Where Is He Going with This?

Sameness and predictability undermine effective preaching. While I certainly want my congregation to rest assured of my bedrock theology, I work diligently and think deeply to keep my preaching and presentation of that biblical truth from being too formulaic. How many times can one say, for example, “David was a great king, but he was a sinful king, a failed king who makes us long for a greater King… ”? That’s certainly true enough, but if that’s my conclusion to all twenty-three sermons I preach in 2 Samuel, my church would be hard pressed to remain interested. 

That’s why I sometimes take an unexpected route to get to the main message. I may open up and examine some easily ignored detail or nuance in the text that, while not the main point of the text, was included by the author – and ultimately, the Holy Spirit – as integral to the I Story or the truth. Using that seemingly insignificant element as the entry point to the surrounding text sometimes feels like climbing in the window instead of walking through the front door, but it keeps the audience interested. They are trying to figure out where I am going, but ! they have to go with me to find out! Then when I turn toward home and the sermon lands solidly on the Gospel focus of the passage, the congregation collectively shares in that wonderful sense of arrival and revelation. 

Last Christmas, for instance, I faced the same challenge that every pastor faces during Advent and the Easter seasons. We gladly preach the same great truth, but we don’t want to do it the same old way. How – can I preach a familiar birth narrative passage and keep people from losing attention because they’ve heard it before? 

I chose the Matthew passage on the visit of the Magi, but after reading the text aloud I began talking about Herod the Great. I almost made it sound as if I like the guy. I told how he so deftly convinced Caesar Augustus to name him – an Idumean and descendent of Esau – King of the Jews! I recounted his military prowess, his inexplicable architectural genius, his uncanny ability to manipulate Rome, and his death grip on Israel. Then I shifted to his long descent into madness, his megalomaniacal paranoia that caused him to murder his favorite wife, his brother-in-law the High Priest, his own sons, and anyone else that he believed threatened his claim on the throne he had schemed and plotted to possess and to hold. 

I knew everyone was asking “Where is he going with this?” When I had taken them down that path about as far as I reasonably could, I then shifted to the Magi, describing their route from the east, passing through Jericho and seeing Herod’s winter palace, walking by Herod’s aqueduct through the Wadi Qelt up the mountains to Jerusalem to see the gleam of gold on Herod’s Temple as they topped the Mount of Olives. 

Many sights on their route spoke of Herod’s greatness, but they surely did not know that he was murderously mad and they could not have known that their simple question was the most threatening words they could have possibly spoken: “Where is He who is born King of the Jews?” 

Now, on firm Gospel footing, I could take it home. I could speak of the glory of a King who did not clutch at power but laid it aside. I could extol the virtue of a King who did not take life but laid it down. He did not reside in a palace but was laid in a manger. 

The NewTestament is replete with examples of this. Even Jesus didn’t preach the same way every time. The Olivet Discourse is nothing like the Sermon on the Mount. Stephen’s sermon surely made his audience wonder where he was going with his recitation of Israel’s history (and they did not mistake his meaning when he got there!). Even Paul emphasized different aspects of the same text from Habakkuk in three different uses (Acts 13:41; Romans 1:17; Galatians 3:11). 

Faithful exposition does not require repetitiveness. While we always want to preach the meaning and the message of the text, we do not always have to take the same route to explaining it. Sometimes, like those ancient visitors from the East who came to worship Jesus, we have to go home by another way.