I have a passion to preach the Word of God with purity and faithfulness. I resonate with Timothy when Paul gave him a strong commission saying, “Preach the Word; Be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage – with great patience and careful instruction.” (2 Timothy 4:2). It is a very weighty calling to preach the Bible. It is a calling to take very seriously. We are literally talking about God’s Revelation to humanity. This is not a light topic. As a result, I enjoy being a lifelong learner of good Biblical preaching, preachers and authors who have written on the subject.
I am in the middle of a great book called, Preach: Theology Meets Practice by Mark Dever and Greg Gilbert. I am greatly encouraged by their concern for solid Biblical preaching and seeing the lack of it in the average evangelical church.
In their introduction, they express three reasons for writing the book or concerns for the evangelical church today.
First, the authors and I can see a rising in the evangelical church over the loss of confidence in the preached Word of God.
They explain that some believe the Word of God should not be preached because our world is filled with pithy sound bites and immediate interaction including Facebook status and tweets. Some say that “conversation” and “dialog” are more important today. They believe, as do I, that “significant things are lost when a congregation never hears the Word of God delivered at length, with power, in an uninterrupted sermon.” God’s Word needs to be “proclaimed, not just considered.” Just as God spoke the world into existence and handed down instructions to His people, there is a unique calling and giftedness for some to proclaim the Word of God to the people of God. There is power in this place that you can’t get anywhere else. This is God’s design from the beginning.
Second, the authors and I can see throughout much of the evangelical church a lack of confidence in biblical exposition.
Exposition of the Word of God is exposing the Word of God to the listeners. Many evangelical churches are more interested in “topical sermons, sometimes character studies, sometimes even with things that strain the definition of preaching; but regardless of what replaces it, opening the Bible to a particular passage and preaching the meaning of that passage Sunday after Sunday is far from the normal practice in most evangelical churches.” I would agree. This is a tragedy! Much of the preaching today is more focused on entertaining as not to have the congregation be bored. The power is not in the preacher. The power and confidence we have is and has always got to be in the vary Word’s of God, His Revelation to us.
Third, the authors and I want to work against the bad name that even some expositional preachers have given to expositional preaching.
Some of what is filed under “expository preaching” is just not good preaching. Expositional preaching is not a “running commentary on first-century Jewish backgrounds.” We need to see good examples of solid and faithful preaching calling people to change into the people God longs for them to be based on the Word’s from God. Afterall, the Greek word for preaching means “to herald” or “to call for change.” It is Gospel-centered.
Later in the book, the authors write, “The fundamental basis of any person’s relationship with God is that we hear His Word and respond to it.” The faithful preacher opens up the Word of God, shares what it’s intended meaning is and the congregation responds in obedience. As we study any character in the Bible who followed God, this was the normal order of things.
God speaks.
They listen and obey.
God’s favor and blessing is on His people.
The calling of the preacher is to speak the Word of God with purity, praying for folks to listen and obey.
The local church must place it’s feet firmly on the foundation of the Word of God. Cool object lessons, backdrops, topics, flog machines, themes, music, fliers, programs, atmosphere or staging are not the foundation that changes lives. They might help or hinder. The Word of God changes lives. I am reminded of what the half-brother of Jesus said, “He [God] chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of first-fruits of all he created” (James 1:18). We were born-again or saved by the Word of God in Christ Jesus. James goes on, “…humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you” (James 1:21).
The preacher is charged like Paul and Timothy with the humble calling to faithfully present the word’s of God as they were intended not “watering down” or compromising their clear message. When we preach expository sermons, we don’t miss anything God has for us. May we not be guilty of presenting half-truth which is really no truth at all. May we rise up to preach the “whole counsel of God” as Paul did (Acts 20:27).
This is a humble, sometimes difficult, but overwhelmingly joyful experience!
What do you think?
