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Practicing the Principle of Differentiation

How to consistently connect with your hearers.
Practicing the Principle of Differentiation
Image: Andriy Onufriyenko / Getty

The sermon tanked and, consequently, I felt miserable. Perhaps I’m guilty of placing too much of my identity in preaching but when my sermons flop it makes for a long and sad Sunday. My homiletical despair, however, wasn’t located in the study; I had labored on the preparation and felt good about the sermon’s content and structure. Moreover, I had spent time in prayer asking for God’s grace as I preached. But as I was delivering the message I could feel it falling flat. It simply wasn’t connecting and, even behind their masks, the congregants couldn’t hide their boredom.

So, after the final song, a few perfunctory fist bumps and some quick comments to “have a safe week,” I beat a hasty retreat to my car. All the way home I brooded over what happened—or more accurately—what didn’t happen in the sermon. And after a time of analysis, I concluded the sermon fizzled because I failed to practice the principle of differentiation.

What Differentiation Means

While preachers don’t mention this much, communication experts talk about it all the time. Differentiation is where the speaker consistently does different things to keep the talk progressing and maintain audience attention.

For example, moving from one side of the stage to the other while speaking invokes differentiation of space. Variety of tone and rate while speaking highlights vocal differentiation. The use of illustrations—especially anecdotes and stories that are different in content and style from each other—helps the message connect with different members of the audience. Using props or other visual aids promotes sermonic differentiation by giving the audience something new to focus on.

Although I’m an experienced preacher, I forgot to implement most of these tools and the result was far from stellar. Given my stumble in the pulpit, can I expand here to help us preach in a way that will consistently connect with our listeners?

Move During the Message

Communication studies have long pointed out that audiences’ often “see” the speaker more than they “hear” him or her. Moreover, recent studies of the brain indicate that “speaker movement” increases serotonin in listeners, thus increasing memory and learning.

That means it’s essential for those of us who preach to move in some way or another during the sermon. Purposeful gestures, stepping to the side of the podium or moving from one side of stage to the other at appropriate moments can all enhance the power of our delivery. These “moves” force the audience to follow us with their eyes, and hopefully, keep them connected to what we’re saying with our words.

We need not be neurotic in our movements; a few carefully spaced gestures and moves while looking our listeners in the eye will provide some physical differentiation as we preach.

Vary Your Pitch and Rate

Although I’m ethnically Anglo, I’ve long been a fan of my African-American brothers and sisters who preach. Thru the decades, they’ve developed a tradition of vocal variety that, often times, is simply spellbinding. Sometimes they start slow and build to a crescendo; other times they speed up and then slow down to speak in a whisper. Their congregants eagerly follow along and shout back “Amen,” “That’s right,” or “Come on, now.” A friend of mine who is a gifted preacher and a person of color says that “White folks talk back by taking notes.”

My own experience reinforces his observation and that requires those of us who preach in less energetic contexts to differentiate our rate and pitch. So, speak a bit louder and then create some vocal contrast by speaking in a whisper. Speed up and when it’s appropriate, slow down.

Sportscaster Bob Costas says it’s crucial for those in public communication to speak with deliberation. I agree, but only to a point. As preachers we must also increase our rate, get a bit louder, and drive home the main points of the message. We need not yell, but let’s remember that we’re delivering God’s Word, not reciting a litany of the day’s events.

Using Different Illustrations

When it comes to preparing sermons I’m something of an illustration junkie. As long as it’s appropriate, I’ll use almost anything that will help me connect be it from a film, books, blogs, advertisements, or personal experiences. I always teach my students that they must illustrate because it helps the audience see and experience the truth of Scripture.

It’s become increasingly important in recent years to differentiate the illustrations in order to connect with everyone in the audience. Specifically, this means choosing illustrations that relate to women as well as men, to older folks as well as to members of Gen Z, to the singles as well as to those who are married.

Alice Mathews, who served as Academic Dean at Gordon-Conwell Seminary and continues to minister there, once made this point in a lecture on preaching. She said that on one occasion she deliberately used a story about sewing and then told the congregation that she had endured forty years of anecdotes about football though she was never a fan. Thus, she felt it only right for the men to hear one story about sewing. At that point, the women in the congregation rose in unison and gave her a standing ovation. Behold the power of using different kinds of illustrations when preaching!

Props and Presentation Programs

Most of us are now skilled at leveraging presentation programs (i.e. PowerPoint and Prezi) in our sermons. This is good and necessary with one crucial qualification: it’s easy to overuse these programs.

At a leadership conference I attended a few years back, one of the keynote speakers was Guy Kawasaki of Apple McIntosh fame. He argued for using technology when communicating but startled the audience by stating never to use more than twelve Power Point slides in any presentation. His rationale, based on some empirical studies, was that listeners get bored and quit paying attention. In other words, differentiation ceases with too many slides.

A friend of mine who teaches communication theory and practice says to only use a slide if it enhances your point. His rationale is that we don’t want to take people’s eyes away from us as the speaker unless absolutely necessary.

This is why the use of props may sometimes be more effective in driving home the truth of the text. A prop—be it a white board, a toy of some kind, a cell phone, or even physical money—can really grab the attention of the audience. Our pastor once climbed and then descended a fifteen foot ladder to demonstrate Christ’s humility in the Incarnation. While his approach had some conceptual limits—as do most attempts to picture the Incarnation—it captured everyone’s attention and has remained with me years later.

Implementing Differentiation

While wisdom dictates that we not over-correct and use all the elements of differentiation in every single sermon, I’m convinced that the more we practice this principle the better we’ll connect with our congregations.

A while back I was invited to preach at a church I know and love. Reflecting on my prior experience of homiletical sloth, I determined to add more differentiation to this message. So I tried to vary my tone and rate, I intentionally included some illustrations that were targeted to different demographics in the audience and then used a white board to highlight my main theological points. By God’s grace, I think the sermon connected and this time the drive home was far more pleasant. My hope is that there was some joy in the halls of heaven as well.

Scott Wenig is associate professor of applied theology at Denver Seminary in Denver, Colorado, and author of Straightening the Altars.

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