I want to suggest some practical things that will help you in the area of proclamation. I will give them to you first and then we can elaborate on them.

First of all, atmosphere. Secondly, attention. Thirdly, action.

These are the ingredients that, I would suggest to you, are necessary for effective proclamation.

Atmosphere

The atmosphere must be conducive to openness and receptivity to the word. It says repeatedly that the people gathered at daybreak. They listened till noon. They apparently stood up during this time. You know, these guys apparently knew how to communicate. And I don't want to delay the point here, but there's certain things you can do to produce an atmosphere that is conducive to effective proclamation. It clearly happened here.

Well, how would you go about thinking of ways in which you can make the atmosphere conducive to receptivity in a church service? Have you ever thought about that? What is it that is going to make the people receptive when I stand up and preach the word? Well, of course, it became obvious to me that the key to that is for you to give a lot of attention to what has gone before in the service.

Now, one of the things that we discovered here at Elmbrook is that people regarded the first part of the service as preliminaries, and when the preaching started the service started. We realized, once we took a strong stand against this idea, that in many ways we were reflecting this philosophy in the lack of attention we were giving to the "preliminaries." When it came to the preaching, a lot of care and attention had gone into it. We recognized that we were going to have to do more work in that area. Now, we do gather—a group of us—gather on a Monday afternoon, and we carefully plan out the details of the worship service. And that's what we're concerned about. We're concerned that the whole service be cohesive, and that there is an atmosphere designed to make people increasingly receptive to the Word. We don't ask them to be here at daybreak and keep them until lunch, and we do let them sit down.

Here's another question for you: if you were going to speak in a coffeehouse to a lot of teenagers, how would you go about it? You certainly wouldn't go about it the same way you would for a church service. When I worked in a coffeehouse ministry many years ago, there were one or two things I discovered.

One was that ten minutes of speaking was quite long enough for them. But if you gave them 50 minutes of music, they were ready to listen to 10 more minutes of talk. We made the adjustment simply. All we did was have 50 minutes of music, and on the hour I'd talk for 10 minutes, then have [50] more minutes of music and on the next hour I'd come on for 10 more minutes. They'd stay for four or five hours. They actually got 50 minutes of talking. And in between, they had 50 minutes of discussion as the music was going on.

Another thing I discovered was that if I went with a set talk, it went over like a lead balloon. But if I simply got on the table and said, "Okay, what would you like me to talk about now?" it would only be a matter of seconds till somebody would shout some crazy thing out. And I'd talk. There was an atmosphere of receptivity there.

The atmosphere is something that you need to be concerned about to have effective proclamation. It should be pleasant. It should be positive.

Attention

To have effective proclamation, there has to be attention. The people have to pay attention to what is being said. This breaks down into two obvious divisions. Number one: getting their attention. And number two: keeping it. Of course if you never get it, then it's extremely difficult to keep it. On the other hand, it's possible to get it and lose it quickly.

If there's going to be effective proclamation, what do we do about getting people's attention? Obviously, subject matter is very important. I did something last Sunday that I've done on only one occasion before. I don't advocate doing it all the time. I've only done it twice in 17 years. I gave everybody in the congregation a piece of paper. On the piece of paper was written: "I would like to hear a sermon no longer than _______ minutes, entitled 'What the Bible says about ________.'" And we received hundreds of responses. In fact, I spent my holiday on Monday going through these things. It's fascinating to find out the kind of things that people want to hear.

My normal style of preaching is systematic exposition. I take a passage of Scripture and preach systematically through. I just finished a 24-week series on the Epistle to the Romans. However, if you're going to go through Romans, you can lose people quickly. The key is this: you have to identify a topic in that systematic exposition every week that is going to grab people's attention.

I preached through Genesis. You know there are 50 chapters in Genesis, so I made a promise before we started that I would take 50 weeks on it—no more, no less—one chapter per week. I knew there were some chapters where I could stay for a long time. And there were some chapters that I'd have liked to avoid like the plague. But I made this a public commitment.

We were going along nicely. Then we came across the chapter where the main topic seems to be the rape of Dinah. Of course, the congregation knew what was coming up next. I got a number of phone calls that week saying, "You're not going to preach on this chapter. You're not going to preach on it."

And I said, "Why not?"

And they said, "Because it's most unsuitable."

And I said, "Well, it's inspired, isn't it?"

And they said, "Well, yes."

And I said, "Well, is it unsuitably inspired or is it inspired unsuitability? You know, what's your problem here?"

They said, "Well, we're not going to bring our children."

And I said, "Why not? It would probably do them good."

I was being casual about the whole thing to them, but I worked on that chapter. I didn't know what in the world to do with it. I studied it and studied it and studied it. In the end I remember pushing it away, pushing my books away, and taking a break, and picking up the newspaper. I put my feet up on the desk and thought I'd read the newspaper for a few minutes and then come back refreshed.

As I was reading the front page of the Milwaukee journal, I got my pen out and I circled one story and then I read another one, circled the next one, and then circled the next one. And then I went back to the story of the rape of Dinah. You know what I discovered? I discovered the front page of the Milwaukee Centennial had in detail all the things that were talked about in that chapter of Genesis. And do you know what that chapter of Genesis is about? Violence. Every conceivable type of violence. And do you know what the Milwaukee paper was full of? Violence. I discovered that if you work long enough you'll see what you need for the text, if there's something to trigger it. That sermon probably was one of the most effective of the whole series that we did on Genesis, but it was also the one I least wanted to do.

So, subject material is important. How do we go about getting people's attention? We have to make sure that it is always God-centered, and that people can relate to it. It must always be God centered. It must always be people related.

Another thing that is important is the introduction. The television people know that the most crucial part of a television program is the first 90 seconds. That's when people are twiddling the knobs. And you've got to try to get them in those first 90 seconds. If you do, they're rather reluctant to twiddle after that. They've settled down, and you got them for the whole thing. Preaching is like that. The introduction is crucial in terms of people's attention. How might this be done?

I remember as a teenager, listening to Donald Grey Barnhouse, the well-known preacher from Philadelphia. He was preaching in England at the Keswick Convention. The Convention is very staid and terribly proper—staid and proper as only the British can do it. I've been away for a long time. And I remember him getting up, and I still remember his introduction. This is what Barnhouse did: He got up to the pulpit, and after the polite, staid introduction that was typical of the conference, at the top of his considerable voice he shouted, "The way to up is down!"

Total silence.

And then he said, "The way to down is up!" He got people's attention. And of course he then went on to explain that if you humble yourself, God will exalt you. That if you exalt yourself, God will humble you. The way to up is down. The way to down is up.

Now you can't always come up with something like that. But if you give some thought to it, it's amazing how you can quickly get people's attention.

Not infrequently, it helps just to start off with a story. People love stories. If you tell a story that is interesting, and relevant, it's even more helpful.

I remember on one occasion saying to the congregation, "I saw a friend of mine this week. He was telling me about playing golf on one occasion and that he had a terrible time. Now, I told him my definition of golf is a good walk spoiled. And with the way I play golf, it's terribly spoiled.

"My friend was playing golf, and he got very, very frustrated with the whole thing. In the end, in total frustration, he got hold of his bag of clubs, and hurled them into the lake, saying he would never play again.

"He then went to the clubhouse and drowned his sorrows at the bar. He stayed there until it was closing time. They suggested to him politely that it would be time for him to leave, and so he got up from his barstool, made his way to the door, went to his car, felt in his pocket for his car keys, and realized they were in his golf bag.

"So, he called to his friends, who got in their cars, drove down the fairway, and shone their lights on the lake. He took off his clothes, stripped down to his underwear, and dived into the lake. This is a true story. He got his golf bag, pulled it out, unzipped it, got his car keys out, zipped it up again, and threw it back in the lake."

The talk that day was about frustration. Have you ever been frustrated like that? It got people's attention.

You can take an extreme situation, a humorous situation, or a situation with which people will relate. You get their attention.

How do we get their attention? First of all, by careful choice of subject matter. Secondly, by introduction.

Thirdly, by your demeanor. You want people to notice you. Now, don't misunderstand that. You want the people to somehow or other to notice that you've started preaching. It sounds like a silly sort of thing, but some of them often don't notice.

You've heard the story of the preacher who dreamt that he was preaching and woke up and discovered he was. That must be a terrible thing to happen to you. Now imagine what it must be like to be a pew sitter and dream that you're sitting in a pew and wake up and discover you are. That happens every Sunday in church. People dream they're in church and wake up and discover that they are. And they have not the remotest idea what's going on. Why is that? One of the reasons is that you have never gotten their attention by letting them know that you've started. Something is about to begin. Now folks, make sure you're a part of it.

I don't advocate this, but a good friend of mine in Mandeville, Jamaica, was the pastor of the largest church in that city. In fact, it was the largest church of his denomination in Jamaica. He was a Rhode Scholar, an Oxford Blue—a brilliant guy, but he wasn't getting anywhere with his church. He would normally preach in a Geneva gown. I remember wearing a Geneva gown preaching for him once in that church. It was about 90 degrees with no air conditioning, and the Geneva gown puts it up about another 30 degrees. Sweat would run off his face when he wore that gown.

In this particular case, he decided he wasn't getting their attention. When it was time for the sermon, there was no sign of him. Then they heard a bell ringing out in the foyer of the church.

Everyone looks around as it gets louder and louder and nearer and nearer. There's the pastor ringing the bell, dressed in sackcloth and ashes. He came and stood in the pulpit in sackcloth and ashes, and he kept ringing his bell. "Now that I have your attention," he said, "I'd like to tell you what I believe is happening in this church." That's one way of getting your church's attention.

You can get people's attention with your demeanor. Eye contact is crucial. I worry about people who get their heads buried in their notes. Clearly preachers can have different approaches as far as notes and manuscripts are concerned, but eye contact is important.

If you're preaching a serious message, your face should convey a serious demeanor. If you're preaching something penetrating, then you should convey that in your demeanor. If there's something that's going to be warm and embracing and tender about your message, that could be easily conveyed.

I love preaching in this church. I've preached in churches all over the world. This is my favorite. One of the reasons is this beautifully open platform. When I preach, I'll always put my Bible and my brief outline down, but I don't stay here for more than a few seconds. Then it becomes a case of "moving out." The important thing is that you can quickly get people's attention at this point by your demeanor. It's amazing how if it's warm, tender, embracing sort of thing, what a difference it makes if you just come down two steps.

On the other hand, if it is something that is striking and powerful, you should move around. If there's a strong point that you're making, you should face one way and turn around. I'm not talking about theatricals. I'm talking about your whole demeanor showing that you're caught up in this thing. It has become part of you. What you're saying is important. That's how you get attention.

So, how do we keep people's attention?

A rule of thumb: predictability produces boredom. I have a tendency to be predictable in my style of preaching. I recognize that, but I'll go with that because I feel that there's structure, and it helps me. But within that structure of a predictable style, I try to make certain that there are unpredictable things that are going to happen. Things that will arrest them when you feel that the attention is slipping away. I play off the congregation. I found, for instance, one of the great things is when something happens in the congregation and people are just sort of lulling away.

On one occasion I was preaching, and things were getting a bit tedious. A little kid in the congregation did what most of the adults would like to do. He's sitting there [big, loud sigh] in the middle of the congregation. I stopped when he did this, and I said, "I know exactly how you feel. You get a bit bored about this thing. So do your mom and dad, but they're too polite to admit it. And the reason that I know that they're bored is because, quite frankly, I got bored with this bit as well. So why don't we go into the next thing?" Everybody laughed, picked up, and we went from there.

You need to maintain a kind of spontaneity. Don't just look for the congregation to respond to you, but work to respond to them. For example: sometimes I'll recognize that people are looking at me like they just don't understand. In that case, I'll sometimes point to someone and say, "Do you understand what I'm trying to say?" They'll say, "No."

"And I'll tell you why. Because I'm not too clear myself. Now, let me run it through again."

This sort of thing helps keep their attention. There's spontaneity, freedom. Now, you don't want to overdo this. I'm not doing it all the time. But there are times when it will help. That's what I mean by "unpredictability."

Uninvolvement kills interest. If you're not involving the people in your preaching, then it makes it harder for you to hold their interest. One of the things that I do to encourage involvement is to print up an outline of my sermon, and everybody in the congregation gets a copy of it. There's a page for notes beside it as well. Not everybody uses it, but many of the people do.

The old device of the rhetorical question involves people. But sometimes I use the rhetorical question that really isn't a rhetorical question. I'll encourage people to respond, to shout out. As they do, it's obvious that some are thinking and some are not.

So, keeping this attention—now that you've got it—is absolutely crucial. If you can be animated, that will help tremendously.

I remember when I first started radio ministry. We took the trouble to record radio messages. We didn't have much of a radio studio in those days. It was a real mom and pop affair, but we worked hard on it.

The people who were encouraging me to do this radio program said, "It's important for you to recognize you preach aggressively. It feels that way when there are a lot of people. But on the radio, only one person is listening to you, so it's got to be conversational. It's got to be confidential."

So I got all conversational and confidential. People started to write in to the program saying, "Stuart, we're praying for you. It's obvious that you're ill. We're concerned about you. You're obviously exhausted."

I was trying to be confidential. I was trying to be conversational. My normal style where there's a lot of animation, there's a lot of things happening, was totally gone. People were concerned because they were not being held; they were not being arrested in the same way they did when I preached in person.

It was dull, quite frankly. I'm not just talking about the subject material—the way it was being communicated was dull indeed.

Action

The next thing is action. Demosthenes, when asked, "What are the essentials of oratory?" said, "Action, action, and action."

I think that if there's animation, if there's action in presentation, you're much more likely to hold people's attention. Action, action, action.

Martyn Lloyd-Jones, who was conservative in his approach to preaching, said this, "Preaching involves the whole personality of the preacher. Even the body is involved." Pretty obvious, when you think about it, but how much thought do we give to that?

A lot of preachers, you can't even see their bodies. They've got them stuck in a box. Occasionally, they'll flail away with their arms, or they'll give a half-hearted gesture, but the body may as well not be there.

Let me suggest one or two words here that relate to this. One is mobility. If there's some degree of mobility in your preaching, that will hold attention. That will assist in proclamation.

Do you remember when I told you the story about my friend with the golf bag? You can stand up there and say, "I have a friend who told me an interesting story. He said he was playing golf on one occasion, and he got so frustrated with it that in the end he threw his bag of clubs in the lake. And then he went to the bar and …" That's one way of telling it.

But you could also tell it this way: "I have a friend …" And you start smiling. You're enjoying this thing. "And he was playing golf one day, and he got so frustrated with this game that he got hold of his golf bag and he suddenly heads for the lake and he threw it in." You see? Now all you're doing is utilizing a different part of you to get across something simple. Now you've got to limit this thing because when you get to the part about how he took off his clothes … so in other words, use a little discretion at this point. Enough said. Mobility.

Flexibility is something else that happens when action is involved. And we've already touched on this. The flexibility of maintaining eye contact—keeping an eye on the people, because when you keep an eye on the people, you can move around, and you can watch them, and they know that you're looking at them. That helps them to concentrate. And it also helps you to be increasingly relevant because you can tell when you're losing them. You can tell when they're disinterested. Watch people's eyes. They glaze over at a certain point. Watch their eyelids. They begin to droop.

You know what I look for when I'm preaching as far as facial expressions are concerned? I look for people's mouths open ever so slightly. When their mouths open ever so slightly, you've got them. Why? Because they are now totally unconscious of themselves. Action also involves proximity. This is one thing that I learned years ago. One day during my coffeehouse ministry, a young man came up to me and said, "The trouble with you preachers is you stand six feet above contradiction."

What he was referring to was of course the "high and lifted up" pulpit. Up away from the people, you stand six feet above contradiction. He said, "I like you because you come down on our level."

Now you can do this in a variety of ways. If you do this physically, you'll begin to build up some genuine proximity with the people.

I had a friend in England named Michael Bourne. He was John Stott's successor at All Souls, and is now the Bishop of Chester. Michael preached in an Anglican church, where he'd always be wearing cassocks—very formal.

He would always preach with remarkable proximity. He'd come down from his pulpit and stand there and speak a certain part of the sermon to people. And it was not threatening to them at all. He was such a warm character. I personally wouldn't go that far. But that would get their attention. It would certainly communicate a real sense of oneness with the people.

Stuart Briscoe is minister-at-large of Elmbrook Church in Brookfield, Wisconsin, and author of several books, including What Works When Life Doesn't (Howard Books).