Preaching without a Halo

It would be naïve for me to suppose that I can say much at all about preachers or preaching, so these are merely a few scattered jots from someone without authority. 

Many Sundays passed listening to my dad preach, and little did I know that one day I would do the tremulous thing and stand behind the pulpit too.

I remember thinking when I was a kid that preachers must have some secret knowledge to do what they do with such astounding and awe-inspiring conviction. Some years later, I discovered much to my surprise that preachers are not angelic beings with special knowledge; preachers are regular humans whose knees begin to shake every time they stand behind the pulpit. Preachers are regular folks who sometimes mistake themselves for extraordinary folks. Preachers are like everyone else. Preachers are regular folks who come from the congregation. They are regular folks who beg God for mercy each Saturday night before they must speak to the congregation Sunday morning. Preachers are human like any other.

Why then should they be the ones to speak? I have asked myself this too many times to count as I have ventured through seminary: “Why should I be the one to preach? There are many others far more suited!” If the preacher is simply a topsy-turvy human like any other, then what makes the preacher’s words worth listening to?

The words are powerful not because of the preacher speaking them but because by God’s mercy God would use even those feeble words of the preacher for the proclamation of good news to an aching world. Without the active presence of God working in our midst, preaching devolves into a futile endeavor of public speaking, futile because such preaching will be nothing more than some fanciful rhetoric with no transformative power.

The preacher then does not have a halo nor does the preacher need to pretend to have one, for the preacher’s words are important only because with astounding mercy God patiently uses them.

Where do the preacher’s words come from? It would be easy to say the Bible. However, it may also be said that they come from the Spirit’s workings in the church’s compost pile. And it is for this reason in part why we should not preach, if we are not willing to wash the church dishes or take out the church garbage.

A good preacher is like a referee who does not make any headlines the following day. A good preacher is like a butler whose presence is hardly noticed at the front door. A good preacher is a humble finger pointing to the crucified messiah and to the unsettling and hope-filled reality of God in our midst.