Sticky Sermons

CONTENTS: Sticky Sermons: Evolution of “The Stickiness Factor” ………………… 3 Elements of a STICKY Sermon: Scripture ………………………………… 5 Elements of a STICKY Sermon: Tension ………………………………….. 7 Elements of a STICKY Sermon: Interaction …………………………….. 10 Elements of a STICKY Sermon: Challenge ………………………………. 13 Elements of a STICKY Sermon: Kerygma ………………………………... 17 Elements of a STICKY Sermon: Yearning .……………………………….. 22

Sticky Sermons: Evolution of “The Stickiness Factor” "Stickiness," a simple children's word, moved into adult discourse when it was included among the factors that cause ideas to spread in The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell. According to Gladwell, "The Stickiness Factor says that there are specific ways of making a contagious message memorable; there are relatively simple changes in the presentation and structuring of information that can make a big difference in how much of an impact it makes" (p. 25). The next big move for "stickiness" came when Chip and Dan Heath, brothers who are university professors, wrote Made to Stick. They picked up Gladwell's concept of "The Stickiness Factor" and took it further. They said their objective was to, "[I]dentify the traits that make ideas sticky, a subject that was beyond the scope of Gladwell's book" (p. 13). The word was "baptized" when Larry Osborne, lead pastor of North Coast Church in California, brought "sticky" to the church. He wrote two books taking full advantage of the new buzzword: Sticky Church and Sticky Teams. Following their lead, I am aware that some sermons can be "sticky," while others seem to be written and delivered with a teflon coating! Sermons, as I am describing them, are designed to be delivered

in a particular context. Granted, some guys have gotten a hold of a bullhorn and tried to make a pulpit out of a street corner, but that is the exception rather than the rule. The street corner is no place for a either a sermon or a guy yelling at people he doesn't know. The proper context is in the weekly gathering of Christian believers for the purpose of worshipping God. The sermon is just one component of that gathering. The others include greeting one another, praying together, singing in unison, offering support, reading the Scriptures, and sharing communion. To imagine a sermon apart from that context is to act as if an appetizer is the sum total of a five-course meal. What this combination of components looks like, sounds like, and feels like in actual practice differs from place to place and denomination to denomination, but the gathering itself is standard Christian practice. Because of the ongoing regularity with which preachers are delivering sermons, I want to identify what I perceive to be the elements of a "sticky sermon." After all, when you preach you want the ideas, beliefs, actions, and strategies that you are presenting to attach themselves to people's lives. In other words, you want them to stick. In what follow, I'll use an acronym of the word "sticky" to identify which elements should be present in the content and communication of a sermon, delivered in its proper context, to help you make it stick.

Elements of a STICKY Sermon: Scripture I went to a sales seminar a couple of years ago. Over the course of the day there were musicians playing music while encouraging us to sing along, speakers telling success stories, designated times to meet and greet other attendees, opportunities to attend breakout classes, and appeals to attend another seminar in the future. It all felt like a bad high school pep rally, or sadly enough, like a contemporary church service. The blunt truth is that too many sermons today have been reduced to motivational speeches that could have been delivered by Tony Robbins. What prevents this from happening? Scripture. In the Bible we find people, stories, poems, prayers, events, and correspondence testifying to the ongoing acts of God within creation and on behalf of his people. Scripture, then, is more than a veneer to overlay a motivational speech about how much of our personal potential we have yet to realize. Scripture is the very foundation and authorization of our proclamation. John Piper, pastor for preaching at Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, says that using Scripture is not to be neglected or

considered as an afterthought. He writes, "Again and again my advice to beginning preachers is, 'Quote the text! Quote the text! Say the actual words of the text again and again. Show the people where your ideas are coming from'" (The Supremacy of God in Preaching, 88). If you are to keep the sermon from sounding like a trivial, selfindulgent exposition of contemporary culture and human achievement, you must stick to Scripture. The historic dimension of Scripture keeps us from the ethnocentrism that so easily think our modern way is the best way and they're way (whoever "they" might be) is clearly inferior. Likewise, the present application of Scripture prevents us from the pious nostalgia that thinks the "spiritual" life would be so much better for us if we lived a long time ago and far, far away. Over against those responses, the Scriptures insist that we live as characters in the forward-looking drama of God and the world that God is renewing through us, his image-bearing creation. A sticky sermon, then, must negotiate the distance between the historic and present aspects of Scripture in ways that listeners can understand. N.T. Wright notes the centrality of this task when he says, "[T]hroughout the history of the church, preachers have sought both to understand what Scripture was saying in its original context and to convey to their hearers what this might mean in their own day (Simply Christian, 188).

Elements of a STICKY Sermon: Tension You spend time each week exploring a passage of Scripture. You read slowly through it, linger over it, place yourself in it, crossreference it for parallel passages, consult what commentators have said about it, and explored various instances where its theme intersects with the modern world. By the time you show up to deliver a sermon out of the passage, you've invested many hours in the process. The most important thing to recognize here is that it was during the sermon creation process that you sorted through the tension, ambiguity, and complexity, and emerged with clarity. The people who are present, most likely, have not. Therefore you must always remind yourself that most of the people listening to the message are hearing that passage for the first time that week - or the first time in their lives. They haven't invested the hours or the effort that you have when you stand up to speak, so logically they are not nearly as excited as you are about the conclusions you've reached! If you don't engage the listeners, your words will be heard with their ears but not with their minds and hearts. How do you engage people? Provoking tension is the key to getting and keeping people engaged.

George Lowenstein, a behavioral economist at Carnegie Mellon University teaches that gaps in our knowledge cause pain. When we want to know something but don't, it's like having a rock in our shoe: we can go on if we want to, but we're aware that something needs to happen to resolve the situation. Eugene Lowry connects this insight to preaching in his book The Homiletical Plot. He says, "The first step in the presented sermon, then, is to upset the equilibrium of the listeners, and is analogous to the opening scene of a play or movie in which some kind of conflict or tension is introduced....The central task of any sermon, therefore, is the resolution of that particular central ambiguity" (p. 31). How do you provoke tension? 1) Question Conventional Wisdom Everyone lives by a set of rules, whether we call them that or "guidelines, "principles," or something else, is beside the point. With every action we take, we have a corresponding expectation for what the result should look like. When the result matches the action, time and time again, we begin to think in formulas. For instance, x + y = z. Conventional Wisdom is comprised of hundreds of formulas like these in all walks of life - from finances to relationships. That's fine as far it goes, but sometimes life throws us a curveball and we find that the old formula no longer makes sense of the present situation. Because real life is messy, I'm convinced that the number of outcomes that can be logically predicted by Conventional Wisdom is slim to none. You are in a position to point this out, and thus provoke tension. For instance, you could say something like, "What we thought was x is really not...it's actually j."

2) Acknowledge and Interact with the Conclusions of Others We live in a time when information and sound bites are freely distributed. People are exposed to the conclusions of others on websites, television programs, and radio shows. You must acknowledge that, specifically on the topic at hand, other people hold viewpoints and conclusions different from your own. Not to do so is not only counterproductive, but comes across as evasive. It's counterproductive because you've lost the opportunity to create and relieve tension through offering a worthwhile critique; and it seems evasive (especially if another conclusion is wellknown), because you have chosen not to mention the "elephant in the room." Explain to people your reasons for choosing the view you hold over-against the other views on offer. So don't shy away from the tension. Provoke it. People will stay engaged because they want the tension resolved. And when people are involved in active listening with a purpose (relieving the tension), your sermon is sure to stick. If you desire to increase "The Stickiness Factor" of your sermons, I encourage you to lean on the Scriptures - both the story they're telling and the God to whom they're pointing.

Elements of a STICKY Sermon: Interaction One reason that so many sermons today lack anything resembling "The Stickiness Factor" is that they are monologues in which the person with the microphone has all the say. Sermons, as a general rule, do not provide opportunities for planned interaction between the one preaching and the ones listening. That is a rule that must be broken. Of course many preachers practice some form of unplanned interaction by simply paying attention to the lives of various members within the congregation. This type of interaction is certainly not to be overlooked, and if you aren't paying attention the lives of the people who attend your local church then it's time to start. This unplanned interaction is what Fred Craddock has in mind when he says, "[T]he listeners participate in the sermon before it is born. The listeners speak to the preacher before he speaks to them; the minister listens before saying anything" (Preaching, 25). That's good but, in my opinion, it doesn't go far enough. I believe that churches must begin to include planned interaction as part of what passes for a sermon. In other words, a sermon must be seen as incomplete until the preacher stops talking and starts listening to the responses of the people who are present.

By Planned Interaction I mean, primarily, giving other people a chance to voice their questions, objections, and needs for clarification DURING the time allotted for the sermon. Why isn't this happening already? I can't say for certain, but I have a couple of hunches: 1) "Sermonizing" reached its present form in the time after the Protestant Reformation (16th century) when most people couldn't read and were largely uninformed about the current events happening outside their towns. Change is uncomfortable so churches have kept the same format in place ever since. 2) To give a more contemporary explanation, preachers are thinking ahead to their podcast during which people can't interact anyway. Preachers of this sort have in their minds all the people across the world who will be helped and inspired by their sermons, all the while leaving the people in their midst disengaged. 3) The church already has an organized time for interaction and discussion through Sunday School classes or small groups/home groups. This is the response I hear most often, so I answer here by simply pointing out a few things: a) Most of those extra-curricular groups are attended by less than 50% of church members. b) People in general, and families in particular, are busier than ever and the time available to sit and get "chummy" with people you see once a week is quickly sliding down the list of priorities for most Americans...yes, even Christian Americans.

c) Unless your church utilizes "sermon-based small groups" those who do attend those other formats are treated to ANOTHER lesson that is based on a different topic than the one that covered in the sermon so their questions related to the sermon are still left unanswered. Whatever the reason, sermons must change to include interaction. Preachers cannot continue expecting competent and informed people, who provide meaningful insights all week long at their places of employment, to show up each week only to be told, "Thanks for coming, so glad you're here. Now sit down and be quiet." However, I try to be a realist and I approach the element of interaction realistically. I'm well-aware that some people are in churches that have followed the same order of service for the last hundred years. For pastors in those settings, I believe a compromise can be struck on a looser meaning of interaction than the one I proposed above. In the looser meaning, I still insist that you must give people a chance to voice their questions, objections, and needs for clarification, but instead of doing it during the sermon, it should be done IMMEDIATELY after the worship service has concluded. Either way, whether you interact in the sense of the primary meaning or secondary meaning, the point remains: If you desire your sermons to be "stickier" you must interact with those who are present by giving them a chance to speak and be heard.

Elements of a STICKY Sermon: Challenge Sermons that offer high platitudes, abstract ideals, vague generalities, and trite clichés are fine if you want to leave "well-enough" alone. But they lack any semblance to what we're calling "The Stickiness Factor" in this e-book. In contrast, sticky sermons call attention to what's happening "in the fray." They point to a peculiar God, and summon specific people with a concrete challenge that can be appropriated in particular ways. The specific people I have in mind are those who identify themselves as the people of God - those members of the church who have committed to contribute within the local congregation and are present week after week. These are the people who have embraced the identity and vocation of being Christian as the path to life (in the next element, kerygma, we’ll look at how to address those who don't fit this description). Those who gather are inundated with other voices during the week. The voices are not those of innocent bystanders, but rather they are the voices of those with vested interest in the dollars, time, and efforts of the Christian believer. And rest assured, in ways that are not nearly as dramatic as the story of Jesus being tested in the wilderness to go the easier way, those voices are promising more for less - all that's required is the embrace of a new, corresponding identity and vocation. Despite those voices, the faithful return to this God and this

community to express their worship and be convinced all over again of the truthfulness of the message we proclaim. All this should serve as notice: the presence of alternative truth-claims about what's real and what is not, each backed up as they are with their own sacred texts and ways of being, reinforces the urgency and boldness required to issue a concrete challenge in the act of preaching. What I mean by "challenge" is the summons to live in ways that are congruent with the mission and message of Jesus for the world. This concept is unpacked in detail by Walter Brueggemann, who writes, "I understand preaching to be the chance to summon and nurture an alternative community with an alternative identity, vision, and vocation, preoccupied with praise and obedience toward the God we Christians know fully in Jesus of Nazareth" (The Word Militant, 56, italics his). So I want to offer two ways that the challenge can take shape: 1) Prophetic Redescription Every member of the church is involved in different levels of accommodation, as it relates to a life-world that is incongruent with the mission and message of Jesus. This should not be automatically attributed to disobedience because some people simply don't know there's another way to think or act in particular situations. In fact, many people have attended the church's worship gatherings for a decade and, because the sermons have simply reinforced the dominant culture of our time (which sociologist Christian Smith has termed, “Moralistic Therapeutic Deism”) they have never been made aware of any subversive implications brought about by their identity and vocation as a Christian.

Therefore, to quote Brueggemann once again, "The task of the preacher is to exhibit this particular narrative script of the Bible and to show how and in what ways life will be reimagined, redescribed, and relived if this narrative is embraced" (The Word Militant, 32). 2) Public Testimony This aspect of the challenge takes seriously the pluralism of our day. The Christian message is not the only offer of life that people encounter. The content of the testimony, therefore, must be specific rather than universal, and persuasive rather than disaffected. By specific, I mean pointing to something to which can be concretely known; and by persuasive, I mean explaining the story in such a way that people are drawn into it and want to be a part of it themselves. Testimony was a central part of the faith communities that are highlighted in the Bible. Over and over again we are met with the instructions to "Tell of God's great deeds." It is, indeed, this peculiar God who creates life from barren wombs (Genesis 21:17), sets slaves free from captivity (Exodus 15:20-21), and gives bread from heaven to those starving in the wilderness (Exodus 16:13-18), to name a few things. And so the people of God are called upon as witnesses in a public courtroom, as it were, to testify to any and everyone that "The Lord has done great things for us" (Psalm 126:3). Christian theology asserts that God is both transcendent and immanent, both beyond us and with us. To leave God "above the fray" is to neglect a major facet of who God has disclosed himself

to be. If the immanence of God is neglected long enough, your sermons will divulge into the lofty platitudes that leave people unmoved, unchallenged, and unchanged. Instead, use your sermon as an opportunity to point to a peculiar God, and summon specific people with a concrete challenge that can be appropriated in particular ways.

Elements of a STICKY Sermon: Kerygma Kerygma is not a word that is on everyone's lips these days. So I'll start off by giving a little background about what it means and what I mean by including it in the list of elements that increase "The Stickiness Factor" of a sermon. My first encounter with the word kerygma came in A Theology of the New Testament by George Ladd. In that book, he identifies kerygma as: "[T]he early church's proclamation of Christ" (p. 10). Granted, a quick trip through church history will yield a few variations on the meaning of the word - some highlighting this or that particular aspect; but for our present purposes, this simple description gets us going in the right direction. Kerygma (pronounced "ker-ig-ma") is a Greek word, which, in verb form, refers to a proclamation or announcement. In later Christian theological discourse, the word took the shape of a noun. It was used as shorthand for the irreducible claims of Christianity, which were made from its earliest days. When the verb form and the noun form are joined, the word takes on a whole new layer of meaning. So it's within reason to offer a present-day, working-definition of the Christian Kerygma as:

The lean proclamation that emerges when the historical events that converged on Jesus are systematized and invested with theological significance. Every proclamation or announcement (Christian or otherwise) has an aim, a goal, an agenda, something it seeks to accomplish as a result of people hearing the utterance. The Christian Kerygma is no different. Its aim is for all people everywhere to "confess with their mouths that 'Jesus is Lord' and believe in their hearts that God raised him from the dead, so as to be saved" (see Romans 10:9). The kerygma achieves what it set out to do when, on the basis of the proclamation, people turn from their customary ways of thinking, being, and doing, and replace them with ways that are congruent with new life in the Kingdom of God. So the kerygma was part of early Christianity's proclamation about Jesus, and they used that proclamation to bring about repentance and faith in those who heard it. But what can we say about the content of the Christian Kerygma? Another way to ask the question is: What did the early Christians proclaim to the non-Christians about the theological significance of the historical events of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection? C.H. Dodd attempted to answer that question by filling up the content of the Christian Kerygma using early New Testament records of preaching from the Apostles Paul and Peter. On the basis of his conclusions, I insist that the ancient Christian Kerygma was comprised of five basic propositions (rooted in Old Testament Expectations):

1) "The Age to Come" has been inaugurated in the midst of the "Present Evil Age." 2) This has happened through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus the Messiah (Christos in Greek, which means, "anointed one"). 3) Through his resurrection, this Jesus has been vindicated, exalted, and enthroned at the right hand of God the Father as "the Christ," the rightful Lord of the world. 4) The Holy Spirit is the present sign of Christ's presence and power among us. 5) The "Age to Come" will reach its consummation when Christ is revealed from heaven, at which time all the living and dead will be justly judged. Then, on the basis of these 5 statements, an appeal is made for people to "repent, believe, and be baptized." Therefore, I place kerygma in the list of elements that make for a sticky sermon because preachers are not merely to drone on with bare facts about what did or didn't happen. Rather, they must seek to explain the significance of the historical events surrounding Jesus in a way that can convince and convert those who are presently standing outside the community of Christian faith. Whereas the previous element -"Challenge" - was posed to "insiders," the kerygma is the directed toward "outsiders." It must be noted, though, that this is only one element of a sticky sermon.

Despite the tendencies of some pastors/churches/denominations, we must remember that this is NOT the main element or the only element of the sermon. But also, despite the tendencies of other pastors/churches/denominations, we must remember that it is an element nonetheless. Two Possible Objections: 1) Isn't that intolerant? My Response: No. I'm approaching the sermon and the kerygma element within it as being given at a particular time in a particular setting, which is decidedly NOT on a street corner - or anywhere else - to disinterested passersby. Further, when people who are not Christians show up in the midst of Christians who are gathered for worship, they are not expecting a music concert, a tailgate party, a coffeehouse conversation (though some sort of planned interaction is certainly a good thing), or anything else of the sort. And if they are expecting those types of experiences, they won't be around for long because neither the church's purpose nor its budget can sustain such things for very long. Instead, they show up at a Christian church because they want to know about the God whom Christians worship as the one true God. The Christian Kerygma meets people where they are, speaks in terms they understand, and allows them to walk away in unrepentant unbelief is they so desire. That is not intolerant. 2) Must the Christian Kerygma be so specific?

My Response: Yes. In a time in which many Americans - including churchgoing Americans - have embraced Gnosticism in its harder and softer forms, Baha’i (even if they don’t call it that), and various forms of deism, it matters that we are clear on the content of what we, as Christians, believe transpired theologically in the historical events surrounding Jesus and the difference it makes for us today. If we fail to do so, we will unwittingly present a watered-down gospel that leaves everything "as-is." William Willimon, a United Methodist Bishop in Alabama, points this out. In his book, The Gospel for the Person Who Has Everything, he insists, "As Christians, as the church, we have demanded so little....We have transformed the faith into an insipid soufflé' with all air and no nourishment, a sweet placebo which cures nothing because it challenges no one....This dull, domesticated, impotent version of the faith is a heresy which mocks the Christianity for which people once bled" (p. 59).

Elements of a STICKY Sermon: Yearning For this element, I have in mind the delivery of the sermon. The light-hearted flippancy that characterizes many sermons today does little to cause people to take inventory of their lives (the whole integration of thoughts and actions related to vocation, occupation, recreation, relationships, and finances) and realign them with the dream of God. Our time is one of increased "spirituality" in which the humanistic arrogance of modernity, which sought to pave concrete over all mystery and grandeur (except for that which pointed to our own assumed excellencies), is giving way to an increased awareness that human beings are more than the sum total of our biological parts. The upshot of this, though, is that people are grasping on to anything that has even the scene of "the divine." Therefore, the present eagerness of people to embrace spirituality must be matched by an equally authentic earnestness of the preacher, by which he asserts what the Christian message is, why it matters, and how it makes sense. Charles Spurgeon, known as the "Prince of Preachers" in 19th century London, once told his ministry students, "If I were asked What in a Christian minister is the most essential quality for securing success in winning souls for Christ? I should reply, 'earnestness': and if I were asked a second or third time, I should not vary the answer, for personal observation drives to the

conclusion that, as a rule, real success is proportionate to the preacher's earnestness" (Lectures to My Students, 305). John Piper, who embodies this idea, echoes the words of Spurgeon. He writes, "I want to give as strong a conviction as words can convey that the work of preaching is to be done in blood-earnestness" (The Supremacy of God in Preaching, 54). What he calls "blood-earnestness," he later brands as "gravity." What's all this talk about blood, earnestness, and gravity? Piper explains, "Intensity of feeling, the weight of argument, a deep and pervading solemnity of mind, a savor of the power of godliness, fervency of spirit, zeal for God - these are the marks of the 'gravity of preaching'" (Ibid., 54). This is also what I have in mind when I say "yearning." This yearning for God to be glorified through the joyous obedience of his people was a hallmark of sticky preaching in the bygone era of the 17th and 18th centuries. There's a story in circulation of a man who comes across David Hume, the 18th century philosopher, on the street one day in London. The man asked Hume where he was headed. Hume replied that he was going to hear George Whitefield preach. "But surely," his acquaintance asked, "you don't believe what Whitefield preaches, do you?" "No, I don't, " answered Hume, "but he does" (John Stott, Between Two Worlds, 269-270). There is a direct connection between the conveyance of sincere passion and deep thought and sermons that resonate with people, draw them in, and keep them engaged.

There are many people among us whose lives consist of moving from one amusement to the next - paying, playing, and paying some more. For those who recognize that such a strategy for life offers a truncated version of lasting joy, an encounter with a message of love, restoration, and hope that calls them to something greater than themselves will be a welcome off-ramp back to "the land of the living." People do not respond in meaningful ways to bare facts or trite slogans. Bare facts rarely make their way into the heart, and trite slogans rarely hold up in the face of trials. Instead, people respond when thoughtful arguments for truth are delivered with sincere passion and nuanced clarity, and supplemented with a life of humble authenticity to match. The people of God assemble to hear a holy utterance that reshapes life for some, and reaffirms life for others. The thing they are not there to hear is a comedy routine full of meaningless oneliners. So, as a pastor, you must use the sermon as an opportunity to plead and call for people to believe, become, and do that which brings honor and glory to God. To do anything less is to waste your breath and their time.