Preaching Narratively

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Preaching (part 7)

The traditional homiletic that developed during the Enlightenment follows a deductive logic and is often given the shorthand description of Point 1, Point 2, Point 3. Often, but not always, the deductive sequence arrangement is static. It does not move towards a conclusion. A way to test if the traditional arrangement has movement is to rearrange the points. If the sequence of the points does not matter, then the sermon is static in the presentation of the material. The New Homiletic addresses how the listener experiences the sermon.1 Craddock used stories as a way for the audience to experience the movement of the sermon like the way the Bible itself preaches. Craddock did this often through inductive logic or indirect speech. More so than any other way, the New Homiletic embraced narrative to present the sequence of the content in a dynamic way. Grady Davis says,

There is one compelling reason, among other reasons, why I shall not rely on the word “outline” to designate the plan of a sermon. The conventional outline is a static and visual plan, whereas the sermon can be properly planned only as an audible movement in time. The proper plan of a sermon, then, the proper sketch of a sermon, the proper design of a sermon, is the design of a time-continuity. And so I shall prefer to speak of the continuity or the movement of a sermon, rather than of its outline…A sermon is a continuity of sounds, looks, gestures, which follow one another in time. A sermon is not static like a painting. A painting shows itself as a whole in a single instant…A sermon is like a play, not the printed book but the action on a stage, which moves from a first act through a second to a third, and the drama is never seen all at once. A sermon is like a story told aloud, where each sentence has gone forever into the past before the next is spoken…Once I have worked my idea through in its structure and its development, in its generals and its particulars, I can see it all at once in my mind. It is then like a picture to me…If there is ever to be a complete picture in the preacher’s mind, he has to see where each piece fits and put the picture together for himself.2

Plot is the strategic sequencing of (events, musical notes, arguments, images, actions, etc.) through time. For example, if you rearrange the notes, you change the song. Eugene Lowry has the example of a song that gathers all the same notes together (AAAACCDDDDFFFFFFGGGBbF#F#) without thought to the arrangement. But when he rearranges the notes, you have “Amazing Grace.” Form matters. And that leads us to consider the plot, a narrative device that arranges the form.

Narrative & Movement: While your destination is discerned first during the exegetical process, you do not begin the sermon on Sunday at the end. The sermon will begin at the beginning. The sermon is not static like a painting but flows moment by moment through time. The metaphor is not the score of notes on a page but the live performance of the music.3 The movement of the words through time is plotted sequence that moves from here to there – beginning to end. In the homiletical journey, do not leave the listeners behind.

Aristotle, in POETICS (http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/poetics.html),4 identified the plot as moving from conflict (tension) to complication (the plot thickens) to climax to denouement. Or as Eugene Lowry often says, “from itch to scratch.”5 Reversal is a key term in plotting and an essential element to the theological goal of transformation. Often the terms Orientation, Disorientation, Reorientation are used to describe moving an audience from where they are to where you intend to take them.

Foster-Harris6 – recommendations for telling a story that simplifies Aristotle’s Poetics. He emphasizes the reversal aspect of plot.

    1. Action in narrative is often experienced as conflict. Set the situation and characters in place with no flashbacks until the action is well underway, making sure that you start with action having already Do not begin with description that has no action. Use description only to serve action. [Sensing’s Note: the character to first consider is God (Father, Son, Spirit); the action, God’s action.]
    2. Develop some complication at the beginning arising from the internal conflict and the character’s decisions and actions. Do not discuss the emotions; simply show the signs of the emotions in a character’s actions or appearance.
    3. Move to a crisis in which the character makes a
    4. Conclude with the resolution (denouement) of the climax.

Lowry’s Loop is a shorthand way to describe the plot and is sometimes illustrated as a Valley Sermon. Both images reflect movement and flow. Lowry, Homiletical Plot (1980); Doing Time in the Pulpit (1985); The Sermon: Dancing the Edge of Mystery (1997) describe the Loop as a narrative plot.

    1. Upsetting the Equilibrium
    2. Analyzing the Discrepancy
    3. Disclosing the Clue to Resolution
    4. Experiencing the Gospel
    5. Anticipating the Consequences

Compare to A.H. Monroe’s (1948) Motivated Sequence. It consists of five steps:

    1. Attention: Get the attention of your audience using a detailed story, shocking example, dramatic statistic, quotations, etc.
    2. Need: Show that the problem about which you are speaking exists, that it is significant, and that it won’t go away by Use statistics, examples, etc. Convince your audience that there is a need for action to be taken.
    3. Satisfy: You need to solve the Provide specific and viable solutions that the government or communities can implement to solve the problem.
    4. Visualization: Tell the audience what will happen if the solution is implemented or does not take place. Be visual and detailed.
    5. Action: Tell the audience what action they can take personally to solve the

The advantage of Monroe’s Motivated Sequence is that it emphasizes what the audience can do. Too often, the audience feels like a situation is hopeless; Monroe’s motivated sequence emphasizes the action the audience can take. Lowry’s Loop sees the Motivated Sequence as a way to provide sermons with narrative logic.

This series on preaching will conclude next week with part 8, Narrative and Sermon Design.

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  1. Reid, Fleer, and Bullock, “Preaching as the Creation of an Experience,” 1–9.
  2. Davis, Design for Preaching, 12; 163–64.
  3. Davis, Design for Preaching, 163–164. Davis’s text in 1958 moves away from the idea of “outline” when conceiving of a The classic text is often cited as the beginning of a movement called the “New Homiletic.” See Sensing, “After the Craddock Revolution,” 211–219.
  4. Sensing, “Aristotle’s Poetics,” http://www.homiletic.net/index.php/homiletic/
  5. Lowry, The Homiletical Plot, 15–21. The “Lowry Loop” is a description of a common homiletical form that is seen in various textbooks and is summarized concisely by Allen, Determining the Form.
  6. Foster-Harris, The Basic Patterns of Plot.