Task 3: Modify the first draft of your homiletical outline according to the values of a homiletical plot, if appropriate.
Essence of the task
If appropriate, modify your first homiletical outline according to the parameters of a homiletical plot/script.
Detailed description
Formally, this task is “optional”. It is optional mainly because it is a second way to work on the homiletical outline you prepared in the previous task. In the event that you do not perform this task, you will still have a fully functional homiletical outline ready to fill in for preaching. Besides, it will not always be desirable to apply the guidelines set forth in this task.
However, modifying your outline according to the parameters of a homiletical “script” can be tremendously valuable for delivering a sermon that really captures the listener’s attention and keeps him or her fully engaged until the very end. Understood in this way, this task is all about ensuring that the work you have done has a maximal chance of producing the fruit you desire in the lives of your listeners. With a little extra thought, it can add a great deal of dynamism and impact to your sermons.
In my experience, the present task almost always serves (at the very least) at some level as a “superstructure” for the final structure I give to a sermon. It requires writing the final outline of the sermon more like a scriptwriter than a philosopher.
The essence of this task is drawn from a short book by Eugene L. Lowry entitled The Homiletical Plot. Lowry argues that the homiletical structures with which many of us work place too much weight on the logical elements and not enough weight on the dynamics of communication. He asks, “ What would the story of the Prodigal Son have been like if Jesus had organized his message on the basis of its logical components rather than on the son’s journey?” (p. 12).
Some might say, “Yes, but the parable of the Prodigal Son was a story. To organize it as a philosophical treatise would have ruined it.” That is precisely the point.
However, I do not mean to argue that every sermon has to be made into a story, far from it. Not at all! Rather, I want to argue that for a sermon to capture and hold the attention of the listener it must contain the components that make a story work. Specifically, an issue to be resolved and a resolution that doesn’t come until the end. That is exactly where Lowry has been so helpful to me. He talks about creating “homiletical tension,” and maintaining that homiletical tension until the end of the sermon. He comments, “Unfortunately, we have been taught to begin our sermons by giving away the plot…” (34). Just because the preacher is very clear about his main idea does not mean that he has to state it in the introduction!
To Do
The beauty of Lowry’s book is that in addition to pointing out the importance of thinking like a script writer, he offers a clear structure that makes it easy for the preacher to develop an outline that will hold the listener’s interest. He speaks of five phases, which are detailed below. When this task suggests “modifying the first outline based on a homiletic script,” it is precisely these five phases that serve as the basis for such modification.
- Phase 1: Create disequilibrium – You need to capture the listener’s attention. Everyone knows this and comments on it. It’s what is said every time you talk about an introduction, and it’s also generally understood that you have 30 seconds to do it. However, many of us waste those first 30 seconds with announcements or ministry reports. We do not always give first thought to the urgent need to arouse the concern of the person sitting in the pew so that the Divine Word has the opportunity to speak to him or her about a matter of vital importance in his or her life. And unfortunately, there are too many occasions in which we waste this opportunity simply for lack of preparation. But the most important failure is the one that has to do with the second phase.
- Phase 2: Dig into the discrepancy – We need to transform the initial attention into sustained interest in the importance of the topic and the desire to discover the outcome or resolution of the issue. In this step, it is important to perform a careful analysis of the problem. You must avoid a superficial analysis at all costs. And to achieve that you have to go beyond describing the facts, and explore the causes. Lowry argues that if the discrepancy is insufficiently or poorly analyzed, we lose credibility with the listener.
- Phase 3: Uncover the key to resolution – Consider a joke. You laugh because something emerges that you didn’t expect. It is a “reverse” of that which is normal. The punchline catches you by surprise. This is what should happen in preaching. Fortunately, according to Lowry, this is not so difficult if we understand that there is discontinuity between what is generally considered “truthful” and what is “truthful as God sees it.”
- Phase 4: Experience the Gospel – In this step you have to prescribe the corresponding remedy for the discovery you revealed in the previous phase.
- Phase 5: Anticipate the consequences – Help the listener see the results that can be expected if he or she puts into practice what was prescribed in the fourth phase. This is where true stories of someone who did what you just recommended come in handy. In fact, I think we should become experts at finding and saving true stories of people who live in accordance with the implications of the gospel.
With that in mind, here is a word of caution of the utmost importance.
To Keep in Mind
To keep in mind
Care must be taken that these five phases – because of their homiletical usefulness – do not become the automatic structure each week. Biblical fidelity still compels that the demands of the text be placed above all other considerations. Rather, these five phases should function as a kind of “filter” through which I examine the structure suggested to me by the main idea of the passage and the purposes it establishes for me.
For practical purposes, therefore, the question I ask of each outline I develop is, “Should I nuance the organization or presentation of this outline in some way so that it better reflects the intentions of these five phases?” In this way the phases serve the text and support its homiletical development without forcing a development that would lead the sermon away from the text it was initially intended to explain.
With this caveat in mind, at the very least, this concept highlights to me the imperative need not to remove the “homiletic tension” from the sermon by the way I organize the outline. In fact, I never tire of telling any preacher who will listen to me that this popular idea of (1) “tell the people what I am going to tell them”, (2) “say it”, and (3) “tell them what I just told them” is a deadly recipe that guarantees that no one will be compelled to pay attention beyond (1) «telling the people what I am going to tell them.»