you are not a clear communicator…they might feel dishonest if they give what you’re looking for!)

2. Showing emotion inconsistent with your words. In a similar vein, it can be very uncomfortable to listen to a preacher who does not match personal emotional expression to sermon content.  Don’t have a silly grin when talking about hell – even if you are uncomfortable for whatever reason.  Don’t be dead-pan if you are preaching on joy.  Don’t be slouching and uninterested when declaring the greatest news ever.  As I heard Piper say recenty in an interview – preachers need affectional breadth.  (In fact, I forget his exact words, but essentially he said that preachers who are restricted or limited in their affections – that is, breadth of heart response to God and people, rather than the ability to contrive emotional expression – such people should not be preaching.)

Preach in such a way that your emotional expression fits who you are and what you are saying.  Preach in such a way that your listeners can be themselves as listeners, rather than having to mimic you.

Any further thoughts related to this?

Collecting Classic Phrases Describing Preaching

/ Peter Mead / 2 Comments

I was just talking with my Dad about preaching the other night. He referred to my Grandfather. Each of the three generations have been preachers, but I never knew my Grandfather because he died three years before I was born.  Apparently, he would sometimes refer to preachers who are all over the place in their preaching by saying, “They go from Dan to Beersheba.” While that saying made me smile, I had to laugh when another phrase of his was recollected, “They romp around the hills of salvation.” That’s good! (Obviously it may not be original to him – doesn’t matter really.)

I tend to describe preaching that goes all over the canon as “going on a wild safari in the back seat of a concordance.” It seems that perhaps it’s in my genes to comment on that kind of preaching.

Anyway, I’m intrigued to know if you or someone you know has any pithy descriptions related to preaching? It doesn’t have to be related to jumping all over the canon, anything related to preaching…

Consider a Growth Prompt

/ Peter Mead / 2 Comments

Many preachers never receive any training in their preaching.  Sadly, for some, that is due to a lack of available resources.  For others, perhaps it is simply habit or an unawareness of their need.  By training I am referring to everything from taking a full degree, a complete preaching course, an introductory seminar, a workshop, to studying through a book on the subject, etc.

I was pondering the fact that there are many preachers who only learn to preach by observing others.  While this can be a great source of instruction, it is lacking in several key ways.  Learning by observing does not provide the learner with feedback, critique and help as they preach.  But there is another concern that I’d like to point out today:

Preachers who only learn by observing others preach are limited by the standard of preaching they observe.  If the pool of preachers is a relatively closed group (as in most churches or denominations), then this will typically result in progressively degenerating standards.

What can you do to prompt growth in your preaching and help avoid a mass degeneration of standards in your church circles?

What Are the Best Echoes?

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

Echoes of heaven.  When believers listen to a preacher, they don’t want to hear the echoing sound of plagiarized preaching.  However, echoes of heaven are a different matter.  It’s that sense that the preacher hasn’t just written a message packed with information and illustration, but has been before the throne of God above.  That sense that this message is an accurate explanation of the passage, but not a cold academic explanation of the passage.  That sense that the preacher knows the Book, and also the Author of the Book.  They want to also hear relevant application of the passage, but not a relevance born out of the worldliness of the preacher’s own life, but the incisive relevance of a “prophet” who speaks forth into this world, yet somehow is anchored in that world.

You can’t fake it.  I suppose we could try.  But faked heavenly echoes will surely clang just like when people drop famous names to try to impress us in conversation.  Genuine echoes of the glories of heaven’s throne room, of angel voices singing, of intimacy with God; these genuine echoes will not clang.  They will usually be faint, even subtle, but resonating with reality if, in fact, they are real.

For the best of echoes we must genuinely spend time in the presence of a God who invites us to boldly come.

Are There Good Echoes?

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Yesterday I echoed the terminology used in Fred Lybrand’s book as we considered whether it is possible to steal your own sermon.  If it is, then there would be a hollow echo in our preaching.  Today I want to ask whether there might be a good echo in our preaching?  I think there is.

It is the good echo of a genuinely influenced life.  It’s not the stealing of a sermon, but the marking of a life that makes for a good echo of others.  Consider those who have taught you, mentored you, influenced you and marked you.  Surely in your preaching their influence will resonate for all to hear.

People do not have to recognize it in order to hear it. You don’t have to speak like them, sound like them, gesture like them.  Mimicry may be flattery for them, but it probably falls into the category of “hollow echo” for you!

Unless you point it out, others may not know how your enthusiasm for the Bible was caught from that Bible survey teacher, or how your passion for accuracy has resonated from the call of that other prof at seminary, or how your theology was forever shaped by encounters with another who remains a good friend, or how your longing to know God was inspired by the genuine example of one close to retirement as you had just begun.  (I could go on describing those who I hope echo in my ministry; Bruce, John, Ron, David respectively.)

Perhaps it would be worthwhile thinking prayerfully through those who have left an impression on you through the years.  What was it about them that made a difference to you?  Perhaps you will have reason to rejoice and express gratitude for good echoes still resonating from your life and ministry.  Perhaps you will have reason to pray and ask God to make more clear in you what you heard so genuinely from them.  (Perhaps their vulnerability was so powerful, yet it is somehow limited in your ministry.  Their precision in wording so effective, yet of a level rarely reached in your preaching.)  What might be found lacking as you look back to others and listen for the echoes in your own ministry?

I think there can be good echoes in our preaching.  The difference is that these echoes don’t bounce around an empty space and come out as feeble hollow echoes.  Somehow these good echoes come from the very fiber of our being, from a life marked rather than a good thing mimicked.

Plagiarism and Echoes

/ Peter Mead / 2 Comments

At some point I will write a review of Preaching on Your Feet by Fred Lybrand.  I need to finish it first.  Today I’d just like to raise an interesting thought.  Is there a connection between plagiarism and the way most preachers preach?  To put it another way, is it possible to steal your own sermon?

Stealing sermons isn’t good.  Maybe you’ve tried it.  Maybe you’ve heard it.  (Maybe you do it every week – and sing private praise songs about the internet!)  No matter how good the original, no matter how well-crafted the wording, no matter how inspiring the passion, or amusing the anecdotes, somehow a stolen sermon can only be, as Phillips Brooks described it, a “feeble echo” of the original power.  It seems to bounce around in the second preacher’s head and come out as an echo.  It doesn’t resonate from every fiber of his being, it pings out with all the added noise and cavernous emptiness of  a poor recording from a low quality cassette player.

Lybrand raises the possibility that preachers of integrity (ie. not verbatim sermon stealers) might still preach with the same kind of echo.  It’s easy to preach on Sunday morning, referring to notes that prompt your thinking back to your preparation on Thursday.  It’s easy to be preaching trying to recall exactly how you had it before.  It’s not as hollow an echo as a sermon that has bounced through cyberspace (or even through history!) and landed in your memory.  But there is still a hollow-ness.  Still an echo.  Somehow we can fall into preaching the sermon of another preacher – that is, the sermon of you three or four days ago (and God has changed you since then).

I won’t offer Lybrand’s solution today.  I’ll just leave this as a point to ponder as we wrestle with how to really preach, how to really connect with real people at a real moment in time.

Make Two Key Times Count

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

I just saw a chart showing that there are two key times in any presentation.  I’ll describe the chart for you.  On the vertical axis, from 0 to 100%, is the scale of attention and retention.  On the horizontal axis, it reads “beginning … middle … end.”  The chart consists of a U-shaped curve.  Attention/retention are highest at the beginning and the end, but dip significantly in the middle.

This poses some concern for me as a preacher.  If this is true, then we need to consider whether we’ve packed the best meat in the middle of the sermon.  Surely we wouldn’t want to give a “meat sandwich” of a sermon if our listeners miss significant amounts of good meat, but take in all the white bread at the start and finish?  Perhaps we need to give more attention to the bread of the sandwich.  Too many sermons are fine steak in the middle of dry cheap white sliced bread.  We need to give more time to preparing our intros and conclusions (so the bread is a higher quality homebaked wholemeal something or other).

Ok, enough of the sandwich analogy, I’m starting to get distracted by my own hunger.  When we preach, let’s think carefully about how to maximize the value of our introduction – not just grabbing attention and building rapport, but also raising need for what is to follow and moving powerfully into the message in order to protect against an excessive dip in attention and focus.

Let’s think carefully about how to make the most of our conclusion – not just fizzling to a faded flop of a finish, but finishing strong, driving home the main idea, encouraging application of it and stopping with purpose.

If attention and retention are highest at the beginning and end of a message, let’s make these two key times count.

(If you want to see the chart and the suggestions given in that post, just click here.)

Prayer Beyond the Pressing

/ Peter Mead / Leave a comment

It should go without saying that a preacher should be a pray-er.  It doesn’t.  We are living in a day when much noise has drowned much prayer, not only for the typical churchgoer, but sadly for the typical church preacher.  If the preacher is employed by the church, the job description has grown exponentially in terms of what is expected (being dedicated to the Word and to prayer seems a long way off for many).  If the preacher is employed in “normal” work and preaches in spare time, it goes without saying that life is also very busy.

While I don’t want to paint a picture that is unfair in gross generalizations, it does seem that many are falling short in their prayer life.  Some may have lost prayer life altogether.  Many are possibly reduced to prayer for the pressing.  Do you find yourself squeezed into that pattern?  Prayer for next Sunday.  Prayer for current crises in the congregation.  Prayer for pressing matters of ministry and “church vision.”  The next project, the next event, the next weekend.

Perhaps it would be helpful to take a walk with God today.  Take time away from the desk, from the PC, from the phone, leave your mobile/cell, your PDA, or any other contemporary contraption (I’m tempted to say pager – just in case anyone still has one!)  Take some time and space, then pray.  Ask God to lift your eyes and your heart beyond the pressing concerns.  Certainly cast those cares on Him, but look beyond Sunday, beyond the current project.  Try to look longer term and pray accordingly.  Get a sense of where you are going.  That could mean praying in terms of five or ten years.  It could mean praying in terms of eternity.  Both are healthy.  This kind of prayer, combined with the dreaming of faith, lifts us from the pressing to have a heart stirred by this God who holds the future, this God who keeps His promises over the very long haul, this God who can wrap up history and move us into an eternity we don’t deserve despite the forces of hell being arrayed against Him.

Prayer beyond the pressing is important.  It’s important in our ministry.  It’s important in our personal walk with Christ.  It’s important.  Don’t let the pressing press away the delight of a longer-term gaze.  (Not that this is the most important thing, but I’m sure your preaching this Sunday will only be strengthened by a heart lifted to heaven, a bigger picture view of life and ministry, and a fresh reliance on our great God!)

Bible Study Is Not a Hop

/ Peter Mead / 2 Comments

I don’t want to oversimplify Bible study, but in most basic terms it involves two steps. The first step is to understand what the author meant by what he wrote back then.  The second step is to then consider the enduring application of that text for us today.  Back then . . . today.  Two steps.  One.  Two.

Bible study is not a hop.  We cannot simply try to understand what the text means for us today.  But this happens all the time.  Last night I was enjoying a Bible study in Isaiah 28-35.  We noticed how easily writers will try to explain the content of the passage in terms of “us.”  The problem with this “melded” approach to understanding a passage is that it flattens and simplifies everything.

You might say that actually simplified is good when it comes to complex books like Isaiah.  Indeed, but not when simplified comes at the cost of understanding what Isaiah was actually writing, and at the cost of enjoying the multi-layered, complex, intricate and beautiful plan of God.  When we look at the way God works out His promises we should be stirred to cry out, “Oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!”  There is a richness to the way God works through history.  That richness can be lost so quickly – in the time it takes to change two steps into a hop.

Wherever we are in the Bible, let’s be sure to wrestle with what the author meant back then, followed by the possible applications for us either by enduring theological truth or by extension (interpretation before application).  One … two.  Not a hop.