This paper examines Black preaching as a rich homiletic tradition rooted in African heritage, Scripture, and the power of the Holy Spirit. Drawing on scholars such as Henry H. Mitchell, Gerald Davis, and Geoff Alexander, the paper explores the key components of the Black sermon — including faith grounded in experience, the role of the Holy Spirit, audience participation through call-and-response, parallelism between sacred and secular experience, and the use of music and emotion. The paper also traces the historical development of Black preaching from clandestine slave worship and the Second Great Awakening to its contemporary influence on seminaries across the nation, arguing that education has strengthened rather than diminished this powerful oratorical tradition.
In the Black tradition, a sermon is not just an address but an experience felt by the entire congregation. As one examines the dynamics of a well-thought-out and well-delivered sermon, one might approach it from four aspects: Scripture, the sermon itself, the preacher, and the listener (Day 2). Scripture is the core of Black preaching — nothing can be accomplished without it: no preaching, no listening, no salvation, and no church. God is always present, but Scripture is His word to the preacher, and through it the Holy Spirit is delivered to those who listen, provided the sermon is grounded in Scripture.
As far as the preacher is concerned, whether uneducated or educated, Black or White, Presbyterian or Anglican, if he or she uses the Scripture and aims to be the medium through which God feeds the people, then whatever techniques are employed, God's purpose will be accomplished. In contemporary practice, as the preacher and sermon grow more heated and reach a climax, the preacher employs a great deal of body language — walking back and forth, perhaps jumping, leaning over, singing, praying, or shouting.
Stories, dance, and song play a large part in the African American worship service, springing from ancient traditions. Congregants participate with dancing, shouting, and similar responses. As for the listener, hearing alone is not enough — hearing and then acting is the goal. A person who can listen to a great preacher and remain unmoved must be spiritually deaf, for a preacher who truly serves as the medium through which God speaks moves His people to act. The listener to Black preaching participates in the sermon not only through praying, speaking, singing, or shouting, but through absorbing the Word and going forth to act on it.
The Black preacher uses several components to achieve the goal of feeding God's people. One important aspect of communication in Black preaching is audience participation in what is called the "call-and-response" phenomenon. Drawing on a traditional African learning process, the preacher calls out and the audience repeats the phrase. Educators today have learned that students retain information longer and more deeply when what is learned is actively practiced. Call-and-response — a method derived from ancient African teaching — is an intense and intoxicating way to receive and remember information. The use of action alongside verbal explanation reinforces learning (Mitchell 1970, 40).
The homiletics that has developed in the United States among Black preachers draws on both Black and White cultures, though the way those cultures are applied depends upon the pulpit, whether White or Black (Day 198). Nevertheless, the shared body of theories and principles works together to create the sermon's essential components.
Faith is the result of experience, not intellectual reasoning. To understand this concept, one need only look at how Jesus acted and taught. When Jesus healed the demoniac on the shores of Galilee and the man begged to accompany Jesus and become one of his disciples, Jesus refused him. Instead, Jesus told the man to go and preach to others about what had happened to him. This story from Mark 5:1–20 offers the student of homiletics a clear example of a preacher whose faith was born from direct experience. The demoniac knew where and how he had received his faith, having experienced Jesus' casting out of the demons that had dwelt within him. So too must the preacher recall how and why the call came, how his or her faith began, and why he or she is so filled with the Spirit.
Why did Jesus not allow the demoniac to remain with him and become a disciple? He might have made a steadfast disciple — one who would not have wavered as Peter did or betrayed him as Judas did. The contemporary preacher may relate to the demoniac, mourning that they too cannot accompany Jesus in person, share his meals, or hear him speak. Yet they are also like the demoniac in that they may rejoice in recalling their own experience of salvation, and they must be driven by the same joy and the same desire to bring that good news to those who need to hear it.
The demoniac had been shackled with chains to keep him from harming himself in his madness. Beset with demons by the dozens, he was imprisoned in both mind and body. When he was freed of those restrictions, restored to sanity and rational thought, his life had been set right and his body liberated. It became his responsibility to deliver the means of his salvation to those in his home community. He was commissioned by Jesus — just as Jesus commissioned his disciples — to go out to others who needed to know how they too might be freed.
Throughout Scripture and from great preachers, there are many sayings about faith. Saint Augustine said: "Faith is believing what you do not see; the reward of faith is to see what you believe." When great faith carries the preacher before the crowd and a powerful sermon is delivered, it is not because the preacher has done it alone — it is because the preacher had faith that God would speak through him or her. When great faith is carried into the pulpit, only God's will can result, whatever that may be. The fruits of a great sermon may not be what the preacher desired or even anticipated, but God's fruit will be yielded nonetheless. The conviction of faith that the preacher brings to the sermon determines the mission of the church as well as the mission of his or her own preaching, as the Holy Spirit moves among the people.
The Holy Spirit delivers the gift of faith. Faith is not something one can work toward or earn — it is the gift of God. Before one can preach to others about faith, one must understand not only the origin of one's own faith but the shape it takes in the sermon being delivered. The preacher must pray and listen for the gift of the Spirit to deliver to God's people that day. The Black preacher has a dynamic, working faith that shines through in words and actions. Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter once said that to him, faith was not a noun but a verb. Unless faith is received from the Spirit and delivered to the people through the sermon, it accomplishes nothing. This is evident in the delivery of any sermon: if the preacher does not have faith, the sermon is empty and the people leave with empty hearts.
Most churches and denominations have a statement describing the work of the Holy Spirit, affirming that it remains with the people and works actively in the world. Such statements typically describe how the Holy Spirit was delivered to the people at Pentecost and lives still among the church, that through the Spirit Christ continues to live among us, that through it the kingdom of God is manifested, and that through it the gospel is proclaimed.
As God's living representative in the world, the Holy Spirit is brought to God's people through preaching as well as through other manifestations. This places a great responsibility upon the preacher who comes to the pulpit full of himself or herself. Before approaching the pulpit, the preacher must empty himself or herself and be filled with the Holy Spirit, or the gift of faith will not be delivered to the people. How else can the people know what God wants to say to them, unless the preacher becomes a vessel of the Holy Spirit and the voice through which it speaks?
The sermon may deliver to the people the spiritual gifts described by Paul — wisdom, knowledge, faith, healing, miracles, prophecy, discernment, tongues, interpretation, administration, and the desire to help others (1 Corinthians 12:7–11). The Scriptures also speak of dreams and prophecies which come through God's servant, delivering words of God's will to the people. Though the preacher may not always wish to preach such words — like Jonah — he or she is commissioned to do so, or he or she is no true preacher. The Holy Spirit is also the Comforter (John 14:16), and through the preacher's words, God's people find relief and comfort for their anguished souls. The Spirit is further described as bringing Truth to God's people (John 16:13–14), speaking on God's authority.
When the listener hears the Word of God from the preacher's mouth, he or she is receiving a personal communication from God — but only if the preacher has become God's vessel and delivers the Word received through the Holy Spirit. Henry Heywood Mitchell asks us to understand the culture from which preaching styles emerge, particularly the idiom, imagery, style, and worldview presented. In Black preaching, culture is seen in the language and techniques of the sermon. Black preachers come from a rich tradition of Black history in which slavery, trouble, toils, and traps surrounded them at key moments. As slaves, Black people were brought to the United States, and they drew from that experience in paralleling the people of Moses' own story. They come from a heritage close to the Holy Land — the same one from which the Bible came. Paul encountered a Black man and converted him, sending him back to his native land to spread the gospel. That is how close the Black heritage is to the story of Jesus. The result is a strong history of oratory and leadership.
Today, Black preachers are asked to "teach homiletics in seminaries all over the nation. It is increasingly clear that this Black tradition has much to offer all cultures" (Mitchell 1990, 12).
Prayer, song, and preaching are the agents through which God feeds and nourishes the believer's faith. The worship service is under the direction of the Holy Spirit, and believers receive the gift through the act of worshipping together. Prayer is an important element of the worship service, as all partake in communication with God — delivering not only petitions but thanks for all the blessings received.
Song is equally vital. All members raise their voices in sacred words, whether gifted singers or not, making song an act of worship in a very real sense. Song and poetry are at times woven into the sermon itself.
In the early days of the United States, Black people gathered in clandestine meetings — much as the early Christians did — to worship in their own way. Even though their white masters attempted to alter their religion and manner of worship, they held meetings in brush arbors with their own leaders, who spoke to them in powerful ways. There was no gender domination, no restrictions on dancing, none of the stigmatized outsiders labeled as "witches," and their own sacred rituals. Their religious language did not impose gender hierarchies; religion was their life, and a rich culture guided the Black religious tradition toward the forefront of oratorical genius (Mitchell 1990, 13).
In the early nineteenth century, during the Second Great Awakening in the United States, itinerant preachers held camp meetings throughout the South and Southeast. Unschooled in traditional styles and theology, these evangelists found that audiences flocked to them for their "fire and brimstone" topics and their anything-but-staid oratory. People came to witness the spectacle, were "saved," and formed both Black, White, and mixed congregations of Baptist and Presbyterian churches throughout the Southeast. As Black people left the South and spread north, east, and west, they brought their music, their churches, their traditions, and their preaching styles with them.
As the movement spread, newspapers reported "acrobatics" such as "jerks, falling, dancing and barking" among the newly converted or among "backsliders" called back to glory (Bruce 53). Miraculous healing, great singing, and the spectacle of the traveling evangelist all added to the excitement of the camp meeting. The greatest orators were those who drew the largest crowds, and certain preachers became famous for their spectacular deliveries. In the early days of Billy Graham's career, he too was a fiery preacher who employed these techniques to draw huge audiences. Other famous preachers — such as Martin Luther King Jr. and, more recently, the Reverend Jeremiah Wright — are well known for hypnotic, entrancing speaking techniques that raise the emotions of a crowd to an intense, almost overwhelming fervor.
Skill in preaching — delivering the message in a vivid, artistic way — is how the story is told and the message is conveyed to God's people. Using logic and coherent, concise sermon texts brings the message into focus. When a sermon is vague and aimless, the message is lost. While prayer and song are important aspects of the worship service, the delivery of God's Word by means of a sermon is often central to the worship experience. In the Black tradition, the sermon is the most exciting part of the service. Through action, a compelling story, music or a choir in the background, and audience participation, the preacher creates a desirable and inviting act of worship — a striking contrast to the English tradition, where the homily has sometimes been met with a groan.
Sticking close to the sermon text is essential. When the authority of the speaker is in view, the preacher must be focused and coherent. Although it may appear to convey straightforward and easily understood ideas, the basic Black sermon rides on a more complex set of abstract ideas conveyed through everyday, concrete imagery. This makes the abstract idea both memorable and practically useful. Jesus used parables to teach the ideas he wanted his disciples to remember. Parallelism — the technique of drawing these connections — will be discussed further below.
"Sermon structure, focus, emotion, and scriptural text"
"Call-and-response, parallelism, music, and secular rant"
"Education, culture, and the tradition's lasting influence"
Always verify citation format against your institution’s current style guide requirements.