Overhearing the Gospel
Fred Craddock, one of the greatest story-teller/preachers of the last 30 years and professor of preaching and Candler School of Theology for many years, titled one of his books, Overhearing the Gospel. I don't remember the whole thesis of the book, but what I do remember is still powerful. It actually goes against the grain of the "seeker-sensitive" preaching style. The book was published in 1978 and is now out of print.

Part of what Craddock says, or at least my interpretation, was that the best way to preach for evangelism is to preach the Gospel to the believer- truly preach it- and let the seeker listen in, overhear it. There was the sense when I first heard that which caught me up short. It rang true. The non-believers/seekers aren't looking for some watered-down, easy-to-understand gospel. They are looking for what makes this true and real and hopeful to us, the believers. They want to see it in its fullness of power and grace, not a mamby-pamby, feel-good superficial gospel.

But that is hard to do, Craddock would say, unless you tell a story. It is in stories that we give truth.

Community Christmas Festival
Our church had our 2nd annual community Christmas Festival last night. We began it last year (doh! the first annual) as a way of touching the greater community with the season's deeper messages. We don't hold it in our church building but go to the Community Center and use one of the large rooms there. We sing carols and have special music. This year it was a brass group and a local piano performer along with our church's choir. It was a wonderful evening. We told the Christmas story using the Scripture, tied it together with music and carols, and had a brief (very brief) message by me on love as the center of Christmas. Not deep, but a story told in varied ways. No over-preaching. Just an opportunity to overhear the Gospel. All told there were about 80 people there, including the musicians.

Standing At the Doors Listening
We left the doors open into the hallway during the Festival since it was overheated in the room. It was hot! Which gave God the chance to do some of His remarkable work. People would stop in the hallway and listen. Some would come up and peek in the door and then stand and listen. Dancers from the Dance Academy's "recital" up the hall stopped. Parents of dancers stopped. Teenagers on their way to a hockey match at the other end of the building stopped. Curious exercisers on their way home from a swim or a workout stopped. I sat there in awe of what God does when we just do what we are called to do- live the Gospel in the midst of the people.

Which is back to Craddock's powerful insights. As I sat there I realized that we were doing what Craddock suggested. Through music and word, through vocals and instrumentals, through fellowship and food, we were preaching the Gospel so others can overhear it. Christmas is a great time of story telling. It is a story enfolded in a story surrounded by The Story. It is perfect for presenting in a way that people can just listen and know that there's something real and powerful here. There is something here that gives hope. Which may be why, even in this post-modern world, the Christmas lights still shine, the Salvation Army bells still ring, the carols- sacred as well as secular- sing forth.

Maybe we need to learn something from Christmas about how to tell stories. The truth is too important to be left without a story.