Here’s a simple preaching tip you didn’t see coming the day before Ash Wednesday: Read a stack of magazines you would normally not read.
For guys, this means picking up a copy of magazines normally targeted toward women. For women, this means reading magazines geared toward men. (I know, I know: Call the stereotype police!) For everyone, grab a tabloid.
Most of us are good at exegeting the text. Can we refine our skills on exegeting the culture?
Magazine are great because they also play to the hopes, fears and insecurities of their readers. I’m not suggesting preachers should do the same.
I am suggesting we ought to know what those hopes and fears are.
And reading a magazine you would not normally pick up helps us see the world from a different perspective (cue Robin Williams standing on his desk in Dead Poets’ Society).
The best part about this is that when you’re caught in your study reading the latest tabloid, you can say with full confidence, “I’m just studying for my sermon.”
(Thanks to Rob Bell for this insight at Peter Rollins’ Soapbox event in October 2015.)