Of Preachers, Poets & Performance, with some inspiration from Sarah Kay

I was blown away by this utterly captivating performance by Sarah Kay telling of things that matter and drawing people into her enterprise. Poetry lifted from the page takes on an entirely different dimension.

Peter Stevenson reminds us that preacher and poet are both performance arts and reminds us of David Schlafer’s encouragement to preachers that they find their own preaching voice as Poet, Storyteller or Essayist.

Now so much performance art is available on the likes of Youtube, more preachers will find their poetic voice. Irish poet Michael O’Siadhail points out that the Irish word for poet, ‘files’, translates as seer.

The prophetic voice is the poetic voice, ordinarily spoken and performed. It’s a tradition that is as old as God’s people as poets have spoken from the heart and to the heart, from the heart of God to the heart of people, from the heart of the people to the heart of God.