The gathered pilgrims benefit from having a competent, compassionate preacher as a tour guide who can lead them through the wonders of God’s Word.
My family and I recently took a long-planned vacation to England. On our last full day, we were to visit the venerable college town of Oxford, with a private tour guide leading us through the academic home of Tolkien, Lewis, and the Inklings, if only we could find our way there.
It turns out that road construction is also a British phenomenon, and the “Sat-Nav” in our rental car had not been alerted to the fact. Technology failed us as it sent us down one dead-end after another, my anxiety rising while our appointment time drew near. Once we finally found a parking spot, we still had to navigate sporadically marked Byzantine alleyways, which my GPS responded to with a digital shrug.
Frazzled, frustrated, and weary, we eventually arrived at the rendezvous point. Standing there patiently awaiting us with a grin from ear-to-ear was our tour guide, Jon, a cheerful Brit whose accent I could hardly restrain myself from imitating. I am pleased to report that, enthusiasm for future Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) overlords notwithstanding, our experience with a human companion could not have been a more delightful contrast to the futility of our technological aids, but I digress.
In my last article I talked about the analogy of preaching and pilgrimage. I actually did not have the forthcoming vacation in mind but am happy to embrace the serendipity. So, continuing the theme, I would like to share what Jon, the agreeable British tour guide for my own modest pilgrimage, showed me about preaching.
- Attend to Your Audience
The first thing Jon did was ask some questions about us, not in a perfunctory, “This is what I am supposed to do,” sort of way, but with genuine interest. He wanted to get to know his audience a bit and made it plain how such knowledge helped him in providing the tour. Interestingly, he asked flat-out whether we were Christians. When we said we were, he leaned in with a furtive glance from side-to-side: “Me, too, but there are not many of us around here anymore.”
This is instructive for preachers. I do not, of course, mean we should do an intake interview of all our parishioners on any given Sunday, much less quiz them whether they are Christians. I do mean we should take more seriously the background and present circumstances of our hearers in our preparations to preach. “Of the three elements in speech-making; speaker, subject, and person addressed,” writes Aristotle. “It is the last one, the hearer, which determines the speech’s end and object.”[1] The philosopher overstates the case, but not by much.
- Be Willing to Improvise
This attention to the hearers leads to a second takeaway from our experience with the tour guide: A willingness to improvise.
We were traveling with our four kids, the youngest of whom is six. My wife and I were all-in on everything Jon had to share. He could have shown us where Tolkien once reportedly blew his nose, and we would have been captivated. The kids... not so much. Reading his group, when attention lagged, he would adapt his message or keep things moving accordingly.
Preachers need to be able to do this. We cannot be so fixed to a script that, when the congregation is showing obvious signs of boredom or befuddlement, we are not able to adapt to their needs. Sometimes this means reiterating a point in other words or reaching for an analogy to elucidate it. Other times it means moving along with the message and/or cutting out a section entirely. Attention to your hearers (and sensitivity to the Holy Spirit) helps to know when such improvisation is necessary.
We cannot be so fixed to a script that, when the congregation is showing obvious signs of boredom or befuddlement, we are not able to adapt to their needs.
- Speak by Heart
The ability to improvise, however, presupposes you are not bound to your notes. As we made our way through Oxford with our capable guide, I could not help noticing that other groups were led by guides who were clearly not as well-versed in, or captivated with, their subject. One sounded like she was reading off a teleprompter. Another simply had a deck of notecards he was working his way through.
Contrast that with our guide, Jon, who spoke out of his deep love for and familiarity with Oxford and the Inklings. He clearly had mapped out where we would be going and the topics he would be touching on. Even so, his discourse was natural and conversational, and his affection for the subject was both palpable and contagious. He made us want to know more.
For pastors, the capacity to “preach by heart” (to internalize the core content of your sermon such that you can proclaim it without notes) is of inestimable value in proclaiming the Gospel. I have written about this at length and will not belabor the point here. Suffice it to say, when pastors preach by heart, they more ably connect the heart of God to the hearts of His people.
- End on a High Note
Our tour lasted nearly two hours. It would have been easy for Jon to start strong and slowly peter-out until we finally just folded. Instead, he peppered compelling stops throughout the tour, but saved two highlights for the end: The lion-clad, faun-framed doorway which supposedly inspired Lewis’s vision of Narnia, and the famous pub, The Eagle & Child (or “Bird & Baby”), which served as the weekly gathering place of the Inklings. By knowing where he was going, Jon was able to send us out on a high note.
So too in preaching. We want the sermon, to paraphrase poet T.S. Eliot, to go out with a bang rather than a whimper. Too often, though, it is as though preachers simply run out of time rather than have a real sense for the ending. In my own preparations, I will often work on the conclusion before sketching out the middle, and the last few sentences may be the only ones I will actually compose. The last breaths of the sermon should be like ringing a bell that continues to resound in the hearts of your hearers.
Some of the folks who happen to enter your church might be bewildered seekers (like my family and I were in Oxford), whereas others might be seasoned locals who have no problem making their way around the grounds of faith. In either case, the gathered pilgrims benefit from having a competent, compassionate preacher as a tour guide who can lead them through the wonders of God’s Word. You do not even need an accent.
Write to Ryan Tinetti at pastortinetti@gmail.com
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