Preaching Well

Episode 19: Bishop Eleanor Sanderson - Prayer, Fire, and the Courage to Speak

What happens when a preacher shaped by student hostels, Pacific villages, and the aftermath of the Christchurch attacks steps into the pulpit? Bishop Eleanor Sanderson brings a rare mix of tenderness and power—prayer that burns deep, vulnerability that risks everything, and a global vision that refuses to shrink God to one culture. In this episode, she talks mission as apprenticeship, preaching as community life, leading through crisis, praying inside a mosque, and learning to hear God’s voice in both silence and tears. It’s preaching with guts. Preaching with joy. Preaching that leans hard on the Spirit. Come and hear a bishop who doesn’t just prepare sermons—she wrestles with them, weeps over them, and sometimes proclaims them like a wave that’s been building for days. This is a conversation for anyone who wants to preach with depth, clarity, courage, and hope.

Episode 18: Ian Collinge - A rhythm of revelation that reshapes preaching, prayer, music, table, and pulpit

What if worship didn’t just include different cultures — but was shaped by them? In this episode of Preaching Well, Bishop Saju sits down with Ian Collinge, an ethnodoxologist —a listener of cultures, rhythms, stories, and songs. Not a curator. A guest. A learner. They talk about the move from multicultural worship (many cultures present) to intercultural worship (many cultures shaping the song together). From adding a token language to sharing real agency. From attendance to ownership. Ian unpacks worship as a journey — God speaks, we respond, God speaks again. A rhythm of revelation and response that reshapes preaching, prayer, music, table, and pulpit. He asks sharp questions with gentle force: Who chooses the songs? Who holds the mic? Who gets heard? This is a conversation about humility and power. About language and listening. About story — not fitting God into our story, but finding ourselves inside God’s story, from creation to new creation. You’ll leave with images you won’t forget: A table with more than one kind of bread. A song with more than one pulse. A pulpit with more than one voice. If you preach. If you plan worship. If you’ve ever felt your services needed more than good intentions — This episode listens deeply, challenges gently, and invites the church to sing again — together.

Episode 17: Lat Blaylock - Preaching Good News to the to the honest, unfiltered minds of young people

What if the most powerful theologians in the room are eleven years old? In this episode of Preaching Well, Lat Blaylock — teacher, thinker, storyteller, and longtime shaper of young hearts — takes us to the frontier where school and church meet. Lat moves between classrooms and chapels, parables and poetry, Gandhi essays and jigsaw‑piece souls. He shows how children crack open questions adults are too afraid to ask, how teaching trains the preacher’s imagination, and how good news sounds when spoken to the honest, unfiltered minds of young people. He talks about grace, curiosity, artistry, silence, formation, and the fierce belief that anyone — absolutely anyone — might be standing on the threshold of a spiritual awakening. It’s surprising. It’s tender. It’s alive with wonder.

Episode 16: David Porter -Preaching that creates a space where enemies become neighbours, and truth is spoken gently.

What happens when a preacher steps into the pulpit carrying stories of Belfast, Bosnia, Coventry — and the hard‑won wisdom of reconciliation? In this episode of Preaching Well, David Porter — strategist, peacebuilder, listener, and longtime companion in conflict‑torn places — opens up the craft of preaching as a public act of courage, humility, and deep, attentive love. David talks flags and fractures, identity and nationalism, lament and trauma, listening as a spiritual discipline, and the miracle of speaking truth with grace in communities that don’t agree on much. He names the complexity, refuses the easy slogan, and shows how preaching can hold open a space where enemies become neighbours, and truth walks gently. This is preaching that steadies, unsettles, and heals. Quiet strength. Fierce honesty. Real hope.

Episode 15: Rt Rev Graham Tomlin - Preaching is a space where Scripture burns, culture listens, and the Spirit breathes.

Bishop Graham Tomlin has preached through fire — literally. From parish pulpits to national crises, he’s carried a voice shaped by Scripture, culture, and the raw edges of human experience. In this episode, he opens his study, his honesty, and his hard-won wisdom.  We move fast: from Pascal’s “night of fire” to Grenfell’s ash; from the surprises hidden in familiar texts to the quiet weight of a preacher’s character; from storytelling as spiritual art to preaching that speaks to believers, doubters, and everyone in between.  Graham shows us why the cross still disrupts, why good sermons begin in silence, why hope matters in catastrophe, and how every preacher can learn to read the world with biblical eyes.  It’s warm. It’s searching. It’s full of stories, insight, and unexpected laughter.  A masterclass in preaching — and a gentle call to become the kind of person whose life can bear the weight of the words we speak.  Preaching Well with Graham Tomlin — where Scripture burns, culture listens, and the Spirit breathes.