A couple of years ago, a week after I had preached on a Sunday morning, a man introduced himself at the sanctuary door as a second-time visitor. The man said, “I heard you preach last week,” and then asked me with all sincerity, “Have you actually been to seminary?” At that moment, I didn’t want to tell him that, not only had I been to seminary, but that I held a PhD in Homiletics (the art and science of preaching) from a well-known Presbyterian seminary. I just smiled and affirmed that I had indeed been to seminary. “Well, I guess I didn’t really get the point of your sermon,” he added.  I am not really sure how I responded; maybe I said through a pained smile, “Well, I’ll work on that.”

Perceptions of what a sermon is and what a sermon is supposed to achieve are as varied as those who listen to those sermons, and if a sermon does not live up to one’s expectations, then surely it is only fair to ask the preacher, “Have you actually been to seminary?” Well, maybe it’s fair, but no preacher wants to be asked that. If grace were to abound in this situation, then perhaps it’s fairest to ask oneself, “I wonder if the preacher has a different understanding of preaching from my own. Would the preacher be open to a conversation about that?”

It all comes down to expectation. What do we want a sermon to be? Is it a teaching moment? Is it a lesson in morality? Is it an exhortation to live in the straight and narrow? Is a sermon supposed to open with a joke, make three points, and give you a life application? All these questions can be answered in the affirmative and more! 

When family members know that I am preparing a sermon, they inevitably ask, “What’s your sermon about?” And I, after a moment’s pause, usually respond, “The sermon isn’t about anything; the sermon does something.” In asserting this understanding of the sermon, I realize that after many years studying and teaching preaching, I have certain biases, especially that the sermon functions as an event of God’s own self-revelation. The sermon is a happening, one in which the gospel is not only proclaimed, but experienced. I certainly hope that this is what a sermon does: set the stage for the hearer to experience the impact of God’s amazing grace here and now.

Teaching preaching at Princeton Theological Seminary, you would expect me to say that I evaluate a sermon first on its theological merits, then on its logical coherence, and ultimately on its rhetorical mastery. What I actually say is, “I know it’s a good sermon if it makes me cry.” This may appear that I lean toward sentimentality, and perhaps I do. But what I really crave in listening to a sermon is the tangibleness of the gospel, incarnated in human stories of redemption. Tell me of God’s redeeming power shaping ordinary folks for extraordinary lives. I want a sermon to feel alive…and I want to feel more alive after experiencing the sermon.

One point we always tried to make clear in preaching class is that the sermon isn’t what is printed on the page. The sermon is an event that happens in the midst of the worship service. Even though the “same” sermon may be presented at 8 and 10am, they are two different sermon events. It’s the hearers who complete the sermon. Every listener has a slightly different experience of the sermon. Things that are meaningful for one person listening may be received as inconsequential by another, and vice versa. 

Listening to a sermon is as much an art and science as preparing, writing and “performing” a sermon. Simply notice: 1) how the preacher gets us into the sermon; 2) what sustains our attention; 3) what causes us distraction; 4) what feelings come up; 5) what we agree with; 6) what we are moved to think or do in light of experiencing the gospel. Most importantly, we can ask ourselves, “How did the preacher bring to life the claims of scripture, so that I felt claimed by the gospel itself? How am I ‘new creation’ in light of this preaching moment?”

There is a lot more going on in any given sermon event than any one of us can digest at one hearing. John Calvin thought of preaching as almost sacramental - an event in which the Word of God becomes nourishing to us through the Spirit of God’s Son. The preaching event is ultimately an encounter between ourselves and living God. It is personal address. It is also a corporate moment. The whole body is claimed in the gospel, as we, the body, reason together, and commune with the One who was and is and is to come. 

In such an encounter, we are called to “take off our shoes,” for we are standing on holy ground, not because the preacher is holy, but because the Word makes us whole.