Certificate in Preaching Excellence (CPX)
The Certificate in Preaching Excellence (CPX) provides a series of non-credit virtual courses designed to elevate preaching skills for pastors with experience and formal training (M.Div. or equivalent). This certificate is awarded upon successfully completing four virtual CPX courses and three mentor consultations.
Four online courses (3.5 hours each) will be offered per year. They do not need to be taken sequentially or all in one year. They can also be taken as stand-alones. After the completion of four courses participants will register for three one-on-one mentor consultations with an expert homiletician.
Cost of the certificate- $75 per virtual course $100 per coaching session. (Total $600.)
Visit our to find out more about CPX and to register for the January 7 class. You can also email preaching@smu.edu for more information.
Courses for Year One
January 7, 2025: “Experiential Preaching”
Let the Perkins Center for Preaching Excellence elevate your preaching to the next level with this engaging online offering taught by Dr. O. Wesley Allen, Lois Craddock Perkins Professor of Homiletics, Perkins School of Theology, SMU.
For proclamation of God’s good news to be transformative for congregations, sermons must engage not only the mind but also the heart. In this workshop, Dr. Allen will lead participants through different approaches to shaping sermons and using imagery in ways that invite hearers to experience the gospel personally instead of only learn about it from a distance.
April 2025: “Novel Preaching: What Preachers Can Learn from Creative Writers”
Preachers face the daunting task of coming up with inspiring, profound, biblical sermons week in and week out. Sometimes we feel like the well of inspiration has gone dry and we don’t know where to look for a re-fill. This workshop trains preachers to take a page out of the novelists’ playbook and practice the fine art of noticing what is right in front of our eyes: the characters, patterns and plots of scripture (textscape), our inner lives (inscape) and life around us (landscape), weaving them into sermons that connect Bible and life in engaging, transforming ways.
This course is taught by Dr. Alyce M. McKenzie, Le Van Professor of Preaching and Worship, Perkins School of Theology, Director, the Perkins Center for Preaching Excellence at SMU.
September 2025: Preaching the Parables
This course will explore several of the major parables of Jesus, through a literary, theological and homiletical lens, stimulating preachers to proclaim the parables in fresh, faithful, and creative ways. This course is taught by Dr. Thomas G. Long, based on his 2024 book Proclaiming the Parables: Preaching and Teaching the Kingdom of God.
October 2025 “Preaching and Trauma”
How can preachers address issues of collective and individual trauma from the pulpit? This courses utilizes insights from scripture, psychology and trauma studies to equip preachers to address ongoing and catastrophic trauma in their pulpit ministries.
This course is taught by Dr. Joni Sancken, Butler Chair of Homiletics and Biblical Interpretation, Vancouver School of Theology, Vancouver, British Columbia based on her books Words that Heal: Preaching Hope to Wounded Souls and All Our Griefs to Bear: Responding with Resilience after Collective Trauma.
Courses offered in 2026 will follow the same monthly pattern of January, April, September and October, exact dates TBA, and will include classes in, among other topics, preaching and spirituality and preaching and embodiment/delivery.
Four online courses (3.5 hours each) will be offered per year. They do not need to be taken sequentially or all in one year. They can also be taken as stand-alones. After the completion of four courses participants will register for three one-on-one mentor consultations with an expert homiletician.
Cost of the certificate- $75 per virtual course $100 per coaching session. (Total $600.)
Visit our to find out more about CPX and to register for the January 7 class. You can also email preaching@smu.edu for more information.
Courses for Year One
January 7, 2025: “Experiential Preaching”
Let the Perkins Center for Preaching Excellence elevate your preaching to the next level with this engaging online offering taught by Dr. O. Wesley Allen, Lois Craddock Perkins Professor of Homiletics, Perkins School of Theology, SMU.
For proclamation of God’s good news to be transformative for congregations, sermons must engage not only the mind but also the heart. In this workshop, Dr. Allen will lead participants through different approaches to shaping sermons and using imagery in ways that invite hearers to experience the gospel personally instead of only learn about it from a distance.
April 2025: “Novel Preaching: What Preachers Can Learn from Creative Writers”
Preachers face the daunting task of coming up with inspiring, profound, biblical sermons week in and week out. Sometimes we feel like the well of inspiration has gone dry and we don’t know where to look for a re-fill. This workshop trains preachers to take a page out of the novelists’ playbook and practice the fine art of noticing what is right in front of our eyes: the characters, patterns and plots of scripture (textscape), our inner lives (inscape) and life around us (landscape), weaving them into sermons that connect Bible and life in engaging, transforming ways.
This course is taught by Dr. Alyce M. McKenzie, Le Van Professor of Preaching and Worship, Perkins School of Theology, Director, the Perkins Center for Preaching Excellence at SMU.
September 2025: Preaching the Parables
This course will explore several of the major parables of Jesus, through a literary, theological and homiletical lens, stimulating preachers to proclaim the parables in fresh, faithful, and creative ways. This course is taught by Dr. Thomas G. Long, based on his 2024 book Proclaiming the Parables: Preaching and Teaching the Kingdom of God.
October 2025 “Preaching and Trauma”
How can preachers address issues of collective and individual trauma from the pulpit? This courses utilizes insights from scripture, psychology and trauma studies to equip preachers to address ongoing and catastrophic trauma in their pulpit ministries.
This course is taught by Dr. Joni Sancken, Butler Chair of Homiletics and Biblical Interpretation, Vancouver School of Theology, Vancouver, British Columbia based on her books Words that Heal: Preaching Hope to Wounded Souls and All Our Griefs to Bear: Responding with Resilience after Collective Trauma.
Courses offered in 2026 will follow the same monthly pattern of January, April, September and October, exact dates TBA, and will include classes in, among other topics, preaching and spirituality and preaching and embodiment/delivery.