The Preaching Life*

by Dennis Kinlaw

The Preaching Life is a regular feature of Preacher's Magazine where readers are privileged to sit in the classroom and read insights on current preaching models from some of North America's finest preachers. This workshop is presented by Roger Hahn, Professor of New Testament at Nazarene Theological Seminary and Teaching Pastor at Kansas City First Church of the Nazarene.

My wife is a faithful critic of my preaching. She has developed the ability to come right to point. "That sermon did not explain the Scripture text," is her ultimate condemnation. But when she says, "The sermon brought the text to life," she has delivered the highest possible praise. The preaching life flows into and out from Scripture. Pulpit presence, rhetorical skills, and a sense of compassion are all important to preaching, but the way Scripture works in us, and we in it, is most important of all.

The starting point for preaching is engagement with the Scripture. A part of this engagement must happen in devotional reading. Another part of our reading of Scripture must also be "professional." When I began my pastoral ministry I selected the text week by week. I spent a great deal of time and energy trying to find the "right" text. A pastor's conference suggested the development of a preaching plan. I began to select texts and themes for four to six month periods and to coordinate them with the church year. Now I am using the lectionary to choose my sermon texts.

The shift to the preaching plan, and then the lectionary, has been immensely freeing for me. By knowing the texts that are coming up my mind is always working on the sermon content rather than on what to preach. The lectionary has also helped me grapple with the entirety of the Bible. Because of the classes I took in college and seminary, I preached primarily from the Pauline epistles early in my ministry. The preaching plan and the lectionary have forced me into the gospel stories and Old Testament narratives on a consistent basis. I have had to learn new homiletical models to preach narratives and the process has invigorated my own preaching life.

The lectionary also forces me to deal with difficult texts. On my own I would not choose to preach on the Parable of the Unjust Steward in Luke 16, but when that is the text of the day I must. Several listeners have expressed appreciation for help in understanding that difficult passage. As I write this column the gospel text for next Sunday is Jesus' teaching on divorce in Mark 10:2-16. I can preach on this important subject without worrying that someone will think I have chosen the text to preach "at" them. Using the lectionary allows me to have instruction already in place before the times when I think, "We really need this text."

A particular joy that I am discovering in this most recent journey through the lectionary cycle is that the individual passages (Old Testament, Epistle, Gospel) often "talk to each other." That is, there are themes or common literary elements that invite the sermon to address the subject from the perspective of two or three different texts. The Word is coming alive in my heart and that makes it easier to proclaim to the congregation (and my wife) what the text is really about.

*Preacher's Magazine is indebted to Barbara Brown Taylor for the title of this column.