More beautiful sermons by Jonathan Holder

A reflection on how beauty in form and function can inspire our sermons to be informative and inspirational, too by Jonathan Holder

A couple of weeks ago I was on holiday in Italy, Florence to be exact. For the first time I went to see the Leaning Tower of Pisa and also got to see Pisa Cathedral which is just next door. I didn’t even know a cathedral was there until we went to see the tower. But by the time we left it was the beauty of Pisa Cathedral rather than the Leaning Tower of Pisa that I couldn’t get out of my mind.

Not so surprisingly, as I am a pastor, being in that beautiful cathedral got me thinking about preaching. Not just about what kind of sermons had been preached in there but also about the relationship between preaching and beauty. Should beauty even be a consideration for our preaching? Architects and artists spent years of their lives making Pisa Cathedral beautiful to honour God. They saw beauty as a vital part of worship. Do we ever consider how we honour God, not just with the content of our sermons, but with their beauty? Or have we been too concerned with just a functional transfer of information?

I have to admit the sermons are few and far between that I would describe as beautiful (nearly all the ones I preach are included in that number too). But I was reminded in Pisa that the beauty of our proclamation is also important. That a sermon should be both informative and attractive. Worship is not just logical, it is also emotional. Form matters as well as function.

In fact, sometimes the form is vital to the proper functioning. For example, if we only focus on the function it's like going to eat out at a restaurant where the only thing the chef cares about is the nutritional value of the food. Not the presentation of the dish, or the setting of the restaurant. They are not bothered by the cleanliness of the eating area, or even the cutlery and crockery. Shockingly the taste does not matter at all to this chef. All they care about is that when you put the food in your mouth you get the nutrition you need from it. A restaurant like that will have an impact on your experience of the meal … and almost certainly mean that you will never go back.

Sermons are not just to communicate the right nutritional information about God. In the same way, churches are not just buildings we sit in to keep from getting wet during worship. Churches and cathedrals are also invitations to a relationship with God, a picture of our view of God, evidence of what we believe are God’s priorities, the esteem we hold him in, and how we think about our congregations.

Just like churches our sermons are part of our offering of worship, and does not God deserve the best? Can the sermon both inform and inspire? Shouldn’t we aim for our message about God to also reflect the esteem we hold in him and what he means to us?

I know that after travelling to Pisa, I want my sermons to be more beautiful as well as informative. I want them to be the kind of things that people will know aren’t done every week just because they are part of my job description. I want my sermons to show that God is beautiful, and he deserves a beautiful offering of a sermon.

Jonathan Holder
Jonathan is a Pastor in Leicester, UK and also a PhD student studying preaching at Baylor University’s Truett Seminary, US.