It's nearly time to preach and I can't find my trousers! Frantically, I run through the church trying to locate them. The pulpit hymn is coming to a close! It's time! I'm up! Unfortunately, my trousers aren't. It's a nightmare!

Over the years, I've had a similar dream numerous times. Since I turned 40, however, I've been spooked by yet another dream, a narrative nightmare. Allow me to share it with you.

The dream begins with me stepping up to the congregation, dressed only in my corduroy bathrobe and slippers. (I avoid looking at the teens who are snickering.) I'm self-conscious in this costume but willing to be "a fool for Christ's sake" in order to help people see, as well as hear, my message. I want to regenerate the impact of this event for my congregation and to do that I must draw them into the story with more than words. The Scripture won't be read. It will be reenacted in a dramatic, monologue narrative.

I am Jesus; the listeners are my disciples. With descriptive speech, I transform the sanctuary into a rickety fishing boat and launch my sermonic craft out into the open water with a dramatic flair worthy of the theater. My disciples are in that boat. I have just finished feeding the 5000. I'm going off to pray now. I disappear from sight but continue talking, crafting the verbal storm of the century. The room darkens; the wind begins to blow and the boat sways with such vividness that Mrs. Johnson grips the end of the pew for stability. Soon everything is rocking with such imaginary ferocity that old man Peterson cries out for a life preserver!

"Where's Jesus?" cries my associate. Suddenly, the spotlight finds me again. I appear bigger than life and somewhat iridescent (thanks to the lights and a change of robe). Screams of fear I calm with the waters as I raise my hands in dramatic gesture and utter, as divinely as I am able, "Yo! Wind! Chill out!"

My Chairman, on cue, cries, "Lord? If it's really you, ask me to come."

No one is even close to falling asleep! "Come." I extend my arms to him and he fearfully gets out of the craft and begins making his way toward me. Suddenly he drops to his knees, as if going under and I grab him by the collar, just in time! Together we stand at the altar as the organ plays "Rescue the Perishing." I open my arms to the folks and invite them to come, like Peter, to Jesus.

I awaken in my dream only to find myself standing before the real Jesus, still in my bathrobe and slippers, pensively waiting for that awesome word, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant." Instead I hear him say, "Get dressed." Finally, I startle awake!

It's my narrative nightmare and it reveals my deep-seated fear of homiletical embarrassment before Christ. Narrative preaching is particularly susceptible to such red-faced sermonics. This is because imagination is essential to good narrative preaching and all imagination includes speculation. Increased speculation is often directly proportional to increased attention, which is what we want.