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I did not intend to be a preacher. My plan was to be a veterinarian after college, but God had other ideas. I grew up in an African-American Baptist congregation, and by the time I reached high school, I only attended church occasionally, though I was committed to Christ and sought to live a life that pleased God. Upon entering college, I wanted to be involved in a Christian organization, and I joined the Navigators (a parachurch organization focused on discipleship).

Though no connoisseur of preaching and though I had no desire to serve as one of God's heralds, I knew what I liked to hear. My view of good preaching was basically anything that was expressed with appropriate intensity or enthusiasm. This changed radically in college.

My encounter with the Navigators was a paradigm shift. In attending Navigator conferences and special events, I learned about the Bible with greater depth than I ever had. I was excited by this kind of presentation, which was very didactic, logical, and unencumbered by excessive emotion in the presentation. It often ended with challenging life-application questions that caused me to take stock of your spiritual state. I could take notes on these messages and contemplate the implications that the Word held for your life. In addition to my Navigator group, I also found a white Southern Baptist church that featured the same kind of preaching. As a result of this newfound approach, I became more knowledgeable about the Bible, and I saw a direct effect on my life.

At that time, around the mid-1980s, I concluded that this was the only way that one could effectively present the Bible in a public forum. All of that emotional intensity that I used to admire was merely a mask to hide lack of content. Besides, how can you take notes on a sermon or message that is more like a pep rally than an in-depth Bible message? Though I failed to recognize it at the time, my enthusiasm for this didactic approach to preaching led to a categorical rejection of the entire African-American preaching tradition in favor of a more cerebral, almost Northern European approach.

It was during my experience with the Navigators that I became aware of God's calling on my life. I knew that one thing I wanted to do was to bring the kind of expository preaching and teaching that I discovered in college to the African-American community. "My people" needed the kind of in-depth approach that could only come through the emotionally cool, contemplative and challenging style that had captivated me.

Upon my college graduation, I moved to Memphis to live with a Navigator representative for a few years before entering seminary. During this time, I became a pastoral intern at a Bible church, and I finally had my opportunities to preach. When I had the occasion to preach, I did my best to give expository messages that vigorously challenged the congregation. On one occasion, I even had the opportunity to preach at the church in which I was baptized. I remember going home to Maryland, full of excitement, knowing that here was my opportunity to show a traditional African-American church the kind of in-depth preaching that I knew it needed.

When I preached, it went very well, but I made sure that I did not give the audience a chance to get too enthusiastic about what I was saying. Every time it would seem like the audience was on the verge of an enthusiastic swell, I would rachet down my intensity in order to get people in a more contemplative mode. I was well received that day, but I don't know if my style and approach caused any shift in their expectations of preachers.

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November (Web-only) 1999, Vol. 43