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PREACHING SKILLSThe Playful PreacherUsing humor and ironyRichard Hansen
Most listeners today are skeptical of power and control. With our culture's commitment to relativism, we have been taught to fear patriarchy and colonialism, not to mention preachers and politicians. To protect ourselves from manipulation, the current generation often use irony. The shrug and the wink deconstruct power better than argument or confrontation. If we don't take the government, Church, university, or media seriously, they can't hurt us, says the postmodernist. Besides, who's to say whose version of "truth" is true, anyway?
While preachers who see themselves as heralds of God's Word must be skeptical of such skepticism, I believe we can plunder the Egyptians by using humor and irony in our preaching. More playfulness can help us communicate more seriously. But that's not easy for me, one whose spiritual ancestors are John Calvin and John Knox.
As I've tried to lighten up, here's what I've discovered.
Coloring inside the lines
Playfulness is sometimes misunderstood. One of my early attempts came while preaching about sexuality. To introduce the sermon, I asked both the men and women to read responsively some of the more graphic passages from the Song of Songs. Sure that I had made my point, I playfully asked when they were finished, "Did any of you know this X-rated material was in the Bible?"
I was met with stone-faced, hostile silence. One person's playfulness is another's irreverence. So it is wise to know your congregation's limits.
Another try with my current church brought better results. A guest preacher had described being so excited when his football team scored a touchdown that he jumped off the couch in front of the TV, pumped his arm up and down, and shouted, "Yes, yes, yes. YES!" So I decided to use his antics the following Sunday after a soloist had just sung a deeply moving piece.
"There's just one thing I want to say after James's song," I said in my best preacher's voice. I paused. Then, pumping my arm, I said, "Yes, yes, yes. YES!" Everyone who had attended the previous Sunday roared with laughter.
My former congregation would have seen this as irreverent. But not this church. They considered it playful—and appropriate.
Playful preachers do not try to use reverse psychology. It's not stating the opposite of what I desire. ("Guess what? Our church does not need your money this year.") Such obvious gimmicks are both ineffective and false.
Playfulness does not misrepresent or deny the truth; it creates a new dynamic—within me. "The major effect of playfulness and paradox is on the perpetrator," says Friedman. "It takes him or her out of the feedback position. It detriangles and changes the balance of the emotional interdependency. It is the change in the structure of the triangle that gets the other person functioning or thinking differently."
In preaching, I am the "perpetrator." Becoming more playful affects me more than my audience. I lighten up. Playfulness frees me from trying so hard to make an impact. Hence, the emotional triangle involving me, the congregation, and the message changes. People are free to listen without activating their defenses. The possibility of impact actually increases.
That's the paradox.
Around the Maginot Line
I've found it helpful to identify who in the congregation I feel most responsible to convince. Ironically, these are often the very people I will never touch. Why? They have built a Maginot Line.
The Maginot Line was the impenetrable system of barriers and bunkers built by France to protect itself from Imperial Germany after World War I. In World War II, however, Hitler didn't attack France through the Maginot Line. His Panzer divisions made a sweeping detour around it through Belgium. France fell swiftly.
When preachers try too hard to make an impact, Klaxons sound and bunker walls go up. My people often know what I'm going to say even before I say it (they know the issues I'm most serious about). When facing a Maginot Line, frontal attacks are valiant but ineffective.
Rather than slug it out in a frontal attack, wisdom suggests a detour. What is the last thing they expect me to say on this issue? What would make them laugh? How can I good-naturedly (not spitefully) be playful?
To sting like a bee
Playful preachers do not overemphasize exegetical data. As a young preacher, I was certain that if I marshaled enough exegetical evidence (from the original languages, of course), I could bludgeon my listeners into belief. My sermons were like boxing matches: I didn't always score a knockout, but I expected to win on points.
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