Are Christians Prone to Over-Compensate for Cultural “Losses”?

Is the state of the culture a report card for the church?

I think I first heard Kevin DeYoung and John Piper ask and answer that question. They both concluded “no.” I think I agree with them. There is no direct relationship between the effectiveness of the church and the broader unbelieving culture.

Yet, it seems most Christians tend to assume a relationship. If the church was doing _____ then the culture wouldn’t ______. Because the church is weak in _____ the society is experiencing ______.

Many Christians too readily draw these kinds of conclusions. I think it’s well-intended. What Christian doesn’t want to see the church have a lasting positive impact on their society?    Continue at Thabiti Anyabwile

Biblically-Anemic Preaching: The Devastating Consequences of a Watered-Down Message

Those who are familiar with my ministry know that I am committed to expository preaching. It is my unshakable conviction that the proclamation of God’s Word should always be the heart and the focus of the church’s ministry (2 Tim. 4:2). And proper biblical preaching should be systematic, expositional, theological, and God-centered.  

 

Such preaching is in short supply these days. There are plenty of gifted communicators in the modern evangelical movement, but today’s sermons tend to be short, shallow, topical homilies that massage people’s egos and focus on fairly insipid subjects like human relationships, "successful" living, emotional issues, and other practical but worldly—and not definitively biblical—themes. These messages are lightweight and without substance, cheap and synthetic, leaving little more than an ephemeral impression on the minds of the hearers.

Some time ago I hosted a discussion at the Expositors’ Institute, an annual small-group colloquium on preaching held at our church. In preparation for that seminar, I took a yellow legal pad and a pen and began listing the negative effects of the superficial brand of preaching that is so rife in modern evangelicalism.

I initially thought I might be able to identify about ten, but in the end I had jotted down a list of sixty-one devastating consequences. I’ve distilled them to fifteen by combining and eliminating all but the most crucial ones. I offer them as a warning against superficial, marginally biblical preaching—both to those who stand behind the pulpit and to those who sit in the pew.

1. It usurps the authority of God over the soul. Whether a preacher boldly proclaims the Word of God or not is ultimately a question of authority. Who has the right to speak to the church? The preacher or God? Whenever anything is substituted for the preaching of the Word, God’s authority is usurped. What a prideful thing to do! In fact, it is hard to conceive of anything more insolent that could be done by a man who is called by God to preach.     Continue at John F. MacArthur

Evaluating Sermons

I was once a member of a church whose senior pastor had retired. A search committee was appointed to do what was necessary to find a suitable successor. The task seemed daunting since the retiring pastor was a gifted preacher under whose ministry people of widely diverse nationality and social backgrounds had been incorporated into the life of a growing church. When asked what it was that drew them to this church, the answer almost always focused on the biblical expository, Christ-centered preaching. The search committee was determined to find a pastor who would continue the pulpit tradition that had so nourished and expanded the ministry of this congregation. That proved to be more difficult than any of us expected.

We discovered that the membership was quite capable of evaluating invited applicants in terms of personality, sensitivity for pastoral concerns, and communication skills. The last of these seemed to be of greatest importance to them. Applicants who were clear and skillful communicators and had captivating preaching styles enjoyed broad appeal regardless of their approach to the Scriptures or the substance of their messages. Since the content of the sermon was a primary issue with the search committee, it became necessary to instruct the congregation regarding the biblical substance which we have come to expect from our pulpit. I was asked to provide some general guidelines to sensitize the congregation as to what it was that the search committee was so eager to identify when evaluating the sermons of applicants for our senior pastor position.

Evaluating Sermon Content

There are three general categories into which sermons fall among preachers who take a text from the Bible as the starting point for their sermons. Many preachers don't even make a pretense of beginning with Scripture or they may have a Scripture reading that really has little or nothing to do with the topic about which they intend to provide advice or encouragement. Their sermons are a form of "group counseling" as Harry Emerson Fosdick once described his sermonizing. We are not addressing that form of preaching. We are rather attempting to distinguish approaches to the preaching task that are taken by those who are serious about the Bible and its message. They are committed to the authority of the Scriptures but approach the task of preaching from the Bible differently. When a congregation is searching for a pastor, the membership should be aware of these differences, at least in general, so that intelligent, prayerful choices can be made.    Continue at Derke Bergsma

Entertaining Pulpits and the Legacy of “Tethered Preaching”

Initially, it may be tough to tell the difference. A gifted Bible-expositor and an entertainment-oriented preacher, with a penchant for garnishing his ideas with some Bible, may not demonstrate much disparity at first.

But give it some time. And check the congregation over the long haul. It will make a world of difference.

Tethered to the Bible

 

John Piper coins a term in his short article “In Honor of Tethered Preaching: John Calvin and the Entertaining Pastor.” “Tethered preaching,” he says, is cut from a different cloth altogether. It is Bible-oriented, rather than entertainment-oriented, even as it often proves captivating to the born-again palette.

The Bible tethers us to reality. We are not free to think and speak whatever might enter our minds or what might be pleasing to any given audience—except God.

A Relentless Reformer

 

While many fine preachers, no doubt, could be celebrated in the legacy of “tethered preaching,” Piper holds up the great Reformer John Calvin (1509–1564) as one example.

For Calvin, preaching was tethered to the Bible. That is why he preached through books of the Bible so relentlessly. In honor of tethered preaching, I would like to suggest the difference I hear between preaching tethered to the word of God and preaching that ranges free and leans toward entertainment.    Continue at David Mathis

Why Doctrinal Preaching Declines by Arthur W. Pink

‘Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.‘ 2 Timothy 2:15

‘For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.‘ 2Timothy.4:3-4.

During the last two or three generations the pulpit has given less and less prominence to doctrinal preaching, until today, with very rare exceptions, it has no place at all. In some quarters the cry from the pew was, ‘we want living experience and not dry doctrine’; in others, ‘we need practical sermons and not metaphysical dogmas’; and yet others, Give us Christ and not theology. Sad to say, such senseless cries were generally heeded: ‘senseless’ we say, for there is no other safe way of testing experience, as there is no foundation for practicals to be built upon if they be divorced from Scriptural doctrine; while Christ cannot be known unless he be preached (1Cor.1:23), and he certainly cannot be ‘preached’ if doctrine is shelved. Various reasons may be given for the lamentable failure of the pulpit, chief among them being laziness, desire for popularity, superficial and lop-sided evangelism, and love of the sensational’.

Laziness. It is a far more exacting task, one which calls for much closer confinement in the study, to prepare a series of sermons on, say the doctrine of justification, than it does to make addresses on prayer, missions, or personal-work. It demands a far wider acquaintance with the Scriptures, a more rigid disciplining of the mind, and a more extensive perusal of the older writers. But this was too exacting for most of the ministers, and so they chose the line of least resistance and followed an easier course. It is because of his proneness to this weakness that the minister is particularly exhorted, ‘Give attendance to reading … take heed unto thyself and unto the doctrine: continue in them’ (1Tim.4:13,16); and again, ‘Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, (2Tim.2: 15).  Continue at Grace Online

Ways to Profit From an Expository Sermon

From a preacher's perspective, it's our happy task before God to craft and deliver a sermon that's worth listening to, attending to, learning from, and retaining. Any regular reader of this blog probably attends a church whose pastor takes this as a solemn, joyous, exhilarating, devastating, God-given duty.

On that assumption, then, how can you gain the most value from the sermon?

I'll tailor my remarks specifically to profiting from an expository sermon in a book-study series. Some of these suggestions will apply to any Biblical sermon, but I have in mind a series that progresses through a book of the Bible.

1. Pray in advance. Pray for your preacher, because sermon preparation is both a science and a spiritual exercise. It's his part to "consider," but he needs the Lord to "give understanding" (2 Tim. 2:7). Pray for yourself, because you need the work of the Spirit to open your eyes to your riches in Christ (Eph. 1:16-19). Pray for others who come, including unbelievers, that the Lord might open their hearts to respond to the truths of God which your pastor will preach (Acts 16:14).
2. Read the passage in advance, asking yourself questions, or imaging the questions you might be asked. Priming the pump is a terrific way to learn the most. It's always both humbling and a blessing to have read a passage, and then to see it anew when a brother brings out valid insights that had never occurred to us.   Continue at Dan Phillips

Preach: Theology Meets Practice

Two preachers talk shop:

Mark Dever and Greg Gilbert. Preach: Theology Meets Practice. 9Marks. Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 2012. 212 pp. 27-page sample PDF.

Excerpts:

What expositional preach is and is not (pp. 36–38):

Expositional preaching is preaching in which the main point of the biblical text being considered becomes the main point of the sermon being preached. . . .

1. We’re not saying expositional preaching has to go verse by verse through a book of the Bible. . . .
2. We’re not saying expositional preaching rules out topical preaching as a legitimate practice. . . .
3. We’re not saying expositional preaching is just a series of lectures, the main goal of which is information transfer. . . .
4. We’re not saying expositional preaching is marked by any particular style. . . .
5. We’re not saying expositional preaching is not evangelistic preaching.

On using the original languages (p. 83):

One of the preacher’s greatest enemies is familiarity: He thinks he understands a particular text because he has known its meaning all his life, and because of that he winds up missing its point when he preaches it. Looking at a text in the original languages helps minimize that kind of mistake.  Continue at Andy Naselli

Sinclair Ferguson 23-Part Series on The Book of Revelation

To download the following MP3 Files, right click and save to your hard drive. 

Sinclair Ferguson is senior pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Columbia, S.C., and Distinguished Visiting Professor of Systematic Theology at Westminster Seminary. One of the most renowned Reformed theologians in our day, Dr. Ferguson is also a member of the Council of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals. He is a prolific author whose many books include The Holy Spirit, The Christian Life: A Doctrinal Introduction, and In Christ Alone: Living the Gospel Centered Life

----------------------------------------------------------

Revelation or Obfuscation? - Revelation 1:1-3

A Greeting to Die For - Revelation 1:4-8`

Nothing to See on Patmos? - Revelation 1:9-20

Ephesus: The Church that Fell - Revelation 2:1-7

Smyrna: The Church that was Faithful - Revelation 2:8-11

Pergamum: The Church That Compromised - Revelation 2:12-17

Thyatira: The Church That Was Too Tolerant - Revelation 2:18-29

Sardis: The Church With a False Reputation - Revelation 3:1-6

Philadelphia: The Church with the Open Door - Revelation 3:7-13

Laodicea: The Church That Was Lukewarm - Revelation 3:14-22

Heaven's Open door - Revelation 4

The Lion, The Dragon, and the Heavenly Door - Revelation 5

When the Seals are Opened - Revelation 6

Before the Seventh Seal - Revelation 7:1-8:1

When the Trumpets Sound - Revelation 8:1 - 9:21

The Little Scroll - Revelation 10:1-11

Continue at Monergism

Application in Sermons

With the growing rediscovery of expository, Christ-centered preaching, many believers—and pastors—are falling in love with the Bible again. It’s not a handbook of “how-to” principles. Jesus is a Savior, not a life coach or personal therapist. 

I’ll be the last person to take issue with these sentiments! Yet still, faithful believers will often ask, “So, um, ahem, does the Bible have anything to say also about raising my kids, having a good marriage, and being a good neighbor?” 

At this point, it’s easy to take one of two ways out. The first is simply to say that the Bible isn’t about these things. Sure, there are a few verses here and there in Proverbs and the Epistles, but that’s not the point. The second easy way out—far more common in evangelical circles—is to say, “That’s what the application part of the sermon is for!”

I’d like to suggest another way of looking at the question.

1. Application as Law

First, it’s helpful to identify what sort of “animal” we’re talking about. Stated in technical categories, the question is, “What’s the third use of the law and how do we preach it?” “Gospel” is “good news”: specifically, the announcement of what God has done to save us from the guilt, tyranny, and eventually the very presence of sin through Christ’s life, death and resurrection. “Law” is anything that God commands. It reaveals God’s righteous and holy will. In its first use, the law exposes our guilt, leaves us without any hope in ourselves, and drives us to Christ. In its third use, the law is our guide. Having “quenched Mount Sinai’s flame,” as John Newton’s other famous hymn has it, the gospel frees us to cherish the law as the loving will of our Father rather than fear it as the basis for the Judge’s sentence.Continue at Michael Horton

Teaching the Whole Counsel of God in One Year

One week into my current pastorate, I challenged our congregation to read through the Bible. Desiring to encourage participation, I offered a weekly lesson on how the gospel of Jesus Christ is evidenced in every book of the Bible. Many in our church showed interest, and so with great zeal for God's Word, and with just as much ignorance on what it would take to finish the course, I embarked on teaching Genesis through Revelation in 52 weeks.

In the year that followed, I learned a lot---a lot about the Bible and a lot about biting off more than I could chew. God was gracious to let our band of Bible readers make it from cover to cover. What follows are some traps of, tips, and tools for teaching through and declaring the whole counsel of God.

Traps

First, if you are just beginning at your church, WAIT! Unless providence prohibits, you will have many years to teach through the Bible. With grand intentions, I dove into this marathon in my first year and nearly collapsed. Thus, if this is year one, consider taking on something more manageable. With that said, teaching through the Bible in one year, if done well, will provide an excellent biblical platform on which you can build for years to come.  Keep Reading >>>

From Calvary Chapel to Sovereignty and Elders

I have a confession to make: I have a Calvary Chapel past.

Don’t jump to conclusions though…trust me—I can explain it. I am from Albuquerque, where for the longest time the Calvary Chapel was the banner of evangelicalism in Albuquerque. The evangelical scene has significantly changed since, but that is a story for another time.

When I was a sophomore in college, I had been a believer for only two years and was one of the only college students at my church. I was desperate for Christian friendship, and found a flier for an STM trip to Nicaragua put on by Calvary Chapel. Since I was a Spanish major, I took the flier to the church, and met the missions pastor. He began meeting with me and teaching me about both missions and ministry.

That started my relationship with Calvary. I was attending the same small non-denominational church where I had come to Christ a few years earlier, and the Calvary pastor never asked me to leave. Because Calvary did Saturday night, Sunday night, and a midweek service, I was actually able to attend three services a week without disrupting my commitments at the church where I was a member (I would not recommend this approach to ecclesiology, by the way). By the time I graduated, I was working with a now-defunct group called LifeLine missions, and regarded Calvary as the source of my rapid spiritual growth.   Keep Reading >>>

Evangelicalism’s Got Talent, Part Two

In my last post, I mentioned that there are two issues that that cause me to think that evangelicalism is being duped when it comes to how we evaluate effective ministries and preaching. I discussed the first of those two in my most recent post: we make wrong assumptions about what it means to be a “gifted” preacher. 

In this post, I want to address how those faulty assumptions about giftedness lead to an errant view of expository preaching. 

Assumptions about Bible “Exposition”

This may step on a few toes, but I might as well say it plainly right up front: I just don’t think a number of the most widely-known preachers today are truly doing Bible exposition, even though they define their preaching by those terms.  Referring again to the panel discussion video I watched, all the men on the panel are considered expositors, yet only a few of them, in my view, are both surrendered to the text and preach its full intent and implications.

For a sermon to be classified as “expository,” it must derive its central message exclusively from the biblical author’s intended message.  The sermon’s principles, therefore, must rise naturally from the structure and force of the text in light of the surrounding context.  D.A. Carson’s explanation is important:  Keep Reading >>>

Evangelicalism’s Got Talent

A few weeks ago I posted some concerns (you can read them here) about various subtle—and I believe threatening—trends in preaching today. One respondent gently took exception and expressed concern that I might’ve over-generalized in making my case. While a full treatment of this subject is thicker than the limits of typical blog-posts, I promised a more extensive look at the matter.

Recently I listened to a panel discussion of well-known pastors discussing the merits, if any, of establishing new churches whose primary shepherd/preacher is heard and known only by live-streaming video. Those in favor offered two main reasons: (1) It works! Patently faster than other numerically-driven approaches, the live-stream messages of admired preachers draws more people from, well, wherever they were before; (2) Only some men have the kind of giftedness to “bring it powerfully” in the pulpit, and so we should maximize their outreach potential through technology.

Now, aside from what I think are grave errors with that particular approach to feeding the flock (which weren’t addressed in the panel discussion, but that’s for another post), two issues cause me to think that evangelicalism is being duped when it comes to how we evaluate effective ministries and preaching. We make wrong assumptions about “giftedness” and this leads to an errant view of expository preaching. This post will simply focus on the first of those points.   Keep Reading ...

A Historic Moment

Forty-three years ago, John MacArthur set his sights on preaching through the entire New Testament, using verse-by-verse Bible exposition. Over the years he worked hard to accomplish that goal, and he didn’t merely hit the highlights of the New Testament or avoid difficult passages. He expounded everything in a bold, courageous, and in-depth manner that we’ve grown to know and love.

John recently accomplished the goal he set many years ago. As you'd expect, he ended his journey the same way he began—by exalting the person and work of Christ.

We thought you'd like to share in that historic moment by watching the video. You can  click here to watch, read, or listen to John's landmark message.

John MacArthur:

Servant of the Word and Flock, by Iain H. Murray (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 2011), HB 246 pages.

In the concluding section of his first letter to the Corinthians, the Apostle Paul challenges the brothers to "Be watchful, stand firm in the faith, act like men, [and] be strong" (I Cor. 16:13), not least of all those men who have been set apart as under-shepherds of the flock.  Sadly, in our increasingly effeminate culture, these biblical marks of manhood appear to be diminishing amongst both laymen and ministers.  Dandified, progressive, culture-centric preachers (and preaching) are becoming as ubiquitous as Starbucks and American Eagle.  Harder to find is Lionhearted, authoritative, expository, God-besotted, Law/Gospel-filled preaching like that which characterized the preaching of men like Calvin, Knox, Owen, Spurgeon and Lloyd-Jones.  It is, in part, for this reason that John Fullerton MacArthur Jr.'s long and steadfast ministry of the Word is a welcome and timely subject for reflection.  

It never occurred to Iain Murray to write a biography on John MacArthur until after he was invited to preach at MacArthur's fortieth anniversary at Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, California on Sunday, February 1, 2009.

 

Rightly unwilling to set aside the preaching of God's Word during Lord's Day worship, Murray chose rather to write "a biographical sketch as a short tribute" to MacArthur's ministry. (xi)  That sixty-page biographical sketch, later included as part of an anniversary volume of landmark MacArthur sermons, formed the basis of the present volume.  Keep Reading...

The Characteristics of Expository Preaching

Your Students Can Handle Expository Preaching