Last Sunday, my family and I attended services at three different churches. During both the morning, the afternoon, and the evening, we all sat in three congregations. We worshipped with three different praise teams. We listened to three different preachers. We shared meaningful fellowship before or after church with three different congregations of Christians. We have been at a lot of churches lately; either serving for a season, or coming because of an invitation to preach, or building new community and new relationships.
Since my family and I are currently working on planting a church, but haven't yet launched, I am in the position of spending some Sundays preaching at other churches. On other Sundays, I find myself sitting with my family under the preaching of others. So naturally I've had some time to think a bit about how to preach and how to listen, since I am spending a lot of time these days doing both.
One thought that has come up is that as a listener, I can gain a lot more if I know how to engage with different styles of preaching. And as a preacher, I can probably help my listeners out a lot more if I tell people how to get the most out of my message.
GENERAL RULE FOR LISTENERS: WORK WITH THE PREACHER YOU HAVE
I have heard (and, sometimes, made!) complaints about certain preachers as a congregant over the last 20 years. But truthfully, I really haven't actually heard that many truly, completely terrible sermons. Most have some redeeming value. Delivery and opportunity for preparation may vary, but any given preacher has likely spent over a dozen hours -specifically that week, and then many more hours over the course of an entire lifetime of solitary study- thinking through the topic or text that he is speaking on. It is probably likely that there is at least something valuable in what he has to say. So here are some friendly ground rules, from someone who occupies a space in both the pulpit and the pew: 1 Appreciate the preacher that you have, 2 come on Sunday morning with an expectant willingness to learn, 3 be a friendly audience, and 4 get a sense for how your pastor preaches (and work with it); not only will you get a lot more out of Sunday mornings if you do, but you can also help visiting friends or guests get the most out of their Sunday morning at your church, too.
RULES (FOR MYSELF) AS A PREACHER: TELL PEOPLE HOW TO PARTICIPATE
Based on my experiences as a listener, I think that when I preach I could help people out a lot more by telling them how they can participate.
1 As a preacher, I can tell people where to focus--which means that as listeners, we can be aware of the options for what to focus on and look for clues about how to listen. As a listener I tend to follow one of four things, and it's helpful for me to know ahead of time what I should be tracking: the text, the argument, the preacher, or the slides/notes. We all have opinions on what the focus should be, but putting that aside for the moment, it's helpful to know what the focus is. Some sermons assume that you've got the text open in front of you and the preacher is doing running commentary and application. I just did this a few weeks ago by preaching through the whole book of Exodus, and I could have helped people out a lot more by telling them to keep their Bibles open to each section as I verbally walked through it. Sometimes, particularly with a more topical message, the argument is the main focus. The text might introduce the topic, but the sermon branches out from there. Having a notebook handy to track the argument is pretty crucial here, as the argument might engage with many texts, quotes, possible objections, and applications, and these are all helpful ways of teasing out the claims or implications of the main text while not exactly arising from within the text itself. Another possibility is that the preacher wants your undivided attention. Some pastors will tell you not to have books open and not to be busy writing notes during their sermon. That's an indication that they want to talk directly to you. They want to get to your heart, and they're going to look you in the eye, and tell you a lot of stories to help you apply what they're saying. They want to see in your eyes whether they've either succeeded or failed to make the message reach you directly. Finally, some preachers have notes or slides that they have put a lot of hard work into, and those slides carry the majority of the message. If you want to get the most out of their message, take pictures of their slides with your phone or capture their information in your notebook. As a preacher, I tend not to have super-detailed slides, but when I do I would probably say that if you have to make a choice of what to write down, the slides probably have the most important information.
2 As a preacher, I can tell people how to engage with changes to the usual way of doing things--which means that as listeners, we can be aware of how to handle some of the the variety that we sometimes ask for. When I have the chance, I like to change up how I preach (though sometimes this is limited by whoever has say over the stage design). I like to mark up the text on the screen behind me using my tablet, or work in some drama or stage props, or get out a big white/black board and build a big picture of words and images that by the end finally captures the whole message in one big visual. I like to do Q&A and run a mic to people, or have text-messaged comments or questions show up on a screen beside me. I like to incorporate videos or songs into the middle of my messages. I have done all of these things. But as a preacher who has been spending more time lately as a listener, I have learned that I need to let people know what's coming up and how they can process it. I could probably help people with interactive elements by letting people know how they can get ready. If I do Q&A at the end of a sermon, I am wanting people to engage by thinking through my sermon as I am preaching it and then coming up with one big question, which I then hope to answer. If I am doing Q&A between points, then I am probably using that time as a "release valve" to help people track with with a dense message. For drama, I want people to put down the notebooks and pens and enter into the story for a second; just write "hold on, the pastor is getting into a lion pit" and then come back to your notes after I get out. If I am marking up a passage on my tablet, I'd like you to have your Bible open so that you can track the same connections that I am making (even if you don't physically mark up your Bible). But it helps if I actually communicate these things.
3 As a preacher, I can tell people what kind of preacher I am--which means that as listeners, we can learn to understand and work with the strengths and weaknesses of our preacher's default style. I find that a lot of preachers are going to have a preacher default mode that we can work with. Some are "buffet" preachers who give you a mountain of all different kinds of content, and expect that each person will take a few helpings of whatever God specially impresses upon their heart. You will feel less overwhelmed if you realize that this kind of preacher has prepared a little bit of something for everybody, rather than expecting that somebody is going to digest everything. You're going to get languages, historical theology, literary structure, philosophy, apologetics, counseling, stories, diagrams, outlines, and various different interpretations of the text, all in one place and time. Grab a few scoops of whatever you need. You'll always find something, every Sunday. By contrast, some pastors are "big meal with leftovers" preachers. This is me. I'm not serving up all different kinds of meals that you can choose some scoops of this or that out of to create your own custom plate, but I am serving up one single big meal with enough for extra helpings. I have one main theme, and a simple outline that's usually projected on the screen behind me, which I hope everybody gets and understands. But packed into that, I include enough within each point of my outline that anyone who wants to, they can get a little bit more out of it if they want to. Some are "curated experience" preachers, and they have everything plated out and presented for you. Everyone gets the same meal, with the same portions, prepared with style by a master chef who wants to take your eyes and tastebuds on a journey. This preacher will tell you what your one takeaway should be from the message. You will know exactly what the points of the sermon are. You will be given exactly the same sermon summary sentence as everyone else. This kind of preaching can still leave you feeling hungry even if you like what you've had, but it does provide a sort of guided helpfulness that the other two kinds of meals don't give you. If you understand your preacher, or if I as a preacher can help my people understand who I am as a preacher, you will be able to get a lot more out of the sermon.
ASK THE PREACHER FOR HELP AS A LISTENER
Finally, as a fellow listener who also preaches, I'd like to encourage you to ask your preacher for help. Ask for his manuscript or outline, or email him a follow-up question to the sermon, or let him know you had trouble following along (maybe you couldn't sleep the night before) and ask him to break the main point of the sermon down for you. Maybe even ask him for tips how to listen to a sermon, because he might have all kinds of good ideas I didn't think of to write here. Work with the preacher whose teaching you sit under, and don't assume that you have nothing to gain from him. Coming to your preacher with the heart of a learner may just reveal him to be the competent, godly teacher that you thought that you were still waiting for.
Cheers,
-Pastor Sean
