Homiletics

Supreme Need

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

Just one more quote from James Stewart’s, Heralds of God (p220-1):

When all is said and done, the supreme need of the Church is the same in the twentieth century as in the first: it is men on fire for Christ.

I beg you not to commit the fearful blunder of damping down that flame.  It is, of course, understandable and right that you who are going out into the ministry should distrust, and set your faces against, the spurious fervour which notoriously brings discredit on the faith.  But the pity is that there are preachers so frightened of this taint that they have actually done violence to the flame Christ has kindled within them, choosing deliberately an attitude of cool and imperturbable detachment, and perhaps even confounding frigidity with philosophic depth and logical precision with spiritual power.  Let us have precision of utterance and clarity of exposition by all means: but even precision and logic are bought too dear if they stifle the living flame.  The radical mistake, of course, is in supposing that precision and the heart on fire are somehow exclusive of each other.

I have thoroughly enjoyed these classic quotes.  Tomorrow I’ll move on to some other thoughts.  However, let’s recognize the value of these quotes, and let’s make sure we are not ignoring all that needs to be learned from writers who are no longer with us, but are waiting for us . . .

Appalling Responsibility

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I suppose this is the week of old quotes . . . lots from James Stewart (published in the 1940’s).  But today I am going older still.  This time Stewart, in Heralds of God (p207), quotes from the 17th century:

There is a great sermon of John Donne’s, delivered in the year 1624, in which he sets forth his conception of the awful burden on the preacher’s heart.  “What Sea,” cries Donne, “could furnish mine eyes with teares enough to poure out, if I should think, that of all this congregation, which lookes me in the face now, I should not meet one at the Resurrection, at the right hand of God!  When at any midnight I hear a bell toll from this steeple, must not I say to my self, what have I done at any time for the instructing or rectifying of that man’s Conscience, who lieth there now ready to deliver up his own account and my account to Almighty God?”  Is it to be wondered at that many a man of God besides Elijah and Jeremiah has tried to run away from a commission so crushing and intolerable?  Nothing but the grace of God can hold you to it.  The magnitude of the task is the first element in evangelical humility.

This is what Stewart calls the appalling responsibility of the minister of the Gospel.  Perhaps we would do well to ponder the burden of our calling.  We live in an age when many take the heavy things of ministry very lightly.  Yet some things have not changed.  Not least the impending reality of the judgment facing humanity after death.  It’s hard to justify levity in light of that.

Vast Trouble

/ Peter Mead / 4 Comments

Permit me to persist in quoting from James Stewart’s, Heralds of God, although only briefly this time (p190):

“Preaching,” inquires Bishop Quayle, “is the art of making a sermon and delivering it?” – and he answers his own question: “Why, no, that is not preaching.  Preaching is the art of making a preacher and delivering that.  It is no trouble to preach, but a vast trouble to construct a preacher.”

I suspect this is a tension every homiletics instructor feels deeply.  It is possible to instruct the method of passage exegesis, sermon formation and effective delivery.  But what does it take to form a preacher?  Surely that is a lifetime work of God Himself.  A couple of comments to ponder:

Are you a preacher, or do you just preach? That is to say, does your life live up to the ministry you give from the pulpit?  Are you continuing to grow, to be shaped, to pursue maturity while resting in God’s work to shape you into the image of His Son?  Have you been so committed to studying preaching and ministry and hermeneutics and theology, but lost direction in your personal spirituality?

Are you pouring into the lives of other potential preachers, even long before they ever preach? Again I raise the issue of mentoring.  How can we claim to be involved in biblical ministry if we do not actively pursue opportunity to mentor others?  A preacher is not made in the course of a training course, although I affirm the value of good training as a good steward seeking to fan into flame the opportunity and gifting God has given.  A preacher is made in the course of a lifetime.  Let’s look with a long-term, strategic view . . . how can we invest ourselves into others?  It’s not ultimately about skill formation, but character formation, spiritual formation, life.

Let me encourage all of us to look for ways to help others develop in the necessary skills required for preaching.  But let’s also look with a greater goal, for ways to help shape the lives of those who can then minister (in whatever form) to others.  This is the vaster trouble, but surely the greater goal.

Tragedy

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

I’d like to quote from James Stewart’s classic, Heralds of God (p20).  After this quote, I will only have the briefest of comments to share:

If you as preachers would speak a bracing, reinforcing word to the need of the age, there must be no place for the disillusioned mood in your own life.  Like your Master, you will have meat to eat that the world knows not of; and that spiritual sustenance, in so far as you partake of it daily, will strengthen your powers of resistance to the dangerous infection.  Surely there are few figures so pitiable as the disillusioned minister of the Gospel.  High hopes once cheered him on his way: but now the indifference and the recalcitrance of the world, the lack of striking visible results, the discovery of the appalling pettiness and spite and touchiness and complacency which can lodge in narrow hearts, the feeling of personal futility – all these have seared his soul.  No longer does the zeal of God’s House devour him.  No longer does he mount the pulpit steps in thrilled expectancy that Jesus Christ will come amongst His folk that day, travelling in the greatness of His strength, mighty to save.  Dully and drearily he speaks now about what once seemed to him the most dramatic tidings in the world.  the edge and verve and passion of the message of divine forgiveness, the exultant, lyrical assurance of the presence of the risen Lord, the amazement of supernatural grace, the urge to cry “Woe is me if I preach not the Gospel” – all have gone.  The man has lost heart.  He is disillusioned.  And that, for an ambassador of Christ, is tragedy.

Amen.

Demand

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

I’ve really been encouraged by reading James Stewart’s classic book, Heralds of God, again.  Here’s a quote that might be relevant before tomorrow’s message:

If you are wise, you will not in your preaching mask or minimize the overwhelming, absolute nature of Christ’s demand.  Men are ready for a Leader who will unhesitatingly claim the last ounce of His followers’ courage and fidelity.  Field-Marshal Wavell has told, in his notable lectures entitled Generals and Generalship, the story of how Napoleon, when an artillery officer at the siege of Toulon, built a battery in such an exposed position that he was told he would never find men to man it.  But Napoleon had a sure instinct for what was required.  He put up a placard – “The battery of men without fear”: and it was always manned.  This is no time to be offering a reduced, milk-and-water religion.  Far too often the world has been presented with a mild and undemanding half-Christianity.  The Gospel has been emasculated long enough.  Preach Christ today in the total challenge of His high, imperious claim.  Some will be scared, and some offended: but some, and they the most worth winning, will kneel in homage at His feet.

In the 63 years since this was published it is not just the length of sentence and complexity of punctuation that has changed.  I suppose it is almost impossible to write something like that today without being vilified from various sides.  Still, does he not have a point here?  From one side we hear that Christian preaching is too full of male dominated illustrations.  From the other side we hear that church is lacking in anything to attract men.  But actually, the calling on a life implicit in the gospel and biblical teaching is not a male versus female issue.  It is a captivated passionate pursuit of God versus a comfortably self-obsessed issue.  Whatever the terminology, let’s not preach a milk-and-water religion.

Generic Sermons

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

Is it possible to have a generic sermon?  That is, a sermon that is applicable to all people, to any church?  A sermon that is essentially lacking in specific character?  A sermon that is essentially untargeted?  The question should not be, is it possible, but rather, is it beneficial?

A sermon that is generically targeted toward all Christians, or all possible audiences, does have some advantages.  It allows for repetition in multiple settings without consideration of the listeners this time.  It allows for a pastor to reuse a set of sermons from an old church in the new church.  It allows for time to be freed up from preparation for other exciting ministry pursuits.

However…and it’s a big however…generic preaching is essentially guaranteed to be inadequate preaching, incomplete preaching.  A generic sermon is in some ways a disabled sermon.  Why?  Because a genuine biblical sermon is not only made up of biblical truth presented through the words and life of a preacher.  It is also targeted at a specific group of listeners both in delivery and prayerful preparation.  A generic sermon may be complete in respect to the Bible element and the preacher element, but it will be lacking or completely shrivelled in respect to the listener element and the Holy Spirit element.

Next time you’re tempted to preach a generic, untargeted, audience non-specific, sermon . . . don’t.  That doesn’t mean you can’t preach that sermon again.  It does mean that we need to put in the time in prayerful consideration of the particular listeners in order to make sure the sermon is not generic, but is targeted.

Generic may be possible, and in certain circumstances maybe even permissible, but it is not beneficial.  If real estate is location, location, location . . . then for this post at least, preaching is target, target, target.

Tool of Inestimable Value

/ Peter Mead / Leave a comment

There’s a tool in preparation that should not be overlooked.  Of course there are many aspects of preparation that matter, not least the preparation of the life of the preacher, plus the various aspects of Bible study skills, pastoral awareness and involvement, etc.  But there is one tool that many preachers neglect far too much.

Most of us were trained to prepare our messages on paper – study notes, outlines, manuscripts, preaching notes, etc.  All of this is good, but don’t miss the obvious.  The goal in preaching is not to write a good outline, or write a good manuscript.  The goal is to speak a message.  So don’t neglect the value of talking through the message.

There is nothing unspiritual about good preparation.  But there is something very sensible about it.  When you speak through a message you will find that some parts don’t flow as they seemed to on paper.  You’ll find that some transitions are clunky, while others are practically absent to the half-listening ear.  You’ll find that some sentences are too long, some thoughts are too convoluted, some thought processes are unclear.  Every negative discovered in pre-preaching speaking is a good thing for you can strengthen your message.

But then there’ll be positives too.  A different way of stating a key point, or phrasing a transition, or even a helpful image or support material that comes to mind as you are listening to yourself speak through the message.  Speaking through a message is a great way to break a log jam.  Recently I was wrestling with a passage, or actually, with a message.  I understood the passage to a certain extent, but was struggling to form the message in any way other than straight information (i.e. tedious sermon alert!)  I decided to preach it through, and in doing so was able to reformulate the main idea to be more engaging and memorable.  I also came up with another illustrative image that conveyed the sense of the passage much better than what I’d written in my outline.

It may sound simple, but sometimes the best thing you can do is leave your desk and preach through the message as it stands.  It will usually improve your message and motivate you to press on in your preparation.  Simple?  Yes.  But definitely a tool of inestimable value.

Other Low Times Factors

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

Yesterday I began a response to Peter’s comment regarding low times in ministry.  It is not at all uncommon for those giving out to get into situations where they are empty themselves.  Yesterday I wrote about the prevention that can be done via good spiritual relational habits.  I wrote briefly about curing a situation where the coldness has come in.  Much more could be said, but here are three further factors to consider:

Spiritual Warfare. The enemy targets specific people at specific times.  There is a spiritual warfare dynamic that we must not ignore.  It could be that there is a spiritual warfare component in a time of discouragement or “coldness.”  This is not always the primary issue, so directly addressing it and focusing on it cannot always be the primary cure.  However, it is no coincidence that those seeking to build up other believers and see people saved from the kingdom of darkness face a whole variety of temptations and difficulties in life and ministry.

Divine Distance. I don’t like that title, but I can’t think of a better one right now.  It seems that there are times when God is very clearly active and overt in His dealings with us.  There seem to be other times when He may allow us to go through some form of dryness . . . perhaps because of the positive benefits of trials of various kinds in respect to our spiritual growth and maturity (Rom.5, James 1, etc.)  I’m not going to develop this theologically here, but simply recognize that negative situations could be spiritual warfare related (solution?  Look to God in prayer).  Or they could be God trying to get our attention (solution? Look to God in prayer).  Seems safe to me to allow any circumstance, whatever the cause, even cause unknown, to allow that to push us back up close to Him.  May be we need greater sensitivity to let any prod push our eyes upward?

Mundane Matters. Times of spiritual dryness may be attacks, or God trying to get our attention, or personal drifting in our relationship with God.  However, they could be indicative of other issues too, often quite mundane.  Getting enough rest?  Sleep?  Weekly break?  Exercise?  How’s the diet?  Any stresses in other areas of life manifesting in this one?  Worried about something else?  I remember Bill Hybels talking about his own struggle at one point and trying to fix it by spiritual disciplines, but then discovering that it wasn’t at root a spiritual issue, but an emotional and physical one.  As he put it, there are several dials on the dashboard, we need to be aware of all of them.

Other factors and suggestions?

spiritual warfare

divine distance

physical complexity

Low Times?

/ Peter Mead / 3 Comments

The site received a comment from another Peter today.  Let me quote, respond and perhaps you’d like to join in?

I was wondering do you ever go through low times during your preaching?  It feels like sometimes I am preparing sunday school lesons and bible study classes for the youth at my Church and then when I preach I spend a lot of time studying, but then there are times where I just feel low.  Kind of like I am spending so much time trying to help others that I feel empty myself.  Any sugggestions on getting through these kinds of times?  I probably didn’t even ask that well but just wondering if you ever go through times like this?

In a word, yes.  I think all preachers, indeed, all believers, go through times where they feel spiritually dry in comparison to other times.  So much could be said about this, but I’ll leave plenty of space for others to add their comments.  A couple of thoughts from me:

Prevention rather than just cure. This kind of situation can be partially prevented to avoid it happening so often.  There is a danger that comes from relying on ministry preparation for personal spirituality.  I am not of the opinion that we should separate ministry preparation from devotions to the extent that one is cold and professional, and the other personal.  Ministry preparation should be working in us before it comes through us to others.  However, to lean on this giving out can easily push us over a point at which we are not ministering out of the overflow of a full personal spirituality, but from an emptying tank.  Good relational habits are important – not cold disciplines in which boxes get ticked in a daily diligent diary of dutifulness, but healthy interaction with God in a daily love relationship . . . reading His Word, communicating with God in prayer, responding to God in worship, etc.  As well as the vertical relationship, we also need to recognize the value of genuinely stimulating horizontal relationships.  All of this can go so cold in ministry . . . a growing distance from God and a lack of genuine relationship with others that is spiritually stimulating (much easier to just give, give, give).

Cure too. Is there a cure to spiritual dryness?  In simple terms I would suggest repent, return and respond.  Repent of your sinful tendency to lose sight of the relationship, return to the fullness of what it means to be in Christ, in relationship, (not through a duty-driven behaviour that tries to fix things from the outside in), all in response to His love for us.  We love because He first loved us, so we often need to expose ourselves to the attractive power of that love demonstrated on the cross.  Solutions that are focused on ourselves seem to be missing the point.  We go dry because we lose sight of Him, so looking to ourselves is not the solution.

Other reasons? There can be multiple factors related to this critical issue.  Tomorrow I’ll raise a couple more . . . anything you would add?

Ask for Double

/ Peter Mead / 2 Comments

I was listening to Howard Hendricks again recently.  He referred to a medical doctor who had gotten hold of a series Hendricks gave on the book of James.  The doctor told him, “I’ve listened to that series about twenty times, and now I think I get what you’re saying!”

When we look carefully in the prophets, and in the gospels, and elsewhere, it is evident that hearing is a critical component of spirituality.  This is not to suggest that reading is not important, of course, but there is something about hearing.  Hearing the Bible, and hearing the Bible preached.

I wonder if we should do more to encourage people to use their ears in their personal spiritual lives?  How many of the people in our churches have never considered getting the Bible on CD or MP3, and yet have significant chunks of time when they could be listening to the Word?  How often do churches produce CDs of messages, expecting only the children’s Sunday School teachers or the absent to make use of them?  Perhaps it would be worth suggesting the possibility that people might choose to hear the sermon more than once!  (Now the pressure is really on you – imagine asking for double the time!  Your message better be biblically solid, clear, engaging and relevant!)