Here’s a word that you may not like very much: “sermon”. We’ve grown pretty negative about this form of communication in the last few decades. It’s common to hear people say things like, “I don’t like to go to church to be told what to do or think,” or, more directly, “Don’t preach at me!”
Some churches, in response to these negative associations have begun to move away from sermons, perhaps even abandoning them altogether. One colleague that I worked with some years ago even went so far as to say that “sermons don’t change people.”
But, I’m not ready to give up on preaching just yet. I still believe in preaching. It was the primary way that Jesus communicated, and the disciples after him. The founders of the denomination I belong to, John and Charles Wesley, changed their nation, at least in part, through their preaching. I’ve seen people changed by a well-spoken word in a well-crafted sermon. But, I also believe in preaching because it still continues to impact people outside of the church in amazing and transforming ways. Some may call it “motivational speaking” or “training” or “coaching”, but every year thousands of people pay good money to listen to some communicator “preach” a message that they believe will change their lives. Let no one tell you that preaching is dead!
So, why are we so unsure of the sermon in the place where it most belongs – the Church? Perhaps it’s because we’ve made faith such an individualist endeavour that we are no longer open to hearing or receiving the wisdom of others. When it comes to spirituality, we want no voice other than our own. Or perhaps it’s because we have become so insecure in this ministry that we have lost the art, and our sermons have become shallow, boring and irrelevant. Whatever the reason, I want to make the outrageous suggestion that we recover the art of preaching – both as listeners and as preachers.
Preaching – and listening attentively to the sermon - is a profound spiritual discipline that challenges us at the place where our pride and stubbornness are most active. We don’t want to be challenged, confronted or instructed. We want to be autonomous, self-directed and self-absorbed. But, we will never be whole human beings if we allow our self-centredness and independence to control our lives. We need to have our blind spots revealed. We need to have our brokenness confronted and we need to be called to repentance if we are to discover the abundant life that Jesus promised. Good, prophetic preaching does all this and more – just read the story of Nathan confronting David’s adultery (2 Samuel 12:1-9).
So, for the sake of our own health and growth, we need to cultivate the practice of listening to sermons. It is healthy and transformational for us to learn to listen to voices other than our own, and to embrace the challenge that this brings. We need to allow someone else to set the agenda for the conversation from time to time, and we need to learn to value words that we may not want to hear. But, perhaps more than anything else, we need to develop the ability to listen well, to embrace silence and reflection and to discover the voice of God speaking through the voice of another.
But, we all also need to learn the art of preaching – for we are all preachers, whether it’s to our children, to our friends as we witness to Christ, or to a congregation as we stand in a pulpit. And preaching, like being preached to, begins with the discipline of listening – to God, to the Scriptures, to the people who are being addressed, to the community, to history and to the world. This is what makes our message relevant and compelling. When this is followed up with hard work and practice in the art of good communication – in the structuring of content, the telling of stories and the choice of engaging words – a sermon (formal or informal) can be a force for change and inspiration like no other.
So, why don’t we recover this art? Imagine if we began to see preaching, again, as a shared discipline in which preacher and listener are engaged in a transforming narrative, a creative conversation. Just think what might happen if we started to open ourselves to the preaching moment as a time of participation, not passivity. And how might the world be touched if we truly started to practice – in every moment and interaction – what we have so mindfully preached.
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John van de Laar is a Methodist minister, liturgical consultant and the author of the book Food for the Road – Life Lesson from the Lord’s Table. He holds a Master’s Degree in theology from UNISA, and is the founder of Sacredise.com, an international worship training and resourcing ministry. John is married to Debbie, and they have two sons.
Visit www.sacredise.com for more articles by John, as well as resources for personal and public worship – music, prayers, liturgies, images and drama scripts.