By Hershael W. York

After preaching for three months to an empty sanctuary during a global pandemic, most pastors probably welcomed the return of routine distractions: crying babies, restless children, talking teenagers, and people leaving for the restroom. Preaching with passion to empty seats certainly proved a daunting challenge, but at least one within our control. We had weeks to learn, grow, and adapt to the task. By the time churches could regather, many preachers were reasonably comfortable proclaiming the Word to people they could not see.

Live audiences, on the other hand, are always a gamble. Anticipating the disturbances and disruptions that distract the faithful is hardly ever included in the pastor’s seminary or personal preparation, yet few skills are more necessary for successful sermon delivery than the dexterity to evade the effects of unplanned events that threaten the concentration of congregation and speaker alike.

In forty years of preaching, I have learned a few rules for handling distractions. By “learned,” of course, I mean I made them up. I had to devise them myself because none of the lofty theoretical and theological books on preaching that shaped my thinking and compelled my calling said anything about how to respond to crying babies, diabetic seizures, or power outages.

The preacher’s first move is to consult an internal Richter scale—the needle that quickly indicates whether the distraction is a mere tremor that can be ignored, an unnerving quake that might be overcome with minor damage, or a massive tectonic disruption so devastating that it necessitates bringing the sermon to an end as abruptly and inelegantly as the Minoan civilization.

If it is in the first category and can be disregarded, the preacher needs simply to concentrate and silence the internal conversation about the offending party that threatens coherent speech. Untrained children and unsilenced cell phones belong to this class.

Maintaining focus is easier said than done, however, because the internal interlocutor of a distracted preacher is typically loquacious and often sarcastic in its wry observations about the offender. The deepest theology can drown in the wave of derision that silently floods a preacher’s mind when the product of so much work has been interrupted.

When the shock waves of disruption move the needle further, some physical action is needed. Small-church preachers are at a distinct disadvantage here. The smaller the sanctuary, the harder it is to redirect attention. Everyone in a small church has an outsized capacity to disturb because each person represents a larger percentage of the audience and the activity.

Regardless of the size of the church, when something happens that everyone notices and every head turns toward, the preacher must decide whether to acknowledge it or to direct attention away through movement, volume, or a direct plea for concentration.

The most dreaded distractions are those that implode the whole service. Medical emergencies, inappropriate and repeated actions by disturbed individuals, power outages, weather emergencies, and the like can fall into this category. In forty years of preaching, I have had to stop the sermon completely and move into a season of prayer three times.

Prayer is almost always the right move here. Regardless of the cause, whether it could be helped or not, it feels awful. The sermon so carefully constructed has come crashing down and cannot be salvaged. However profound the interruption, however far it moves the needle, such a moment requires more than preaching—it requires shepherding. It calls for leadership.

We preachers work hard to prepare sermons. We need to think about possible responses to the inevitable distractions, too. We must plan for them the way a sports team plans for how to respond to the most adverse circumstances at the end of a game.

I remember when I was a child, one stormy Sunday night we had a guest preacher in the little country church my father pastored. Right in the middle of the sermon, lightning struck nearby and blew a transformer, instantly depriving the church of electricity. The preacher stopped for only a second to gather his thoughts and then quickly asked if some of the men would go out into the rain and direct their car headlights through the windows so he could continue preaching.

Within sixty seconds, the sanctuary was once again ablaze with a warm radiance from farm trucks and family cars, and the Gospel message continued.

That was the night my young heart came under conviction of my own sin, and not long after that, I trusted Christ. It was just a tremor to him, and he handled it well. For me, lightning struck.

Hershael W. York is Dean of the School of Theology at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and Pastor of Buck Run Baptist Church in Frankfort, Kentucky.