First-Person Preaching

I just received a really encouraging email from Steve. Steve has attended a couple of my preaching seminars and also helped to set one up in his own church. We had talked about the possibility of preaching in first-person, and he followed through on the idea. Here are the highlights of the email with some added comments from me:

“Whereas I’ve heard another preacher do this with a slight tongue in cheek approach, I did the whole thing totally straight, trying to maintain the idea that I was Abraham telling my story to my grandchildren.” – that’s an important point, it’s so easy to slip into an ongoing humour that distances us from our character in order to connect with our listeners. This may be appropriate in some settings, but I say if you’re going to go for it, go for it. Now, was it easy?

“It was really tough going as I had no notes whatsoever and when you realise you’ve missed something it is so hard to think around whether you should go back and make that point you forgot or carry on, whilst still keeping totally in character.” Most people agree that Abraham would not use notes to give his message (I would suggest the same principle might apply as you give “your” message next time too, but that would be taking us off the point of this post). Preaching without notes in any form provides that kind of challenge. It does get easier, but never easy. Here comes the exception clause:

“I think many were impressed with the fact I listed out Abraham’s genealogy from Abraham back to Noah. That was just a memory trick though and very early on in the sermon.” Generally we should avoid anything that smacks of showing off in our preaching. It can be easy to do after spending hours with our nose in the books, but we are there to serve and communicate, not to show off. However, Steve has made a comment here that I view as an exception to the rule – in this case such information would obviously be known by Abraham himself. People may be impressed, but if used judiciously, this type of communication can serve to underline that this is a serious sermon. But this should be carefully weighed so it is not the big talking point or lasting effect of the message:

“It was so good though as I was taking the story of Abraham sacrificing Isaac and so many people came up afterwards and said that the story had come alive for them like never before and made them think what it really felt like for them both. You could really see people on the edge of their seats.” That’s the power of well-told narrative!

So, last words to a first time first-person preacher: “It was definitely worth doing though even if it was a real challenge.”

One more post in this series. Again, I affirm first-person preaching as a powerful tool in the preacher’s repertoire, but I don’t affirm poor first-person preaching! Hence this list of dangers to be aware of when venturing into this realm of preaching.

Danger 6 – Excessive humor or frivolity. First-person preaching provides many more opportunities than regular preaching for humorous and even frivolous comments. Sometimes humor is helpful. Sometimes humor can help to cover a potentially distracting moment. Sometimes it can provide relief from tension. Sometimes it helps, but only if it is sometimes. I don’t see any court jesters in the Bible, so there’s no need to preach like one. First-person preaching inherently carries the risk of being seen as more entertainment than preaching. Don’t exacerbate that through excessive humor or frivolity.

Danger 7 – Inadequate or strained relevance. This form has inherent strengths in terms of being engaging and disarming. It also has the inherent weakness of struggling to be relevant. If the audience are invited to listen “back then,” applications can only be timelessly conceptual, i.e. vague. If the character has traveled through time then they have to portray a convincing understanding of contemporary culture and issues if they are to make any attempt at relevance. While it is certainly possible to preach the entire sermon in character, it is also possible to step out of character for specific and concrete application. Whenever you preach in first-person, pay careful attention to the need for relevant application.

Danger 8 – Not being appropriate to your audience. This covers a lot of what has been stated already. But I would go further. Analyze the congregation to decide how much first-person preaching they will truly value. Some congregations love it and beg for more. Others can gain a lot from it once in a while. Some are so rigid they cannot hear the message because the form is a potentially offensive distraction. As always in good preaching, we have to know not only the text, but also the listeners.

Please preach first-person when it is the best strategy available, but please always do it with as much excellence as you can muster!