In the last decade I have invested a lot of time in public speaking. With employee meetings, plenary sessions, breakouts at conferences, consulting ministry leaders and speaking on books I have written, I have given hundreds and hundreds of leadership and ministry presentations. I have also preached weekly for the last several years as teaching pastor, interim pastor and now a bi-vocational senior pastor. Preaching is different. In both the burden of responsibility and the eternal impact, preaching the Word of God to a congregation of His people far outweighs speaking on other subjects. Preaching differs from other speaking in that the message we deliver is the only message that will endure forever (Isaiah 40:8), the only message that brings someone to saving faith (Romans 10:17), and the only message that can transform the human heart (1 Peter 1:23).
So what is my aim in preaching? My good friend Ed Stetzer asked me that recently and it caused me to jot down some of my thoughts. One way to describe this sacred stewardship is “Teach Christ and the text in their context.” The aim is three-fold:
1. Teach Christ . . .
The apostle Paul reminded those he ministered to in the city of Corinth that he decided to know nothing among them “except Jesus Christ and Him crucified” (1 Corinthians 2:2). It is possible to teach a passage and not teach Christ’s work for us, but doing so isn’t faithful to the whole story of Scripture and fails to change hearts with the grace of Jesus. Of his preaching, Charles Spurgeon said, “I take my text and make a bee-line to the cross.” In other words, he would walk through the text while simultaneously moving people to Christ and the cross as quickly as possible.
