What is the ultimate goal of preaching? Hopefully, our preaching inspires faith in our listeners, drawing them closer to the God who called us to preach the Good News.
But what kind of preaching do listeners report as helping them grow in their faith? Are there attributes or qualities or descriptors that can help us name how to preach faith-fully?
These are the questions we asked at the beginning of the Faithful Preaching Project, a grant program at Austin Seminary funded by the Lilly Endowment, Inc. We interviewed clergy and lay people who came to campus for an annual lecture series, and we also sent out a survey by email to elicit responses.
Here are some of the qualities of faith-full preaching described by our sample of roughly 100 lay people and clergy:
Biblical. Authentic. Storied.
One of the main ways we help listeners grow in their faith is to be biblically based in our preaching—focusing on the Scripture text in ways that give greater understanding and connection to our daily lives.
This is the primary distinctive of preaching: that we speak not just to inspire an audience (like a TED Talk) or to educate (like a lecturer), but to bear witness to the God who has met us in these sacred texts. So it makes sense that many listeners look to us to do this in our preaching so they can experience a deeper sense of faithfulness.
In our cohort of clergy and lay preachers, we invite preachers to consider their own relationship to Scripture, and how it may have been different at other stages in their lives. With that in mind, we envision the host of our listeners spanning those stages as well, with a wild diversity of relationships with Scripture.
Preaching that is biblical
One of the key ways we can help inspire faith in our listeners is to help them cultivate a closer relationship (or even a beginning relationship!) with the Bible. As preachers, this may require that we pursue this in our own lives as well.
Authentic preaching
Which brings me to a second key aspect of faith-full preaching: authenticity.
Listeners know when we are being our genuine selves. And when they can sense authenticity from our preaching, it helps them to connect to the sermon in a more personal way.
But authenticity also has to walk a fine line of knowing what to share, how much to share, and when to share.
Guidelines for sharing stories
Some basic guidelines for sharing personal stories include not making yourself the hero in every story you tell, making your stories not only about the life of ministry, not breaking confidences, and always getting permission first before you share a story that involves someone else (unless you change identifying characteristics)—and, yes, this includes your family members (even children).
Authenticity is not just about story-sharing, however. It is also about listeners being able to feel that you believe what you are preaching—that the faith you are proclaiming is the same faith you are living. This can be difficult when you feel burned out as a preacher or dry in your faith life.
Which is why part of faith-full preaching is spending time nurturing our own faith as preachers. Fortunately, preaching can be one way of doing that—the very exercises we engage in as we craft sermons can be faith-inspiring when we allow ourselves to be ministered to through the process.
Authenticity in preaching requires that we ourselves are growing in our own faith throughout our ministry.
What are some ways you are tending to your own faith as a preacher? Are there communities you belong to (outside the congregation you serve) that can help you nurture your faith? Can you meet with a spiritual director?
What are the faith practices you engage in as part of your daily life that renew in you a sense that this call to preach is mysterious and a blessing?
And what are the stories you can share with your listeners about how your own faith has grown over time? What are the experiences you can share that point to the power of faith in your own life?
Next steps
How can you empower your listeners to share their stories of faith with others in the congregation? This can be a way for listeners to practice the language of faith-sharing, as well as to strengthen their own faith.
And while preaching in these ways is not a guarantee that listeners will experience growth in their faith (we merely plant the seeds—it is God who waters and brings our efforts to fruition), they can help you model the attributes listeners have used to describe sermons that have helped their faith grow.
Aiming to preach biblically, authentically, and with stories of faith, we can work diligently at this craft and leave the rest in God’s hands. Throughout our sermon-writing process, we can be faithful in our efforts to prepare sermons with the aim of increasing our listeners’ faith—and our own.
