“How do I make the connection? How do I connect the textual, scriptural, gospel-centered truths I’m preaching to my listeners’ real lives?” Preachers ask such questions, even if not out loud, every time they write a sermon. If much of the sermon concerns the “what”—the truths of the text, the broader scriptural context, the law and the gospel—the preacher must still answer the questions “So what?” and “Now what?” What connection do these truths have to people’s day-to-day lives, the lives they’ll go on living after they exit the church doors?

We often call this part of the sermon “application”—applying God’s Word to people’s lives. David Schmitt’s term in the Tapestry of Preaching is more integrative: “hearer interpretation.” His definition: “This is the language of the sermon that depicts and interprets the contemporary life experience of the hearers.” This is the fourth and final thread of the Tapestry of Preaching.

(The first article in this series introduced us to the Tapestry of Preaching. Author David Schmitt compares a sermon to a tapestry, in which four “threads of discourse” are woven together. The four threads: textual exposition, theological confession, evangelical proclamation, and hearer interpretation. The full “Tapestry of Preaching” essay may be found here; unless otherwise noted, all quotations come from this essay.)

This part of the sermon can go awry in a number of ways. One way is that it’s absent. The preacher has accurately proclaimed scriptural truth, but he has assumed that his hearers will find it obvious how these truths connect to their lives. Some do, but others leave wondering, “What pastor said is nice, but what does it mean for me?” Two other ways that this part of the sermon can fail to hit the mark are those David Schmitt describes: caricature and generality. The first can happen when a preacher asks his hearers to identify with a biblical character in a text—which can be helpful—but he doesn’t help them see how doing that will benefit them in the week ahead. They learn that they are, in some ways, like the sinful woman who was forgiven and then anointed Jesus’s feet . . . but they know they’re actually not that woman, and so they are left to wonder how they can learn from her in the week to come. “They are then left with a caricature of who they could be rather than a definition of who they are in the kingdom of God.” Another way this part of the sermon can limp (and I feel convicted by this one) is through generality. Preachers’ “sermons take on a timeless quality, able to be preached to any one at any time, rather than to these particular people on this particular day.”

Love for our hearers, though, leads us to work at depicting their lives in God’s kingdom:

We desire for our hearers to see themselves with the eyes of God. Thus, in the sermon, we offer them glimpses of what human life is and means in the context of God’s eternal reign that has come among us in Jesus Christ. God has sent you as his preacher to these people on this day, and your words are chosen for them, not others. They are God’s people, gathered in his presence, and will be sent forth into his world for his service in his kingdom. Hearer interpretation moves beyond caricature and generalities to set forth an accurate depiction of the life experience of one’s hearers in the kingdom of God.

David Schmitt names four functions of hearer interpretation in a sermon. Or, using other terminology, he lists four reasons why “application” is an essential part of every sermon.

The first is to “reveal how people are relevant to God.” We might think the reverse: we need to show people how God is relevant to them. We detect people’s struggles, problems, and needs, and then we show them that God can address those things. But this way of looking at things can dangerously place humans, rather than God, in the center. “We have a need and, through the preacher’s overzealous manipulation, God somehow turns out to be a perfect fit for our need. Jesus ultimately becomes an object of our wish projection and a tool in our projects of self-definition.” Instead of that, Schmitt writes, we make it our aim to show how people are relevant to God:

Hearer interpretation helps your hearers to see themselves with the eyes of God and to interpret their lives as having a God-given place within God’s kingdom. When God graciously intervenes and brings people into his kingdom, relevancy is given. People are relevant not because of anything in them or anything done by them but simply because they are God’s, they live in God’s world, and God has a strange way of pouring out all that he has for the sake of reaching out to his world. Daily business is more than business, it is a vocation . . . The fragile moments of our daily lives are filled with a meaning beyond our making and a love beyond our strength. Our lives are taken into the hands of God, and there, in his hands, we become the instruments of God’s work in the world.

The second function of hearer interpretation in the sermon: it “identifies and forms God’s holy people.” In other words, it affirms that our hearers are God’s people in the midst of the ordinary busyness of life. Yes, God works in the lives of believers in extraordinary circumstances: believers bravely confessing in the face of death or confidently living as they bear remarkable burdens. God is at work, too, among Christians who are prospering, who seem to have it all together in their spiritual walk. But he is at work just as much in the grind of daily life. “Our God works not only in the sentimental and the marvelous. He works in the mundane as well, and when your hearers spend their lives in mini-vans that haul children all over the city . . . it is a comfort to know that God sees, God hears, and God acts even in, especially in, these ordinary situations.”

The third function is related to the second. Hearer interpretation in the sermon “forms God’s people by confessing the variety and complexity of Christian life.” David Schmitt recalls his surprise when a student preached about how God was at work in the life of a divorced parent—not something often, if ever, talked about in the pulpit. Christians’ lives in this world are often complicated and messy. Yet God’s grace is powerfully at work in them. Can we, in our preaching, depict both the grace and some of the messiness? When we do, our words will hit closer to home than if we depict only tidy, idealized situations.

Schmitt offers a helpful clarification, which applies not only to this third function but to all the functions of hearer interpretation in the sermon. “Don’t misunderstand; I am not talking about exhortation, telling the hearers what they need to do. I am simply speaking about hearer interpretation, depicting or revealing what God does in the lives of his people in the mundane moments that fill up our days. Hearers begin to recognize their formation as God’s holy people and their vocation in the world as they await the coming of their Savior.” Exhortation may be called for at some point in the sermon; it may be a vital part of the sermon text. But when we think of connecting God’s words to hearers’ lives, we can think first of what is—his gracious work right now in our lives—and not just what ought to be.

Finally, “hearer interpretation” opens the eyes of the hearers to the body of Christ.” Last time, when we focused on evangelical proclamation, we heard the encouragement to preach the gospel directly to our hearers, rather than just preaching about the gospel. Usually we want this proclamation to be second-person-singular: “You (one, individual Christian) are forgiven!” We therefore usually think of applying Scripture to each individual believer. “Some preachers can choose illustrations that promote an insular and individualistic view of the faith without considering the matter of community and how community is reflected in the sermon.” In our sermon applications, can we regularly depict God’s grace among a group of believers, not only in each singular believer? How does God’s Word bear fruit in a congregation? In a Christian family or extended family? David Schmitt broadens our vision:

Through varied hearer interpretation, preachers help hearers see God at work not only in their lives but in the lives of others, not only for individuals but also for the people of God. Seeing one another in preaching, recognizing that the burdens of others are the burdens we share, we begin to know what it means for God to have called us and fashioned us into the body of Christ. Our eyes are opened to the community of the church and to the larger evangelistic work of God in the world.

How can these insights into hearer interpretation enrich your preaching?

Next time, the challenge of negotiating these four threads of the Tapestry in each sermon.

This article in Devote Yourself was contributed by the team that previously created and distributed Preach the Word. View past preaching-related articles at worship.welsrc.net/downloads-worship/preach-the-word.