#200-The Sneak-A-Preach

Editor's note: Post recommendation and naming credited to Aaron J. Hall

Imaginary Monologue from the Dude who is totally going to try stealing the show by sneaking a preach at tonights youth rally


You may have seen me reading my Bible on the platform just before service began. Yes, I was reading Psalms specifically. But it wasn't for any kind of personal devotion or to hype myself up...No it was for something march larger in scale. Something that all may enjoy. You see, I was looking for a good, solid, powerful verse about praising or something. I was memorizing a verse, which is not the easiest thing in the world since I was not a Bible Quizzer, nor have a been part of a Sunday School contest that awarded points for memorizing a verse in years. The memorization would be key to the preach, I planned on sneaking in the service.

Some should say I should be content as a worship leader for tonight's service. But everyone knows that to be labeled as a worship leader alone as a ministry comes with many negative stereotypes. Mainly that worship leaders are an overly-emotional bunch who don't have the mental capacity to do anything more productive than to quote a few verses, a chorus, and a bridge to a song that was made famous on an Israel Houghton CD. Sure, worship leaders, and musicians in general are talented in their craft, and they dress amazing, but there is much more to us than what meets the eye. And don't think for one moment that I signed up as a music leader simply to evade the obligations of praying at the altar. That's only a quarter of it.

The reality is I'm really a good preacher. You should hear the sermons I recite in the shower. Epic is a good word for them. And all those years of being a worship leader and the limiting stereotypes that the role entails, I have decided to branch out, and use my worship leading as a launch pad to reveal to you my greater call. The call, to be a profound preacher. It's not too dissimilar to an big-time actor trying his hand at forming a band.

So it's here tonight, at the youth rally that I plan on showing you and the rest of the audience that I am not some pretty face who shrills the notes quite well after a verse. There is also a girl I have a crush on who I want to fall in love with me here tonight five pews back. Sneaking a preach is a solid tool to birth butterflies in her stomach when she thinks about me. Plus the big name evangelist who is here tonight,  if I do a good enough job, I am hoping he may take me on the rode with him to kind of open the show. A John the Baptist sort who paves the way. And then if I am good enough, which I will be, I can use my role as a "sneak-a-preach-preacher" to become a full-time evangelist. Through me you get the best of both worlds: Musical splendor, and a preacher aficionado. Killing two birds with one stone. A singer-sermon writer.

Everyone knows that if a preach is to be sneaked, it must happen between songs. If the song is to be slow, the preach must be sneaked on the first quiet notes leading up to the first verse. Here, the mini-preach must be in a sincere tone that aims at a preparation of the slowness which is to come. It hushes the crowd if you will. These "sneak-a-preaches" become especially critical when a fast song has just been played and the slow song is about to come on. Thus the "sneak-a-preach" is administered solely for reasons of transition between the fast-paced Holy rolling music to the "close your eyes and think about God enough that you may end up crying" slow song. Thus, if one wants to be noticed in their sneaking, the introduction to the slow song is not where such recognition is to found because the role assumed "setting of the tone for the next song" is more functional and necessary. In such a sense, the introductory "sneak a preach" to a slow song is not really a "sneak-a-preach" at all in terms of definition. There is nothing spontaneous about the mini-preach begun at the beginning of a slow song. Thus my sneaking tonight will be not be resolved in such amateur expectancy.

Now to properly "Sneak-A-Preach," it must be done at the conclusion of a fast-paced, cymbal-crashing worship song. Here, not only is having a flawless delivery important, but of equal importance is the timing at which the preached is to be sneaked. This is where most "sneak-a-preach" preachers get it wrong. Where most error is they launch into their prepared sneak-a-preach right after the completion of a fast song when everyone's in the throes of worship wrapped up into their own God moment. Thus when the timing is wrong and launched into too soon, the "sneak a preach" is a distraction to the worship and not a facilitator of the worship. On the hurried "sneak a preach" people are called out of the worship (which is usually loud as it is), and forced to open their eyes to see this rambunctious kid trying to scream over them spouting God-knows-what complete with a mention of a cliche verse from Acts about what everyone is doing is what the Prophet Joel spoke with daughters dreaming dreams. In such ill-timing, the "sneak-a-preach" is oppositional to the rest of the congregation.

But worry not listener, as I know my place and where the preach must be sneaked but at the same time listened to in approval. For I will place my preach at about 90 seconds after the conclusion of the song wherein the worship will still be flowing, but it will now be coming down to a tolerable level wherein, when I launch into my premeditated spiel (which must come across as completely spontaneous and unplanned. I can't stress this enough), it will not be done at a confrontational volume to the rest of the worship but rather will augment the worship by speaking at an acceptable volume just above the buzz and with such authority that I will be seeking the perpetuation of the worship that will carry the momentum of the worship right into the next song. You will know my preach has been properly "sneaked" with the many head-nods, arms raises, and head-nods that will surely follow my mini-sermon. You will be awed.