The Preaching Life
by William H. Willimon
In this issue we have once again expanded “The Preaching
Life” feature in order to bring you the insightful comments of
one of North America’s finest preachers. William H. Willimon is
Dean of the Chapel and Professor of Christian Ministry at Duke University.
He is author of over forty books on pastoral theology, the Christian
faith, and church renewal.
Getting Organized for the Pulpit
One of your challenges, in preaching, is organizing the
various resources that are presented for you each week into a coherent
sermon. I remember preachers who ridiculed the “string of pearls”
sermon that was little more than a string of disconnected anecdotes,
illustrations, and ideas. How do we organize our sermonic material in
such a way that our hearers know that we have a destination in mind
and that we have a systematic way of getting to that destination by
the end of the sermon?
A few years ago, Professor John S. McClure compiled a
book that consisted of the best advice for preaching from a panel of
master homileticians. In a helpful section on sermon organization, Professor
McClure included a number of quotes that speak well to the challenge
of sermon organization. (The quotes are from Best Advice for Preaching,
Edited by John S. McClure, Fortress Press, Minneapolis, MN, 1998.)
For instance, John R. Claypool referred to Fred Craddock’s evocation
of “eureka moments” as a way to put together sermonic ideas:
“I have found Fred Craddock’s insight to be
very helpful when it comes to shaping one’s material for a sermon.
He says there must be two eureka moments for the preacher to create
one eureka moment for the listener. The first moment is deciding what
you want to say in terms of a central theme, the second is deciding
how to package this so it will be understood and connect with all the
faculties of the listener.”
As McClure says, “Hearers need to know that they
are onboard a vehicle that has a pilot who is not lost, but has a road
map and the skills necessary to navigate the highway and terrain ahead.”
That’s a good image of what our hearers expect of us as they are
listening to our sermons. For many of us, a sermon outline will not
be as important as our intuitive, instinctive feel that a thought is
being pursued in a sermon, that something coherent has emerged from
the process of brainstorming that has occurred on the way from text
to sermon.
Presbyterian preacher, Joanna Adams, stresses the role
of instinct in the process of sermon organization, the intuitive way
a preacher just knows that some thought fits:
“I jot down ideas, possible sermon trajectories,
potential sermon illustrations, in no particular order or importance.
For resources, I look to my current reading, my files, experiences in
the life of the parish, experiences in my own life, among other things.
The next day, I go over my notes to see if I can discern my emerging
themes or patterns. I am often surprised at what emerges, and I have
learned over the years to trust my instincts. When I begin to write,
I usually have a clear idea of where the sermon is going, but now and
then, I am genuinely surprised. The two constants in the process are
the awareness that I need to have my destination in mind and a commitment
to take the congregation with me. Nothing is worse than a sermon that
meanders.
One of Fred Craddock’s great contributions to the
nature of modern Christian preaching was his stress upon a sermon as
an organic, growing, inductive movement. Any of you who have been privileged
to hear Fred preach know that there is a special, delightful way in
listening to how his mind works with material. Here is Fred speaking
to the issue of organization:
“I find it helpful to write in the center of a sheet
of paper my theme or focus sentence. This is the message, distilled
and drawn from study of the text. As Luther said, “First the flower,
then the meadow.” Then I circle this statement with related material
drawn from related texts, theological reflection, news reports, observations,
experience, congregational life, history, biography, general reading,
and so on. Lines are drawn from these sketched pieces (to be fleshed
out later) to the central message, like spokes in a wheel. Any material
that does not connect with the message, no matter how good it seems,
is eliminated from this sermon, but saved for another time. Next, I
list these items in no particular order and begin the process of arranging
them as they will appear in the sermon. I usually arrange and re-arrange
four or five times.”
Among the questions that Lutheran preacher, Barbara Lunblad
asks herself as she is putting her sermon together are:
“What shape seems best suited to this focus? Where
do I hope to go with the listeners today? If I want them to see God’s
promises (even when there seems little evidence), can I help them see
Isaiah’s image of the shoot growing from a stump? This sermon will
lift up this image—What is this image like in my life, your life?”
In his important book, The Homiletical Plot, Eugene Lowry speaks of
sermons as arranged like the plot of a novel. His plotted sermon begins
with a sense of uneasy equilibrium that includes some foreshadowing
of potential problems. Then, this equilibrium is upset as an enigma
is presented that energizes the sermon’s forward movement. Something
is wrong that needs fixing; something is out of balance that needs restoration;
something is missing that needs to be found; something is confusing
that needs clarification. The rest of the sermon is expended in delaying
the restoration of equilibrium. This method of organization, that is
sensitive to a sermon as something that moves through time, that practices
a strategic delay of meaning until the end, gives a sermon a dynamic,
engaging quality.
Aristotle, in his rhetoric, taught that public speaking involved the wise employment of just the right arguments, and right illustrations in speaking to an audience. The challenge of organization continues to be one of our major tasks as contemporary preachers.
