On Preaching

Transcript (edited for readability).

Often, in various places, you talk about the use of words — of course, very notably, because we're dealing with the Word — the distinction between, as pastors, contemplating the Word. Perhaps walk us through a little bit of how you developed that, your own contemplation as you've been doing with the Psalms or others, but then also the oration of the word itself, and how speaking that word and preparing to speak the word, as a pastor.

Well, you learn as you go. After five years or so, I think I had pretty much my system. I spent the early part of the week — I usually used the lectionary. Sometimes I'd take a book of the Bible and go through it. But I usually used the lectionary, and my company of pastors — that's what we did on Tuesdays. We started with preparing to preach. But we often, you know, got sidetracked; somebody had a death or a divorce or something. But then I found — so I was really meditating on the Scripture from Monday through Wednesday, thinking about it, reading commentaries.

And then Thursday, I wrote. I pretty much kept Thursday just to write, Miss Herman. And I always wrote it out, word for word. And then I put it away and never looked at it again, because I wanted some eye contact with these people. And so, because I'd prepared pretty well, I wasn't doing it word for word, but I had written it, and it was all there, in an orderly way, a balanced way.

And then Saturdays — well, when I could arrange things, that's when I did my hospital work. And I had five hospitals in Baltimore then. So it was a long day. And then Saturday was kind of mowing the lawn day, taking out the garbage. But then I'd go to the church early Sunday morning and have a couple hours there by myself. And I would just think through the congregation, walk up and down the pews, and imagine the people that are going to be there. And when I got into the pulpit, I was free. I was free from the manuscript, which was important for me. But also free of silliness, or faddishness, or jokesterisms, or things like that. I just rarely felt unprepared. It helps.

If — I was going to say, if you love to preach. I'm not sure that's the right word. Yeah, maybe it is. If you don't confuse loving to preach with loving adulation. And that's — you can notice that. You're sensitive. I used to, every time I came home from church, when I was younger, I'd say, "Well, Jan, how'd it go?" And she'd say, "It was really good." And then at one point, I thought, "Why do I do that?" And so I determined I wouldn't do that anymore. It lasted one week. "I know I shouldn't do it, Jan, but how'd I do?"

Eugene, you were talking about preaching. Could you speak a little bit more about the role of preaching — why the pastor stands in the pulpit to preach?

Herman Melville, the story at the beginning of Moby Dick. The world's a ship on its journey out, and the pulpit is its prow. I love that.

I think preaching is an ideal way, actually, to train a congregation in paying attention to the Word of God. And if we're true to the Scriptures, there's an educational aspect to it, but it's more than educational. It's a community. I mean, we're a community of Christians worshiping together, and this is what we're hearing. And so the sermon defines something worth paying attention to collectively, not just individually. So the collective nature of the congregation is a very important part of preaching.

So I found preaching as a way of, I guess, installing an incarnational imagination in my congregation. A sermon is sacramental. It deals with the stuff of everyday life in the context of Scripture, which makes it incarnational. So the sacramental aspect to preaching is kind of kin to Eucharist and baptism. We're dealing with the stuff of our lives, which is language, as well as with the body of Jesus Christ and this whole baptismal thing.

My son, my pastor son, has been fascinated with baptism as a sacrament, and he's really shaped his whole pastoral ministry around baptism. And obviously, that's not — he didn't talk about it, but it's there for him. And it's very effective.

Hans Boersma — I don't know if I say his name right. Boersma, Boersma. Any of you Dutch Calvinists able to say that? Yeah. I just wrote an introduction to a book he wrote, a preface. And it was about preaching the Old Testament. And there are people who are very convinced that you can't put Jesus into the Old Testament. And he says, "Well, that's strange, isn't it? Some of us find him there." Yeah. And this manuscript is a magnificent piece of art. But, you know, Eric does that with baptism. He finds baptism in a lot of different places.

That's where I think pastors really need to take preaching seriously, because this is one of the major ways we have of developing an imagination which includes the congregation and the Scriptures and the whole context of worship. And it provides a way in which we can avoid entertainment. Entertainment sermons are just death, I think. It just cheapens the whole life of the church.

So, Eugene, you wrote that this is what preachers are for: to bring us into focus in the story. Right?

Did I write that? Yeah. Okay. That's all right.

I'd love for you to reflect on this idea — you talk about the Scripture story, and then the preaching act, this telling of the story, and bringing into focus people's life. So this was at the conclusion of your talking about Nathan confronting David, right, with his sin. And so he tells this story, this indirect story, about this other thing, to — it's distant from him, but it's to draw him in, and then —

Yeah, subversive, right? Your other word for it, right?

And so how do we do that in preaching? How do we bring people in, bring it to focus — the story, themselves, and the story?

Well, I think you do it by hints and guesses. You suggest things, but let people have to discover it themselves. You know, if you over-explain something, you kind of take all the meat out of it. And so I think good storytellers, they let you put all the pieces together.

I'm curious if you could follow up on that. What are the ingredients in a good story, as we, as preachers, approach and listen to the text, first of all, and then tell this eternal story in a way that evokes something within the hearers? I think that's difficult in a time in which there's kind of an immediacy that people have in our time, that somebody else always does all the work. They don't have to engage it. What are some of the ingredients that could help us along that way?

I think you avoid saying things too much. I had a young man in my congregation who went to a Billy Graham meeting and got saved. And he came back, and he was full of it — he was about 18, 19 years old. And then he started criticizing my sermons. His main problem with me was, I didn't tell people what to do. So, in order to satisfy him, about every third or fourth Sunday, I would have three things to do, and he would leave and say, "Oh, Pastor, that was such a good sermon." "Thank you, John." You know, I think if we have Johns in our congregation, we give them something that they recognize, but you can wean them away from it, too. And I weaned him away from it.