Preach Magazine Issue 5 - Preaching to the unconverted | Page 24

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Opportunities for people to contribute
can be varied. It might be that you
ask people to discuss something with
those around them for a minute. You
might say at the start of your talk that
you are happy to be interrupted with
questions or thoughts (if you are). If
your church has a large contingent
of younger tech-savvy people, you
could have a live Twitter stream to
which you refer occasionally. You
could leave time for a question and
answer session at the end of your
presentation. You could ask questions
and leave time for silent reflection.
You could bring people to the front to
discuss certain points with you.
Of course there are risks involved in
this approach; someone might jump
in and say something inappropriate,
or start talking and keep going, or
derail your direction and head off
on an unhelpful tangent. It is quite
a skill to respectfully curate a multiperson conversation, while keeping a
hold of the reins. For this reason, you
might be more comfortable exploring
less immediate ways of encouraging
participation.

REACTIVE CONTENT
There are many ways to make your
preaching interactive, and not all
of them involve vocal interruptions.
John Stott argued that ‘true preaching
is always dialogical’. But he did not
mean a verbal dialogue, which he
believed better suited to a Bible-study
setting. Rather, he went on to say, ‘It
refers to the silent dialogue which
should be developing between the
preacher and the hearers. For what
he [the preacher] says provokes
questions in their minds which he
then proceeds to answer.’3 What
questions do you raise as you preach?
Do you make them explicit or do
you just let your listeners infer them
by the answers you give? Asking
questions gives people a chance to
chew things over for themselves as
they listen, giving them a chance to
engage in what you are saying at a
personal level.
Another way to make your preaching
interactive without turning it
into a discussion is to consciously
craft your material in response to
conversations you’ve had with your
church members, what you know of
their lives and contexts, the aspects
of faith and doctrine you know they
struggle to grasp or accept. When
planning a sermon series, do you
ever ask people what they’d like to be
taught on? Do you seek feedback
on your preaching, and take
on board the comments you
receive? Your sermons are
less likely to be received as a
one-way lecture if you allow
your community to shape
what you teach.
You might also want to
create other opportunities
for people to discuss
the sermon. This could
be in a small group
that meets during
the week, or directly
after the service over
coffee, or in an online
forum like Facebook,

where you could post a reminder of
your key points and encourage chat.

THE BABY AND THE
BATHWATER
The danger of interactive preaching
is that content is diluted and becomes
a palatable soup made of all the
various opinions and perspectives
of those present rather than the
life-giving nutrition of God’s word
as spoken through Scripture. The
danger of a straight monologue is
that it can soar over the heads of
everyone in the room, touching no
one. John Sweetman, in a blog post
entitled ‘Talking back: is there a place
for interactive preaching?’ gives a
definition that avoids both dangers:
‘Interactive preaching is authentic,
biblical preaching when it involves
a passage of Scripture, a sermon
theme derived from the Scripture, a
preaching intention, and a cohesive
structure. The additional dimension
of an interactive sermon is a genuine,
spoken interaction with the audience
that contributes to the preaching
idea and the intention of the sermon.’4
Sounds good to me.

PREACHING IN A
CONTEMPORARY WESTERN
CONTEXT IS ALWAYS GOING
TO BE MORE EFFECTIVE IF IT
INVOLVES SOME LEVEL OF
PARTICIPATION.

1. B
 auckham, R (date), God and the Crisis of Freedom:
Biblical and contemporary perspectives, John Knox
Press, page 58.
2. S
 weet, L (2014), Giving Blood: a fresh paradigm for
preaching, Zondervan, page 259.
3. S
 tott, J (2014), I Believe in Preaching, Hodder &
Stoughton, pages 60–61
4. Sweetman, J (1 January 2004), ‘Talking back:
is there a place for interactive preaching?’,
preaching.com, bit.ly/IntPreach.