Listen up preacher geeks. I’ve got a book recommendation for you.
Check out Chris Erdman’s Countdown to Sunday
I usually read about one book on preaching a year and this is my book for 2007.
It’s really a collection of essays on preaching that are loosely related. There is some practical text to sermon stuff and there’s some provocative theological stuff like “Preaching as an Alternative to Violence” and “Preaching and War” and “Preaching at a Time of National (or Any) Election.”
The preachers who will find this book the most helpful are those who take themselves too seriously (and you know who you are). I know who you are too because I am one of you.
It is easy for a preacher to make his or her preaching into an idol. We worry too much about what people will think of us. We pay too much attention to picking just the right words believing it is our word choice that saves. We carry with us to the stage or pulpit the belief that the future of the church depends on our being “good.” We make our sermons out to be more important than the gospel itself. In doing so, we become slaves to preaching the “perfect” sermon. (Which by the way, I once did. It wasn’t much fun and no one seemed to notice.) As you well know, there is no joy in slavery.
Can I get an amen?
Erdman’s advice to preachers like us is to stop taking ourselves so seriously so that the gospel can be taken more seriously.
Here are a couple of quotes:
The best way to be a really good preacher is by not trying to be good at all. If you’re trying to be good, you must put being good out of your mind. Trying to be good has at best produced some silly caricatures of preaching. At worst, trying to be good is an alluring Siren that has caused many a preacher to crash on the rocks of ambition. You are not sent by the Lord Jesus to be good. That said, I’ve no doubt that you can be good so long as being good is not your aim.
I no longer think gestures ought to be practiced and I don’t think the sermon ought to be rehearsed. . . in advance. I’ve also preached too many sermons and listened to too many sermons that have been practiced, and frankly, they sounded practiced–there was no real room for those departures that bring life to the preaching moment. But even more than all this, I think a sermon ought not to be practiced in advance because doing so betrays what preaching is all about. Doing so keeps us preachers and our congregations stuck in the fallacy that preaching is about the preacher’s performance. It’s not. Preaching, ultimately, is about the performance, the practice, of the congregation . . .
Telling Stories, Asking Questions, Learning Lessons
Thanks for the insight. Great quotes.
Amen ! We can never forget to get out of the way and to give all, I mean ALL , the glory to God. Prepare diligently and preach with a fervent conviction so that our heavenly Father is given praise ahd He is the one who is praised.
I once heard “You can’t convince people that you are great and God is great at the same time. You have to pick.”
I appreciate you sharing this with us. Good thoughts. Kyle, I like your quote, too.
Here’s an interesting thought:
When a preacher exalts God, telling few if any antecdotal stories or personal illustrations, it is often said that, as a preacher, he is stuffy…impersonal…unauthentic, maybe even arrrogant.
Yet when a preacher tells many antecdotes, personal illustrations, and stories about how his clever principals have worked out in his life he is called genuine and real. In fact he will probably be called humble, because oftentimes his illustrations are self deprecating.
However, who is exalted when sermons are built around personal illustrations? That’s right: at the very least the preacher is. So the very thing percieved as being humble is actually self serving. Yet the stuffy, arrogant preacher is just doing his best to exalt Christ, and not get in the way.
Safe to say we all get in the way, and it’s a wonder any of us is effective. But the reality is every revival in church history has been connected to the vocal proclamation of the gospel (ie. preaching). So, it’s importance can’t be overstated, but our importance could not be more understated.
It is a definite good one, Wade.
The day one opens his heart and preaches what’s inside is a happy day both for preacher and congregation.
Peace.
Doesn’t this apply to everybody? I am not a preacher, but when I try to do something good, and being good is my main goal, I focus way too much on the what ifs. Such as, what if I fail by doing this, and what if anybody likes this. In art, you just have to go after it. You cant be thinking the entire time to please anybody. Art is for the artist, not the audience. If it touches a soul, great! But if you make art in the pursuit of being good enough to touch souls… well… it is just frustrating and the work is forced.
I once found preaching preparation to involve text research, application, and illustration. Each remains significant in sermon communication. Yet, for the longest time I did not realize a more important factor….hearing from God. When He becomes the voice and we partner with Him, weird mystery of His involvement begins to show up.
The closer I get to God and His Word, the littler I become….and the bigger He and His kingdom get.
More and more I think of preaching as I do what actors go through on Broadway (there are holes in the analogy…that’s why it is an analogy).
I’ve done the exegesis (which many think to be unnecessary). I’ve listened to the local church. I’ve reflected on my life. I’ve tried to experience the mystical presence of Christ in every text. I’ve asked what the implications of this text are for those on the margins. I’ve listened back to the testimony of history and remember that God is a God of action and not philosophical inquiry.
I craft a message. I eat and digest the message.
Then, I leave the script on the pew, trusting that God will take what I’ve written and do something “gospel” with it. I trust that the Holy Spirit will delete the sections that are more about my pride, propensity to use big religious words, etc. I trust that the Spirit will bring the faces and situations to which I bear witness to the forefront of the mind of every child of God, both young and seasoned.
And, hope of hopes, I pray that people leave believing that God is alive and working in the world.
Thank you for the book recommendation, I got the book about leaderless organizations, the starfish one. Thank you.
I really liked this year, “Communicating for a change” by Andy Stanley.
http://www.matthewsblog.waynesborochurchofchrist.org
I get the overall sentiment about letting God shine through in our preaching and agree. I have tried to rely more on inpsiration than preparation and have become a better preacher because of it. I do think, though, that preparation, study, research, etc., and even rehearsal are events through which God can actively be involved and can ultimately affect the message for the better. All the prep one does for a sermon does not necessarily mean that God is being shut out. God can be directly involved in it, if we let Him. He can guide us to texts, illustrative stories, personal experiences, all to help convey a spiritual truth to the folks we’re preaching to.
Rehearsal is important to me simply because I feel more relaxed when I’m preaching, and in my experience, the more relaxed I am while I am speaking, the more I am able to let the Holy Spirit work through me in the delivery. I heard Buddy Bell make that connection once and it’s true. The more worried and stressed I am over a sermon, the more I tend to shut out the leading of God’s spirit. The more relaxed I am, and some of that is from practicing, the more the Spirit can flow through me and positively affect the message.
I do believe delivery is important. I know the power is in the Word, and the Word is what is living and active and sharp and piercing, but poor delivery can distract people from the message and therefore be detrimental to it. So maybe good prep and practice might not improve the message, but it preserves it and prevents it from being weakened by a bad presentation.
Since the Holy Spirit is one of the divine authors of scripture and since the word is the sword of the Spirit , it is imperative that all who preach and teach should work hard at study and preparation. The study and preparation means more time alone with the Spirit. Even practice includes some precious and important time .