Apply via the Reimagining Preaching webpage.

REIMAGINING PREACHING COHORT

MAY 2025--April 2026

Features: Keynote address, breakout sessions, preaching inspiration, tools, and practices for clergy and lay leaders

• Date: May 3rd, 2025

• Time: 1:30 pm--6 pm

• Cost: $69 for individuals 

• Location: Shoreline, Washington, Calvin Presbyterian Church

Purpose: Reimagining Preaching inspires, equips, and supports new and experienced preachers in post-Christendom contexts to craft transformational homilies and homiletic events.

Format: 6 weekly, 2-hour zoom meetings in your track followed by 9 monthly small groups that combine experienced and lay preachers for formational content and feedback. CEUs may be available for participating in this program.

Cost: The Pilot is free of charge for participants who are referred by denominational partners and accepted into the program.

Track I: Lay Preachers

Meets Thursdays, May 15--June 19, 6:30--8:30 pm PDT

This track is designed to get more voices into pulpits in order to

• Diversify perspectives

• Increase access to preaching as a spiritual practice

• Create preaching teams that relieve the pastor from weekly sermon crafting

Benefits of Reimagining Preaching: Track I

This lay track of the program will fulfill the imperative to develop a priesthood of all believers. Many laity, especially in highly-educated cities of the Northwest, have the potential to develop greater spiritual maturity through engaging the art of sermon crafting. Additionally, lay preachers can provide partnership for pastors, aiding in planning upcoming sermons and collaborating in telling God’s story as it intersects with the congregation’s story. Logistically, lay preachers free up pastors’ time for the multitude of other tasks that need attention.

In the Reimagining Preaching program, laity will develop foundational exegetical skills (text). They will be encouraged to mine their lives (soul) for understandings or metaphors that speak to the reality of Christian life and hope today — the hospice nurse’s grief, the conflict in the office, a compassionate read of a scriptural lawyer from a current lawyer.  

Program Content 

In this track, participants will learn and practice the foundational skills needed to craft sermons:

• Exegetical tools and practices

• Crafting homilies for your specific context

• Connecting your own story to the story of God

• Effective communication skills

Then the clergy and lay leader tracks will combine for 9 monthly, 2-hour online meetings. In facilitated small groups, they will take turns presenting sermons, receiving feedback and honing skills. The tone of these small groups will be supportive, coaching, and encouraging. Both lay leaders and professional clergy benefit by being in these mixed groups, with laity learning more about scriptural exegesis, and clergy learning about what resonates and is relevant to lay people.

Time Commitment

Participants in Track I should plan for about an hour of pre-work for each of the 6 weekly meetings. For the monthly meetings, lay participants will need to set aside time to prepare several sermons.

Track II: Clergy/Experienced Preachers

Meets Wednesdays, May 14--June 18, 3:00-5:00 pm PDT

This track will invite participants to 

• Reimagine sermons as more than scripts

• Create transformational moments (homelic events) that shift their audience’s understanding of self, God, the world, and relationships in innovative ways.

• Interweave emotional intelligence (soul) and contextual awareness (culture) with scripture text.

Benefits of Reimagining Preaching, Track II

Traditional theological programs provide training in scriptural exegesis, but not nearly enough training in soul exegesis: reading the pain, hope, and relational dynamics that bring people to faith. This gap in training cultivates the pastor’s intellect but neglects their emotional intelligence, which limits their ability to participate in and create transformative moments. Reimagining Preaching closes this gap by equipping clergy with tools to understand their own life story, the story of their congregation in its specific context, and how those are held by the story God is telling through humanity as revealed in the scriptural word and incarnate Word.

Program Content

For the 2025 Cohort, this track covers 6 different skills via interactive teaching and workshopping.

1. Preaching for transformation

2. Sticky communication

3. Text: Storytelling workshop

4. Soul: Trauma-informed liturgy and preaching

5. Culture: Developing anti-oppressive skills in your preaching

6. Innovative formats for preaching

Then the clergy and lay leader tracks will combine for 9 monthly, 2-hour online meetings. In facilitated small groups, they will take turns presenting sermons, receiving feedback and honing skills. The tone of these small groups will be supportive, coaching, and encouraging. Both lay leaders and professional clergy benefit by being in these mixed groups, with laity learning more about scriptural exegesis, and clergy learning about what resonates and is relevant to lay people.

Time commitment

Participants in Track II should plan for about an hour of pre-work for each of the 6 weekly meetings. For the monthly meetings, each participant will prepare several sermons. Professional clergy can craft these sermons to be used in their current congregations, so no additional time is needed beyond their normal sermon-preparation time.