In that moment when the text impresses him emotionally, he will recall related thoughts, feelings, and experiences. This process of association is entirely appropriate if one accepts Robinson's definition of expository preaching as being the communication of a biblical concept first applied to "the personality and experience of the preacher, then through him to his hearers." If the preacher is fatigued, in pain, at odds with another, or otherwise emotionally distracted, he may find emotional interaction with the text difficult, if not impossible. Even if he succeeds in experiencing the emotions of the text, he may fail to express them and elicit them from others because of an impersonal approach, authoritarian stance, nondescript language, or rushed delivery.

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Affecting the Pathos of the Audience

Donald Miller described the ideal sermon with the following, "The final form of the sermon should seek to convey the emotional mood of the passage on which it is based, in the hope of touching thought with emotion which will lead to action." 27 Expository preaching should seek to create within the hearer the same emotions as found in or demanded by the biblical text. The objective is to move the hearer so that he will think, feel, and live in ways that are consistent with the text. Just as the text dictates the message, it dictates the mood. As the preacher will want to guard against an eisegesis of meaning, so he will want to guard against an eisegesis of mood.

To influence the emotions of his hearers in a textually appropriate manner, the preacher must start in his study with a thoughtful analysis of his audience. Because, as Aristotle observed, emotions exist in a continuum, preachers must ask certain questions about their audience. In what general emotional state will the people enter the preaching hour? What might their initial reaction be when they hear the Scripture read or the subject announced? How should the sermon engage the hearer initially so as to lead him eventually to feel what the text intends? How does his emotional state need to be adjusted in the course of the sermon?

Illustrations and images are tools commonly used to clarify biblical concepts. They can also enhance the emotional dimension of the text. The most effective illustrations are those that lie closest to the hearer's experience. Aristotle's conception of proximity applies here. The nearer to the hearer the object or personal relationship (whether actually or perceptually), the more intense his emotional reaction will be.

The speaker's tone, rate, and stress in voice will influence his audience's emotions, so, too, will his body language. If he will allow his message to saturate his mind and spirit to the point that he incarnates his sermon, voice and gestures will come naturally and appropriately. In such a state, the preacher will need to exercise special control over how deliberately he shares the descriptive portions of his message. Aristotle's admirer, the Roman rhetorician Cicero spoke of the importance of deliberate description, allowing concepts time to crystalize in the imagination and emotions of the hearer. 28 Hearers can grasp facts quickly. Feelings take longer to develop.