CH Spurgeon’s conversion is one of the great conversion stories in church history. Feeling under heavy conviction and longing to find out how to be saved, he set off for church one January Sunday morning (172 years ago tomorrow, in fact). The weather was atrocious and he couldn’t make it to his intended destination, and instead slipped into a small chapel where about a dozen people were attending. Their preacher had also been thwarted by the weather, so eventually, a thin man stood up to preach. Some have said it was the wrong preacher, in the wrong church, in the wrong weather, with the wrong congregation. Whatever, God is still God!
Spurgeon himself said, “Now, it is well that preachers should be instructed, but this man was really stupid. He was obliged to stick to his text, for the simple reason that he had little else to say.”
Of course, the story continues. The text was from Isaiah. “Look unto Me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth.” And the message was on target for young and troubled Spurgeon, “there was a glimpse of hope for me in that text.” So the thin-looking preacher restated the text every way he could manage for about ten minutes, and then told the young guest at the back that he looked miserable and needed to look to Jesus to be saved. And Spurgeon was born again. Spurgeon often told the story and it is well worth reading.
But let’s just ponder that earlier point. “He was obliged to stick to his text, for the simple reason that he had little else to say.”
Three points to ponder:
1. Our job as a preacher is to say what the text says.
2. Our education does not give us something better to say than what the text says.
3. God once spoke through a donkey, so humbly say what the text says.
Looking back on that moment, Spurgeon quoted words you may have sung:
E’er since by faith I saw the stream Thy flowing wounds supply, Redeeming love has been my theme, And shall be till I die.
To read a slightly fuller version of the story, click here. (And if you want to sing the song, I enjoyed this!)
New year and new project! Last year I enjoyed working through the book of Psalms on YouTube. I hope those videos will be useful to more people this year as people choose to use them as companions in a journey through the Psalms. And now we are into a new year and a new project: Enjoying the Word.
Enjoying the Word will be a growing collection of videos that will hopefully help people to enjoy reading and studying the Bible. The first part of the sermon preparation process is the privilege of every believer – to spend time in God’s Word so that it gets into us and changes us.
The plan is to release short videos related to Bible reading and Bible study. I will share a simple process to think through the Bible study journey. I plan to release more mini-series called Pursuing God’s Heart Yourself. These short series use a single Bible book or section to illustrate important principles of biblical interpretation. And I may work through a Bible book or two from start to finish to show the workings of healthy Bible study.
I hope this will be helpful to you and to others you know. Please do let me know if you have questions or ideas for videos. And please share the resources with others too! As videos are liked and shared, and as more people subscribe to the channel, so these videos will get in front of more people. (You can click here to subscribe to the YouTube channel.)
I am also planning to write companion posts on this blog to point to individual videos or mini-series of videos. The subjects we will cover in the videos perfectly fit this blog, so why not?
The introductory video includes a quick look at a fantastic biblical truth!
Solomon wrote thousands of proverbs. So when he writes, “Above all else…” – that should get our attention. What is “above all else” from Solomon’s perspective? In Proverbs 4:23, he tells us: “guard your heart.” That is huge. He recognized that the heart is the governor of all our activity, but strangely he did not simply say, “control your heart.” If we could just control our innermost desires, then we would have no problem living holy lives (or even being successful in any other pursuit of our choosing). Perhaps at the core of our being, we are responsive to external stimuli and not simply responsible free agents who can consistently choose whatever is best. The wise advice in this section of Proverbs is profoundly important for us as we head into another year.
In Proverbs 4:20-27, Solomon urges the reader to pay attention to his wise words – looking at them and keeping them in our hearts (v. 20-21). He underlines the critical role of the heart and the need to guard it (v. 23). He urges the reader to protect themselves from careless speech or from letting their eyes get drawn aside so that they should step away from their path (v. 24-27). Above all else, in 2023, we need to guard our hearts. I believe a great place to begin is with a prayerful eye evaluation.
I have been pondering a scale to help me take stock of what is getting through my eyes and influencing my heart. It is a scale that runs from -2 to +3.
Distractedly Entertained – Level 0? Long ago, this might have involved some children playing a game in the town square or an animal behaving amusingly. It was a break from the norm. Nowadays, we have entire industries actively targeting you with entertaining distractions. Scrolling through Facebook or Instagram, watching random YouTube videos about cats, men throwing CDs into a CD player, the most bizarre incidents in professional sports, and this list is designed never to end. Then there are video games, an endless Twitter stream, etc. Distracted entertainment has become a staple part of our cultural diet in recent years.
I think we can make a case for calling it Eye Level 0 entertainment because there is implicit moral neutrality to some of what distracts us. But once we consider all factors, is there really moral neutrality? Could we be hurting ourselves by believing that we can stand still in a world that is relentlessly moving away from God? Perhaps we would do well to call this entertainment Eye Level -1. The Bible does warn us about time-wasting, which can involve things that are not wrong in themselves. The average weekly consumption of distracted entertainment in our culture is stunning. Perhaps we have become more entangled than we realize. Let’s confess that entanglement and prayerfully take steps away from Eye Level -1 and the regret of lost time as we head into this new year.
So we have Distractedly Entertained – Eye Level -1.
Sinfully Entertained – Eye Level -2. Any of the above activities can easily slide into sinful entertainment – where we seek satisfaction for sinful desires through what we watch. The classic example is pornography, an industry that has made its content far easier to access than ever before. But even without the things that a good filter will stop on your device, we can also fall into “pornographying” non-pornographic content. Perhaps we think of it as a more sanctified type of lust that does not rely on overtly provocative material – on social media, TV shows, movies, etc. And then there is envious window shopping or jealously obsessing over what the rich and famous wear and drive. There are so many contemporary forms of idolatry. “Search me and try me, O Lord…” – prayerfully ask God to show you where your distracted entertainment has morphed into something even more harmful than time-wasting.
Let’s get back to the positive end of the scale:
Intentionally Entertained – Eye Level +1. There are legitimate uses of entertainment media. We need to evaluate prayerfully so that we don’t get sucked in by what our world is pushing us to think. However, there is a place for finding a TV show refreshing, a favourite movie can be restful, a shared football game can be social, a good book can be helpfully engrossing, etc. Where Eye Levels -2 and -1 leave us guilty, ashamed, worn down, frustrated, and empty, Eye Level +1 entertainment can be good for us.
Informed – Eye Level +2. In the old days, this might be found by listening to a report from a friend who has been travelling, reading the newspaper over breakfast, or watching a helpful documentary on the television. The rarity of access to information placed a premium on this commodity, but today, the situation has changed. We are bombarded with information. A well-chosen news subscription, a select list of Twitter accounts to follow, some helpful YouTube subscriptions, or a select set of blogs, etc., can be beneficial. The key seems to be planning rather than scrolling, or else we end up back in Eye Level +1 intentional entertainment, or even more likely, in Eye Level -1 distracted entertainment, or worse.
We are bombarded with the enticement to fritter away hours in Eye Levels -2, -1, +1 and +2. As we get used to and dependent on technology and social media, we may even start to think that our mental health, knowledge and spirituality are to be found somewhere in Eye Levels -1, +1 and +2. Perhaps we even think that our ministry is helped and built up in Eye Levels +1 and, especially, +2. But let’s remember that there is another level.
Enriched – Eye Level +3. There is something different about Eye Level +3. In the old days, time spent in the Book or good books was an obvious option in a world with a relatively limited range of alternatives. The significance of good reading was especially true for a serious-minded Christian, and even more so for a minister of the Word. Nowadays, this can be so easily lost. We live in a tidal wave of evil, distractions, entertainment, and information. But even if we avoid the worst of that flood, there is still a qualitative difference between being informed by a screen and being enriched by the page. Personally, I find that even reading the same author on a blog does less for my soul than spending time reading their book – is that just me?
We live in an age of hyper-distracted, entertained, and even a few well-informed, but largely unenriched people. It shows in our world today. Are we also living in a time of well-entertained and sometimes well-informed but largely unenriched believers? It shows in our churches and pulpits. So let’s do something radical. Let’s value that which enriches our souls and takes our relationship with God and others to someplace deeper than the norm.
As we head into 2023, let’s take stock of how God would want us to use our eyes this year. After all, they are an essential gateway by which we can guard our hearts.
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In 2023 I am planning to release short videos related to Bible study. God has given us a great treasure. How can we read and study it for maximum understanding, enrichment and life impact? Please subscribe to this playlist to see the videos as they are released. Please like, comment, and share any that might be helpful to others. Thank you!
During 2022, I decided to work my way through the Psalms. One video per Psalm. One point relating to interpreting the Psalm, and one point of relevance for today. I completed the playlist this week. I hope this can be useful to you. Please do let others know about this playlist if it might be helpful to them too.
I know some people used these videos as a companion to a personal reading of the Psalms this year, perhaps this can be useful in a similar way next year. Since the playlist is complete, it now allows that to happen at your pace instead of mine!
Let’s continue that list with two very important additions:
4. Some are afraid. There is a lot of fear in Christian ministry. Let me put it out on the table. It is probably better to discuss it rather than pretend it is not there:
Fear of upsetting people in our church. Every church will have people across a spectrum of political or cultural views. Our society controls contrarian perspectives by its reaction. This mechanism is evident with gender, sexuality, race, public health, climate crisis, military conflict, etc. Some people sit primed to be upset if we touch the wrong nerve. It always feels safer to play it safe.
Fear of upsetting Christians beyond our church. Maybe your local church is not as diverse as the wider church. Perhaps you can speak freely in your local pulpit without concern. But we live in an age of online recordings. Spurgeon used to have his sermons typed and published in newspapers. At the same time, thousands of other pastors could preach anything, and only their smaller congregation would hear them. Today the pastor of an obscure church can be heard by someone on the other side of the world. That person might disagree vehemently and take to their keyboard.
Fear of upsetting people in our society. A decade ago, church leaders were concerned about being forced into a complicated legal situation. “What if someone asks me to perform a wedding I can’t offer in good conscience? If that happens, then I could get in trouble.” Today, we are already in trouble with many people because of our beliefs. We don’t have to do anything wrong; we are already wrong. We are already guilty of wrong-think. We hold dangerous views. When some agent in society requires us to affirm certain things, we will already be in trouble. This dynamic can lead not only to silence but also to participation so as not to stand out. When Daniel’s three friends did not bow down, they stood out. They were heroes then, but it is genuinely challenging to know when to stand out in the complexities of today.
Fear of the backlash. Nobody wants to be in the sights of the mob. The destruction meted out by today’s cancel culture can be ruthless and unforgiving. The antagonistic othering of people who do not conform to society’s expectations has already become quite sinister. In the last couple of years, I’ve seen people wishing on me imprisonment, the withholding of medical treatment, the restriction of movement, and even death. Thankfully they did not name me specifically, but I happened to be in a class of people that were overtly “othered.” Nobody wants to face the force of that anger on any of the triggering issues.
Solzhenitsyn’s stunning warning in 1978 at the Commencement of Harvard University still rings out today. Does it apply to us? “A decline in courage may be the most striking feature that an outside observer notices in the West today. The Western world has lost its civic courage, both as a whole and separately, in each country, in each government, in each political party, and, of course, in the United Nations. Such a decline in courage is particularly noticeable among the ruling and intellectual elites, causing an impression of a loss of courage by the entire society. There are many courageous individuals, but they have no determining influence on public life.”
5. The category I have not mentioned. You may have read through these points and said, “yes, but there is another perspective.” I know. Let me raise the common one that I anticipate. I agree that the hope of society, indeed the hope of humanity, is the gospel. Absolutely. Signing petitions, participating in protests, writing to our representatives, voting one way or another, or any other political action are not the ultimate answer. I agree. The gospel is the answer, and we must rest in it ourselves. Then we must also broadcast it and share it from person to person.
But can I be candid? I feel like sometimes we might be hiding behind a gospel-only approach. To do so allows us to say nothing about what is going on, human rights, moral evils, etc., and thereby not face much in the way of antagonistic response. I know exactly how to say the right Christian things to avoid criticism or backlash. I’m sure you do too. We still have the freedom to speak Christian truths to each other, so long as we do not trip the growing number of hyper-sensitivities in our culture. Gradually the freedom to quote Bible verses will grow ever more restrictive. When referencing the Bible at all becomes culturally unacceptable, will we then quietly comply with that expectation too?
As Solzhenitsyn provocatively wrote in Live Not By Lies, “And as for him who lacks the courage to defend even his own soul: Let him not brag of his progressive views, boast of his status as an academician or a recognized artist, a distinguished citizen or general. Let him say to himself plainly: I am cattle, I am a coward, I seek only warmth and to eat my fill.”
I do not quote that to point only at others. I fear that I can too quickly be part of the herd too.
In closing, my mind goes to two scenes:
The best burger I can remember. I sat with another pastor enjoying both the burger and the conversation. We were both expressing the same thought. It isn’t easy to prepare people for what seems to be coming in our society when we are not allowed to mention what is coming. In my preaching and social media, I can make every public statement both gospel-centred and relatively safe. But the gospel has always been radically counter-cultural. And as culture pivots away from a Judeo-Christian ethical basis, the gospel will only become more radical. Many people in the church are not prepared for a world that is overtly antagonistic and institutionally persecuting them for their beliefs.
That congress. The film, Tortured for Christ, begins with the “Congress of Cults” that brought together religious leaders in Romania in 1945. Richard Wurmbrand, a Lutheran pastor, sits with his wife listening to the leaders praising the “progress” brought by the new Stalinist regime. Then he spoke out. We could just as easily go back to the example of Dietrich Bonhoeffer in Germany a few years earlier. It is hard to speak out when almost nobody else does. I know some Christian leaders are taking a stand today and speaking out on various issues. I am thankful for them. But I also see that many are already choosing to play it safe. We aren’t in the 1930s or 1940s, but we are in the 2020s. How can we be so sure this decade will not prove equally significant?
As we come to the end of the year, we also may be coming to the end of an era. One last quote from Solzhenitsyn, “If the world has not approached its end, it has reached a major watershed in history, equal in importance to the turn from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance. It will demand from us a spiritual blaze; we shall have to rise to a new height of vision, to a new level of life, where our physical nature will not be cursed, as in the Middle Ages, but even more importantly, our spiritual being will not be trampled upon, as in the Modern Era.” If we were not at a major historic watershed in his day, it feels like we are now. So, let’s all pray for wisdom, insight, courage, and strength as we head into 2023. Let’s not take part in the lie. We need a spiritual blaze. God has put us all here for such a time as this.
As we come to the end of 2022, I want to share a series of three posts with you. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s writings have been swirling in my mind, as has a single tweet from a few weeks ago. A massive body of work and a lengthy sentence separated by a few decades yet resonating together.
As you may have noticed, there is always something going on in the news. Of course, not every story is genuinely momentous. Perhaps you can remember the end of 1989? The Tiananmen Square protest and massacre had happened earlier in the year. As the end of the year approached, Hungary proclaimed the end of communist rule, the Berlin Wall came down, and Bulgaria’s long-serving leader resigned. Apartheid rules were changing in South Africa. Student demonstrations in Prague started the velvet revolution. President Bush (senior) and Gorbachev declared the cold war over. Romanian dictator Ceausescu was ousted and then executed on Christmas Day. The news was fascinating, and everyone knew we were watching history unfold.
How will we look back on our current time? There have always been news stories, but some news cycles feel more significant. We live in a season of swirling stories – some are featured and polished for maximum coverage. In contrast, others seem to be painstakingly discounted, twisted or buried. For instance, and in no particular order:
The Ukraine war is stirring the threatening language of Armageddon from global leaders. At the same time, celebrities fly into Kyiv for photoshoots with the president.
Many social media platforms restrict free speech. However, the media dismiss new revelations of illegal government influence on Twitter as irrelevant.
Critical Race Theory is fundamentally shifting every academic discipline, business practice and even whole Christian denominations.
Excess deaths remain way above the pre-covid five-year average, or even the pandemic year, when daily and total death counts were constantly before our eyes. And yet, asking why this is happening seems to be socially unacceptable.
Protests and legal wrangling over possible election fraud rumble away in various countries. Reporting suspicious behaviour results in being labelled an election denier and a threat to democracy.
“Fourth Industrial Revolution” ideas derided as conspiracy theories only two years ago are explicitly promoted by proponents today.
One western government is confiscating thousands of farms because of the climate crisis. And we are all required to pay the bill for Net Zero plans that may or may not make any difference to the projected catastrophe. Again, don’t question it, or you will be labelled a denier!
There is a push for digital id and digital currency, a checkpoint society with a Chinese-style social credit system that will replace fundamental freedoms with earned privileges.
In another western country, Euthanasia is being promoted, celebrated and normalised with increasingly ineffective controls.
Children are being sexualised and offered life-changing surgery and puberty blockers. At the same time, parents are increasingly pushed out of the conversation.
And in the last few days, a woman was arrested and questioned by police about whether she was silently praying in a particular location here in England.
There are many swirling issues, but we must step back and ask about underlying issues. We are living through a fundamental reshaping of the ethical foundations and the nature of the society built on them. In the past, there was rebellion against the generally accepted Judeo-Christian ethic underlying western civilisation (e.g. think of the sexual liberation movement of the 60s/70s). Today we see the replacement of that ethic with an entirely new moral code. We also observe the culture militantly enforcing compliance so that everyone is required to not only tolerate but also proactively participate in and promote the new moral order. A dictator enforces their will by sheer power, but a totalitarian tyranny seeks to control everything, even what subjects think.
Solzhenitsyn is both enlightening and provocative. He warned the students of Harvard in 1978: “There are telltale symptoms by which history gives warning to a threatened or perishing society. Such are, for instance, a decline of the arts or a lack of great statesmen.” I am no art critic, but I suspect many would agree that we are experiencing something of a decline. And when did we last see a political leader in that category? We live in a threatened, perhaps even perishing society.
I mentioned a tweet at the start of this post. On November 18th, Owen Strachan wrote, “Christian men: it’s not Tucker Carlson, Jordan Peterson, Ben Shapiro, Joe Rogan, Elon Musk or other conservative (or just not super-left) voices who should be known for speaking the hard truths, fighting what is evil, taking unpopular stands, and promoting what is good. It’s us.” (We might add a few more names in the UK, like Calvin Robinson, Neil Oliver, Douglas Murray, etc.)
I’ve been pondering that tweet. I know one of these men I added is a clergyman, but the point is well made. I also know that merely stating any of these names will cause some to react negatively to this post. That shows society’s shift from yesteryear, when people used to think and discuss provocative ideas, to today’s hair-trigger dismissal and antagonism. I might disagree with soundbites from all of these people because of their content or tone. Still, I must be willing actually to hear the points they are making and engage thoughtfully.
Honestly, I find myself regularly prompted to think, investigate, pray and take action based on monologues by Neil Oliver, interviews by Joe Rogan, books by Douglas Murray, and tweets from Jordan Peterson. But then, when I look at my feed of Christian leaders? Honestly, with some exceptions, it can often feel disengaged, out of touch and sometimes eerily silent on contemporary concerns. It makes me think of that famous quote from Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, “The simple step of a courageous individual is not to take part in the lie. One word of truth outweighs the world.” Yes, there is plenty of biblical truth in the social media voices of Christian leaders that I follow. But I fear our silence on some matters might mean we are inadvertently starting to take part in the lie.
In part two I will share some reasons for this perplexing silence.
Travel can be transformational. By travel, I don’t mean layovers in airports en route to somewhere else (I’ve unsuccessfully visited some significant countries this way!) No, I mean genuinely visiting.
Let me share two examples and then make my point for us.
A “Third World Country” – How often have you heard people return from a missions trip and say that the local people taught them so much? It is a consistent message! I remember visiting an East African country and experiencing a completely different life.
There was the food, the wildlife, the weather, and the transport. The cultural differences hindered my teaching, but then again, they also supported it. There was that more remote tribe where the children could pick out their friends in a picture on my camera. And yet they could not recognise themselves because they had never seen a good reflection before. And there was much to learn from the simple lifestyle, not to mention the sacrificial hospitality. It was like stepping into a different world, and I came home changed by my visit.
A “Second World Country” – I visited an Eastern European country some years ago. We walked past the jail where political prisoners, including pastors, used to be held and tortured. Communism never has room for dissenters, free thinkers or any God except the state. Therefore church leaders and Christians are always a threat.
I remember asking a man driving me to a meeting what it was like to live under communism. He spoke of how some things worked, but nobody was free. He gave me two examples. He described living in a world where one in three people worked for the government as an informer. It meant that you would never speak openly about politics or religion. You never knew who would inform and lead to your arrest and the suffering that might also come to your family. And he described how everyone would dutifully buy the newspaper, signalling that they were good citizens. But they would never read it because everyone knew it was all government-controlled lies.
I have thought a lot about that conversation over the years. It was like a haunting warning from another country at another time. I often think about how our culture is moving towards that kind of community spying. We now live around people ready to call out anyone who breaks the brand new moral codes related to gender, sexuality and race. And we have technology constantly monitoring every click of the mouse, message from our keyboard or even word uttered by our mouth. And perhaps most concerning is the number of people who digest the messaging disseminated through our news media but don’t realise how controlled the messaging is. It is not hard to imagine our world morphing into another iteration of communism with millions of people naively celebrating such a sinister transformation of society! After all, it always comes out of a crisis for the good of the people.
The bottom line – Travelling to a different culture and meeting people who’ve lived in other times can hugely impact us. It should have a significant impact on us. Insightful lessons that will enrich our lives. Haunting warnings to protect us. If we have the privilege of travelling and go eager to learn, it will change us.
So, what do we do as Christians when we open our Bibles? What happens when we preach the Bible to others? We get to travel to a different world.
1. A different world geographically & culturally – Good bible study and biblical preaching will take our imaginations to the battlefields of ancient Israel, the throne rooms of ancient kings, the living rooms of ancient peasants, and the discussion forum of ancient philosophers. We will visit the Sinai peninsula’s wilderness, the fishing villages of Galilee, the arid hills around Jerusalem, the stormy Mediterranean sea, and strategic cities around one section of the Roman empire.
2. A different world educationally – Good bible study and biblical preaching will take our hearts right into the crowd hearing Moses preach. Or we might join the crowd hearing an Old Testament prophet proclaim God’s message. We might sit on the grass and hear Jesus teach. Or perhaps overhear the apostles announcing the resurrection. We will spend time being mentored by the experience of a young shepherd fighting for his nation, a want-away prophet running from his calling, or a height-challenged tax collector hiding in a tree. Wonderful enrichment for life and haunting warnings await us if we just travel into the Bible with our hearts open and ready to learn.
3. A different world entirely – Good bible study and biblical preaching take us to faraway lands and insightful mentors and, beyond that, give us a glimpse into another world. The Bible is not an old travelogue. We are earthbound and tend to think very “down here” kinds of thoughts. But heaven has broken into our world, and we can hear from the world of love where God is forever reigning, without caveat or coup. We might pray, “your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” In the Bible, we get not only those words to pray but also the life-changing revelation of what that all means.
Every day we have the privilege of travel with all its life enrichment, haunting warnings and unique mentoring opportunities. Open your Bible with an open heart. And every time we share our biblical travels with others in conversation or preaching, we can take them with us. Don’t shortchange yourself or others by simply grabbing for an applicational point or a quick anecdote.
Too many of us visit the world of the Bible like a traveller in transit through an airport. We might pick up a local bar of chocolate in a kiosk, but we haven’t truly been to the country, and our lives show no evidence of impact. What would it look like to really go? To meaningfully visit? To spend time with the people, to see the sights, to be lastingly changed?
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By the way, after going through the Psalms in 2022 on YouTube, I am planning to spend the next months offering short videos related to the subject of studying and enjoying our Bibles. Please let me know, at any time, if you have an idea that would help that playlist become more useful to you or your church!
Definition matters massively. One person might say, “professional preachers are the problem!” Then another person might say, “amateur preachers are the problem!” And both might be right. It all depends on what they mean by what they say.
1. “Professional” can be referring to very different issues. What image does the term “professional” bring to mind? You might think of a person’s skill, or how they handle their communications with customers, or their manner in person, or their motivation for what they do. That is already four variations of potential meaning for the term “professional.” Perhaps an electrician is called to solve a problem in your house. They might be a real professional in their work (positive – they knew exactly what to do), their invoice was very professional looking (positive – good communications), their conversation and manner in conversation might have been a bit professional (negative – cold or aloof communications), and their reason for working may have seemed too professional (negative – it was all about the money).
2. “Amateur” can be referring to very different issues, too. What image does the term “amateur” bring to mind? You might think in the same categories as before. Perhaps the electrician was amateur in their work (negative – they did not know what to do), their invoice looked very amateur (negative – sloppy communication), their conversation might convey the enthusiasm of an amateur (positive – they love what they do), and their reason for work may have been the best side of an amateur (positive – they do it for the love of their craft).
3. In terms of skill, be professional. I don’t want someone showing “amateurish” skill levels when they fix my car, cut my hair, or operate on me. Skill is good. In reality, some of the most skilled people in the world may not be paid for what they do, while some who are paid should not be allowed anywhere near your car, your scalp or a scalpel. So actually, pay is irrelevant. The point is about skill. So as a preacher, it does not matter to this point whether you are paid to preach or not. In terms of skill, be as professional as possible. Read, learn, study, grow. Be a good steward of the ministry opportunity God has given you.
4. In respect to motivation, be amateur. When someone’s vocation has been “professionalised” then their motivation becomes suspect. This is why a nationally known car exhaust company may not be trusted (did they do more work than was needed in order to get more of my money?) Or why it is a problem if your medical practitioner is incentivized by drug companies to prescribe treatments to as many people as possible (whether they need the treatment or not!) In this respect, skill is not the issue. The point is about motivation. A highly skilled mechanic who rips off the customer is not to be celebrated. A brilliant clinician who risks lives to increase their income should be prosecuted. So as a preacher, your skill level (in this point) is not my concern. In terms of motivation, be as amateur as possible. Love God, love people, and love your craft. Be driven by the privilege of getting to speak God’s Word to people for their benefit.
5. And in the area of interpersonal communication, be genuine. I have underlined issues of skill and motivation, but interpersonal communication is also part of the package. Coming across as too professional can be problematic, even when you are not preaching. Coming across as an amateur might be an issue too. Instead, how about we settle on the need to be genuine? It does not resolve all the complexity of conversational dynamics, but it does leave us with two clear points to finish.
6. As a preacher, let’s do what we do as well as we can. If that means being professional in some sense, so be it. We certainly don’t want to be amateurish.
7. As a preacher, let’s do what we do with heartfelt motivation. If that means being amateurs in some sense, so be it. We certainly don’t want to be professionalised.
The definition of labels is important. This is an example worth pondering as far as preaching is concerned and how we might view our ministry. We should preach as professionals in the sense of “to the best of our ability” and as amateurs in the sense of “with the passion of a captured heart.” We should not preach as professionals in the sense of “relying on our own ability,” or “just for money,” nor as amateurs in the sense of “to a poor standard.”
It is also an example to keep in mind in a world where labels so easily get applied as a pejorative, and the mud sticks because people don’t question what is really meant.
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In the next week or so I will be completing my short video collection through the Psalms. Please do check it out and share with any who may find it helpful as a reference, or better yet, as a companion through the Psalms in 2023!
We all say it every year. Where did this year go? Before we know it, the year has slid past, the temperatures have dropped, and the shops swell with Christmas sights, sounds, and shoppers. In church, we are busy preparing for the nativity play and dusting off the carols for their annual airing. We will hear the infancy narratives of Matthew and Luke, a briefer reading from Isaiah’s Immanuel section, or Micah chapter 5, and soon Christmas will be all over.
But the Incarnation is not just for Christmas.
The Incarnation is critical to the Christian faith. At some point during these weeks, someone will point out that Easter is the reason for the season. They are not wrong. Jesus had to be born to live the perfect life and then die in our place. But that is not the whole story. The Son of God became one of us for several reasons, including God’s great rescue mission.
I have introduced three more reasons that the Incarnation is not just for Christmas. To read the article, please click this link and then check out all the other great resources on the Union website!
This might seem like a really obvious thing to say, but I think it needs to be said. We have to really work hard in order to really know a passage before we preach it.
It is very easy to assume we know a passage. It is very hard to recognize how much we don’t know. But learning to think clearly about your own thinking is a critical skill for the preacher.
Here are some thoughts to consider:
1. Knowing a passage involves more than knowing some highlights or landmarks in it. After reading a passage and spending some time in study, you may be able to identify some key features of the passage. You might be able to say that there is the truth in verse 3, and the truth in verse 5 and then the conclusion in verse 9. Do you know the passage? No, you are aware of some highlights in the passage.
2. Knowing a passage involves more than being able to launch preaching points from phrases in it. You might feel ready to preach because verse 3 mentions justification (and you have some things to say about justification), and then verse 5 mentions hope (and you have a nice illustration you want to share about hope), etc. Are you ready to preach the passage if you have some good preaching points ready to launch? No.
3. Knowing a passage involves more than being able to talk about each phrase with theological truth. But what if your preaching content is not illustrations, but rich theological truths? Maybe you have a whole theology of justification that you can launch in verse 3, and then you can make a presentation on sanctification because of a key word that appears later in the passage? Surely if it is rich theological truth, then you are ready to preach? No. Not if the passage is not saying what you are planning to say. Just because wind appears in John 3 does not mean that I should preach about God’s view of changing weather patterns from it.
4. Knowing a passage involves more than reading some commentaries about the passage. It is not a bad idea to have some conversation partners in your study. Other live humans can be super helpful. As can published ones. But even if I can quote from impressive commentaries, it does not mean that I really understand the passage yet. By all means use the best resources you can access, but remember the goal is still for you to understand the passage, not just to have studied things written about it.
5. Knowing a passage involves understanding the details as they work together in a coherent whole. This is where many preachers seem to stumble. They do reasonably well with the details. They speak theological truth. They associate that truth with the wording in the passage. But if they don’t recognize how the details are working together in the passage, they don’t know the passage. Remember, your goal is not to study a passage in order to find a sermon. Your first goal is to study it in order to understand it.
6. Knowing a passage involves understanding the flow of thought in the passage, with an awareness of context. A passage sits in a book, as part of the whole. If you don’t understand how the passage works in the book, how can you really grasp what the passage itself means? So we need to study each passage in its whole book, as well as whole Bible, context. The point is, each passage was written to communicate something specific, and we need to figure that out. Our job is not to generate meaning by creativity, but to find meaning by dogged humble persistence.
7. Knowing a passage means being able to explain it so that the original author would affirm your grasp of its essential meaning. That sounds like a bold goal. It is. That is why we can’t just study until we feel a message emerging. As preachers we can generate messages out of nothing. But God has given us something very specific. And unless we grow in our confidence that it is possible to communicate the essential meaning of a passage to a level where the original author would affirm our explanation, then we will not put in the work necessary to be ready to preach.
Implication? The big implication of this post is simple. Don’t be so confident that you know the meaning of a passage. Study more. Study longer. Study humble. Study persistently. Make it your goal to know the passage better than you ever have before, to be able to handle questions about specific aspects of the passage, and be willing to explain the meaning of the text even to the original author himself…and then start thinking about how you will preach it!
Biblical Preaching 