maT = Text

Few among our number doubt the authority of God’s Word.  We’ve gotten our theology right.  We even hold our theology passionately.  Who among us does not feel a bit emotional when he recalls that he is called to “preach the word”?  But, if our only authority is that from God given us in the text of Scripture, how does that guide us in our actual preaching?

Our bibliology must inform and govern our homiletics.  Our exegesis must govern our sermon crafting.  The text must govern the entire process of sermon preparation and delivery.  Today there is great want of text-driven preaching.  The rage is for market-driven preaching.  The result is often a psychologizing of the text of Scripture that reads it first through the lenses of my experience rather than that of the original readers.  Rather than being bound to the sacred text and governed by it from start to finish, the text often becomes a springboard that provides little more than a theme that then launches the preacher off on his own fancied flight.  The danger is to become what David Potter asserts our nation’s advertizing agencies have become, communicators intent not on “finding an audience to hear their message but rather with finding a message to hold their audience” (David M. Potter, People of Plenty, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1954, p.183).  In such a pursuit the structure of the message too often bears no resemblance to the structure of the text itself.  This problem is not new.  Even Luther lamented the problem in his day.

This is the way it has gone with preaching. . . . After the text of the Gospel is read, they take us to fairyland.  One preaches from Aristotle and the heathen books, another from the papal decretals.  One brings questions about blue ducks, another about hen’s milk . . . In short, this is the art in which nobody sticks to the text, from which people might have had the Gospel. (quoted in Henry Grady Davis, Design for Preaching, Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1958, 91.)

If we want authority in our preaching, we must expose the authoritative text of Scripture.  We must leave people looking with appreciation at their Bibles rather than in awe at us.  Luke spoke of those who were “servants of the word” (Luke 1:2), and he used the title as a badge of honor.  Run that phrase through your mind again, “servants of the word.”  The word of God gives the orders.  The word of God dictates.  The word of God governs.  The word of God rules, commands and directs.  Does it do so in the study as we craft our messages?

Our goal is to preach what the Bible says.  But our goal must be more than simply this.  Our goal must be to preach what the Bible says, in the way the Bible says it.  Do you discern the difference?  A man may preach from I Samuel 17 about David’s confrontation with Goliath.  He may wax eloquent about five smooth stones needed to slay the giants in our lives.  He may select as his “stones” homiletical gems such as Bible reading, prayer, obedience, fellowship and witness.  What he says may be Biblical, but has he been a servant of the word?  Or has he made the word serve his purposes?  He may have preached Biblical truth, but did he present it as the Bible presents it?  In other words, is that the point of the story of David and Goliath?  Was it God’s intent in breathing forth that Scripture that we should focus on the stones David put in his pouch?  Or is there another meaning, that, if discovered through sweaty exegesis in the study during the week and allowed to mold the structure and substance of the message, will yield divine authority in the pulpit on Sunday?

Some preach textually, some topically, and still other expositorily.  If we, who are responsible for the ongoing diet of the people committed to our charge, are to nourish them and build them up over time we must make our preferred form of preaching that of expository preaching.  While any of these forms of preaching may be deemed Biblical in a given instance, it is expository preaching that most ardently guards us from imbalance and personal preferences.  A commitment to expository preaching drives you back again and again to the text of Scripture, modeling for our people how to handle a passage so as to come to God’s intended meaning and application.  When we faithfully preach expositorily we not only expose them to the meaning of that passage, we open, over time, a method of approach to other Scriptures they will encounter in their own walk with God.  This is especially so when we are committed to lectio continua (systematic preaching through books of the Bible).

I define expository preaching as that form of proclamation which, in reliance upon the Holy Spirit, arises from and is delivered through a study of the grammatical, syntactical, literary, historical, contextual, theological and cultural elements of a given biblical text and seeks to convey the abiding and authoritative principles that are inherent in that text and were primary in the author’s intention in such a way that the enduring relevance of the Scriptures are made plain for the contemporary listener. Note again the words: “arises from and is delivered through.”  Though the pulpit is not the place for the dumping of unprocessed information gained in the study, the preacher by means of selectivity and homiletical crafting nevertheless guides the people to discover what he has already discovered as he has been before God.

This means that the main points and my sub-points of my message should arise from the text itself.  I need to not only gain my main points from the text before me, I must wrestle with the text until I can sufficiently support that main thought from it with sub-points.  Then, and only then, am I ready to add supportive Scriptures that may add weight to the argument of the Divine Writer of Scripture in the text before me.  It has been suggested that cross referencing while preaching is the lazy man’s way to fill time. Though I may not like it, this is probably correct more often than I care to admit.  Developing the selected pericope holds me close to the sacred text in the development of what I say on God’s behalf.  In addition it is more likely to assure that I am saying what God is saying, and that I am saying it in the way He has said it.  I must discover the mood of the passage and make that the mood of my message.  I must labor to reflect the symmetry of the passage in the symmetry of my message.  Few of us would ever preach a sermon that was not Scripture-based.  Yet we must strive for more than simply being Scripture-based, we must wrestle until our messages are Scripture-shaped.  In all things and in every way I must strive to be text-driven.  This will build believers on the words of God.

At root in our homiletics from start to finish are these two questions:

• Do I trust the Word of God?
• Do I trust the God of the Word?

Having answered both questions in the affirmative, then there is plenty of room for creativity, growth, improvement, learning and personality.  But in the end do I trust the efficacious and living word of God or am I relying upon my ingenuity, cleverness and creativity?  If I trust the latter, I may tickle ears, but people will leave hungry and with bloating stomachs.  If I rest on the former, people will be nourished, built up and established in the faith.  I must ask myself:  Am I text-driven and market-sensitive or market-driven and merely text-sensitive?

mA = Authority

Erecting a building requires authority.  You need permits, the community building inspector must sign off on the project, there are specifications that must be adhered to, a state inspector must survey the final results.  If a stranger shows up and begins to erect an edifice on your property, you will no doubt have him removed.

What constitutes authority in preaching?  The people marveled at Jesus’ teaching  because unlike the professional clergy of the day, He spoke with authority (Lk. 4:32).  How do we come to the place where we are not simply professional, but where God speaks an authoritative word to His people through us?

The apostle Paul spoke to the Corinthians concerning “our authority, which the Lord gave for building you up” (2 Cor. 10:8; cf. also 13:10).  The Apostles were vested with authority by Christ from God through the Holy Spirit to build the Church.  Apostleship (in its narrow sense of the twelve) does not continue today, though a gift of apostleship may be found operative.  The authoritative office does not remain today.  What then?  Are we to flail away at preaching in accountability without authority?  No!  The authority of the apostles continues today, not in some papal delegation, but in the written documents of the New Testament.  The Holy Spirit penned through the apostles and their designates the authoritative words of God (2 Peter 1:20:21).  These words are given for the up-building of the church (2 Tim. 3:16-4:2).

The issue at root in preaching is that of authority.  R. Albert Mohler has stated the issue well, “The authority of the preacher is intrinsically rooted in the authority of the Bible as the church’s Book and the unblemished Word of God . . . We speak because God has spoken, and because He has given us His Word.”

The only authority a preacher may legitimately claim is a delegated authority, that authority which belongs to God alone.  The true preacher does not seek personal authority.  He seeks, rather, a message full of authority.  God delegates His authority to we preachers when He hands us His Scriptures and calls us to proclaim them.  To the degree we speak what God has spoken in holy Scripture, to that same degree we speak with divine authority.  Where cleverness and cuteness govern our message there is no authority.  Again, Mohler well says, “The issue of authority is inescapable.  Either the preacher or the text will be the operant authority.” And he warns us “of confusing our own authority with that of the biblical text.  We are called, not only to preach, but to preach the Word.”

Lets be clear, our authority in preaching arises from the text of Scripture and our fidelity to it, not from any subjective experience we may claim to have had with God.  We must carefully distinguish between a perceived authority that grows from an experience we have had and the authority of God inherent in the text of Scripture.  Paul warned the Galatians, “But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned!” (Gal. 1:8).  Paul did not discount the spiritual nature of the experience, only the authority of it.  Paul, similarly, warned the Corinthians of those who would come preaching another Jesus or another gospel and he warned them against receiving another spirit (2 Cor. 11:4).  Paul did not deny that these folk had gone through a spiritual experience, only that it carried the authority of God.

Experience alone does not constitute authority.  “Feeling” like God wants you to say something is not the same as having authority when you preach.  Our only authority is that which is inherently God’s and embodied in the text of Scripture.

Our authority comes from the text of Scripture, but it must be delivered under the empowering of the Holy Spirit in order to be biblical preaching.  So, in one sense, there is experience necessary for authority in preaching—the experience of God the Holy Spirit pulling the preacher through the knot-hole of divine truth in Scripture and then pouring that truth of holy Scripture through the clean vessel of the preacher (if I may mix my metaphors!).  Our every experience must be governed by the text of Scripture, and our every proclamation of the text of Scripture must be empowered by the Holy Spirit.  When these two elements come together as we step into the pulpit the Apostle Peter’s words come true, “Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms.  If anyone speaks, he should do it as one speaking the very words of God” (1 Pet. 4:10-11a).

How, then, can we actually preach with God’s authority?  The answer to that question will be taken up in our next post … and in the next letter of our acrostic.

Few missions in life are as challenging as that of preaching the Word of God.  We who preach are under Divine commission, but we stand before people for whose minds a million things compete.  We preach under the discerning gaze of God, but too often before the glazed daze of people suffering from sensory overload.  We stand to proclaim the timeless, authoritative Word of God, but we do so in an age of pluralism and relativism where any given voice is deemed as no more legitimate than the next.

How are we to faithfully “preach the word” (2 Tim. 4:1) in such a day and age as ours?  There is some preaching that gathers crowds.  There is some preaching which garners guffaws.  There is some preaching which is mired in a day gone by.  Our calling as pastor/teachers is to build believers through the proclamation of the Word of God.  How can we preach so as to strengthen and establish the people of God on the foundation of Jesus Christ as revealed in the timeless Scriptures?

To answer this question in a series of posts I would like to employ the use of an acrostic.  Lets take the word mature, since it represents our goal in building up mature believers in Christ, and use it to guide our way.

M = Mission

“M” stands for mission.  What are we preachers aiming at?  I take Paul’s words to Timothy as normative for our divinely given mission in preaching:  “But the goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith” (I Timothy 1:5, NASB).

Note that this is “instruction.” Practically speaking in our cultural context preaching and teaching are often viewed as distinct.  We, however, should not make too fine a distinction between preaching and teaching at a philosophical basis.  All good teaching includes application, and all good preaching is didactic as well as applicational.  Yet the primary goal of preaching is not the imparting of information or the increase of knowledge, but the production of love.

We do not simply teach a passage, explore a topic, or preach a message.  We must do more than be orthodox, though that we must be.  Our goal in preaching is not just to “get through the material” we have assembled from passionate study.  As God’s spokesmen we do not have the freedom to get lost in a topic, theme, or doctrine as we frantically attempt to say all that could be said on the topic of the day.

We must seek to communicate a given passage, topic or theme in such a way as to provoke love toward God and man in a particular people.  There must be connection with these people.  This love is, however, not some nebulous sense of goodwill.  It must arise from an encounter with God the Spirit through the Scriptures.  The desired love must spring from a firm, three- pronged base: “a pure heart,” “a good conscience,” and “a sincere faith.”

1. This means I must preach in such a way that the people to whom I speak that day are moved toward a love which looks outward at others with good motives (“a pure heart”),
2. looks inward at self in self-judgment (“a good conscience”), and
3. looks upward at God without ulterior motives (“a sincere faith”).

Such an encounter will begin to produce the love sought from the beginning to the end of the preaching process.  This encounter is accomplished logically by providing a preaching experience which moves people from #3 (looking upward to God with a sincere faith), through #2 (looking inward with a clear conscience), and on to #1 (looking at others with a pure heart).  That is to say that we first seek to bring people into an authentic encounter with God through His Word, this encounter should lead to an inward examination of self before God, which in turn changes the way they look at and respond to others.  This and nothing less is our desired objective each time we stand to say “Thus saith the Lord!”

We do not aim at experience over content, for it is the truth that sanctifies (John 17:17) and sets free (John 8:32).  Nor do we function merely as a conduit for content.  Rather we aim at a presentation of the Scripture’s truth that grows from disciplined preparation and is delivered under the Spirit’s enablement so that it might accomplish its divine mission.  This means we preach messages whose very shape as well as content are derived from the biblical text.  We select the appropriate content gleaned in our exegesis that will accurately convey the Spirit-intended message of the passage to the specific people before us at that time and that will produce in them a love that is catapulted forward on the fulcrum of “a sincere faith,” “a good conscience” and “a pure heart.”  Preaching is the art of selection; selection made on the basis of a specific desired outcome.

The question is how can I preach so as to create an atmosphere wherein the Holy Spirit can produce this well grounded love?  That will lead us to our second letter in the acrostic, which we shall take up in our next post.