Actuality: Real Stories for Sermons that Matter by Rev. Scott Hoezee - Faculty Book Review
From The Forum Magazine, Spring 2015 - view the full issue here
Founded on the premise that stories are both indelible and primary in the way people understand life, Actuality is Hoezee’s apologetic for the place of narrative in preaching.
“Research increasingly shows, and real-life experience shows, that we are narrative beings,” he says. “We really are recognizing that we learn best through story.”
Hoezee drew on extensive experience as a preacher and teacher of preachers in developing the book. He also dug into research in the area of creative writing, paying special attention to the writer’s mantra, “show, don’t tell.”
For example, creative writing experts advise authors against simply naming a feeling to communicate a character’s emotional state. “That’s telling,” Hoezee explains.
“How do we know someone’s angry with us [in real life], and what does a novelist do to convey that [a character is] angry? Well, you don’t tell us that he’s angry. You show us color rising in his face. And veins sticking out on his neck, and pursed lips, and clenched fists, and eyes narrowing to slits. You see somebody ready to erupt like Vesuvius and you know he’s angry at you without his ever having to say it.”
Hoezee reapplies the “show, don’t tell” principle to the development of sermons. Too often, he says, preachers simply restate a point in various ways without showing the congregation what they mean.
“In preaching we say, ‘Jesus is a good Savior. He’s good. He’s good; he’s on the move; he’s active in the world, he really is!’ If it were a real conversation, somebody should stand up in the pew and say, ‘How? How is Jesus active? How is he good?’ And if the preacher can’t come up with anything, then [maybe he doesn’t] know what he’s talking about.”
Hoezee hopes that Actuality will inspire preachers to become better critics of their own sermons, challenging them to express the pain of the world and the grace of God in vivid and meaningful ways. He also seeks to provide them with tools for finding stories for sermons in life and culture.
“[Stories] are around us all the time. Preachers need to train themselves to be attentive … . Stories come through testimony, through listening to people, and also by recognizing that the grace we need to celebrate doesn’t always have to arise to the level of walking on water or turning water into wine. [It] can be … very simple acts of witness, very simple things that happen to us on a daily basis that [confirm] for us that God is here, God cares, and God’s aware of what we’re going through.”
Although stories increase congregational engagement in a sermon, for Hoezee the listeners’ interest factor is just a corollary of a greater good.
“We look for stories not to be interesting, not to be entertaining, not to give people a time-out in the sermon by telling a cute kitten story. [Stories are] part of the spine and the architectonic of the sermon because this is how we learn.”
Actuality is part of the Artistry of Preaching Series released by Abingdon. Companion volumes include Paul Scott Wilson’s Preaching as Poetry: Beauty, Goodness, and Truth in Every Sermon and the forthcoming Preaching in Pictures: Using Images for Sermons that Connect by Peter Jonker.
