2. And the text . . .
While we must point people to Christ continually, we must also properly expound the text we are teaching. In his book Preaching, Tim Keller advocates this balance: “We have a balance to strike—not to preach Christ without preaching the text, and not to preach the text without preaching Christ.” The text must be opened. The Scripture must be expounded. Preachers who don’t hold tightly to the truth, trustworthiness and power of the Word will find something else to expound. And whatever else they find is less and pales in comparison. If people don’t see us holding tightly to the Word in our messages, we are foolish to think they will hold tightly to the Word in their own lives.
3. In their context.
The teacher/preacher must place the life-changing message in the context of those listening. To place the message in the context of those listening is to be faithful to how the Lord has served us, stepping into this broken and fallen world to rescue us. He also placed the written Word in modern street language, as Calvin Miller reminded us: “We must remember that the New Testament was not born in colonnaded Greek. Koine Greek is, of course, ‘street’ Greek. The gospel of Christ was written in friendly street language.” Because we love the people we speak to, we must aim to make the message of Christ accessible to them. To do so requires a love for those we are speaking to. Without love preachers are merely resounding gongs and clanging cymbals, merely clutter without compassion. Anglican preacher Richard Cecil stated, “To love to preach is one thing, to love those to whom we preach quite another.”
