The greatest challenge the preacher faces is, well, the preacher. Most of us are not confused about the text by the time we get to the pulpit. And we are not really struggling to make this passage of the Bible relevant for the congregation. What we don’t know is how to overcome the feeling that we are frauds.
The best sermons are written not in the head but in the soul of the preacher. It is there that the Word of God has to meet all the other words we have heard all week. Some of those other words were pretty harsh. Like the ones an irate mother used to complain about the new youth minister, or the words we read in a letter that critiqued last week’s sermon. But a parishioner’s criticism always pales in comparison to the words we utter to ourselves.
No one is harder on preachers than preachers.
Sometimes the difficulty is that we aren’t convinced we have done as good a job as we need to do on this sermon. At my congregation the pastors wear robes with long stoles (or flags, as my daughter calls them). Every time I go the pulpit I remember an old woman who told me when I was a child if I had nothing to say I should at least look nice. I live in the fear of the day a parishioner interrupts a sermon to ask, “What are you talking about?” But this isn’t the real reason we feel like dressed-up frauds on Sunday morning. The deeper problem is with the contrast between the Truth of our proclamation and the truth of our own lives.
When we preach on faith, we have to confront our faithlessness. Preaching stewardship, we remember we are behind on our own pledge. On sin, do we dare be the first to throw a stone? If the preacher doesn’t ask, “Who am I to give this sermon?” then he or she is not really showing up for worship that day.
I don’t know any good preachers who don’t entertain dreams of chucking the whole thing and getting a day job. Those who sit in the pews don’t understand this, but when preachers look at them across the pulpit, what we feel is envy. We think that they have lives, that they came to church today because they chose to, and best of all, that their souls enjoy a privacy that ours never know. Those in the pew can hear the Word of God and (hopefully) be convicted by their need to live with more faith, hope, love, and obedience.
Not only are preachers also convicted of these things, but we tack onto ourselves a bonus for being hypocrites.
Clearly, this is why the prophet Isaiah shunned his calling: “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips … “
The fascinating thing is that the Lord still chose to use this man who was so convinced of his sin. But first a seraph touched Isaiah’s mouth with a live coal, and said, “Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.” That is what the preacher has to believe. We have to believe that the seraph is still in the guilt-cleansing business for all who are called to use their unclean lips to proclaim God’s Word.
But what exactly does this mean for the preacher?
For one, it means that preaching is a wonderful way to keep our lives accountable to the truth we have to present on Sunday morning. Preachers are given the grace of having to confess our sins honestly and thoroughly to prevent us from being too distracted by them during the sermon.
When Cardinal Mercier, the late Belgian Prelate, ordained new priests, he would find a moment in the course of the ceremony to whisper in the ear of the ordinand, “Remember, God called you to be a priest because he does not trust you to be a layman.”
More important, Isaiah’s ministry reminds us that preaching is not about the preacher. The Word is too powerful to be limited by the sins of the preacher. The Holy Spirit will speak that Word through us, and in spite of us, but it is never about us. Thank God for that.
I do, every Sunday morning.
M. Craig Barnes is pastor of National Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C., and editor-at-large of Leadership.
Copyright © 2002 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.
