Preacher’s Personal Life

Unhealthy Division: Style & Substance

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

Perhaps people like me add to the kind of division I am thinking about by the labels used in our teaching of preaching, but still, we’d do well to think about this.  Do we too easily divide elements of preaching?

For example, content and delivery, or substance and style.  It’s a simple distinction, and it works for planning a class schedule.  But when you consider the complexity of the act of communication, perhaps the distinction can be unhelpful?  Certainly once we start dismissing style out of a resolute commitment to substance, we are shooting ourselves in the foot.

Now don’t get me wrong.  The term “style” is not the best for what I am writing about.  Even “delivery” can sound like a performance.  The reality, though, is that the message is transmitted through a preacher.  This includes many elements.  Not just vocal production, verbal clarity, non-verbal presentation, etc. (the classic elements of “delivery”), but also that which you might label “ethos” and “pathos.”

I recently tweaked my gradually-improving definition of preaching in one part by adding the two words “and life.”  In reference to the oral communication aspect of preaching, my current best attempt at a definition says that preaching involves “…effective communication through the preacher’s words (and life)…”

Perhaps we would do well to not dismiss matters of “style” and “delivery” as “mere performance.”  It is too easy to take Paul’s self-distancing from the manipulative skill of classical rhetoric (1Cor.2:1-5) and therefore dismiss all rhetoric and homiletics.  The problem with such a blanket response is that Paul clearly utilized both rhetorical and homiletical skill in his writing and preaching.  Instead of a quick dismissal of all style/delivery issues, or at the other extreme, an obsession with delivery that results in a performance mentality, perhaps we would consider more seriously that which results in the pulpit from the weight of who we are personally in our walk with Christ.

Maturity shows.  Passion shows.  Love shows.  Life shows.  Perhaps a preachers style and delivery are a lot more about the preachers inner life and spirituality than our categories tend to recognize?

The Ache of Preaching

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

I recently ended a post with a quote from William Willimon, in which he states, “On any Sunday you can give it your all and still know that the Word deserves more.”  How true that is!  In my experience, the majority of preachers, the majority of the time, do not feel great after they have finished preaching.  Sometimes a sermon may leave us energized and excited.  Yet so often we feel vulnerable, weak, drained, even regretful.

The post-sermon interactions with folks are complex.  Some people have used the analogy of giving birth in reference to preaching (to which I quickly add that a shorter gestation, a shorter delivery, and the fact that it is not the same experience at all does slightly undermine the analogy – it’s too easy to minimize what some people go through in this kind of analogy!  My wife deserves much more credit for her birth-work than I do for mine!)

Perhaps we could pull in another analogy and then reduce it appropriately?  Think of a time of emotional trauma – a car accident, a death, a major moment in life (the verdict of a judge, the pronouncement of pass or fail in a major examination), etc.  In the time after a major emotional event, there is that time when things aren’t quite real, when words people say don’t register properly, when the slightest thing can mean too much.  Now reduce that life-sized grief, tension, emotion…reduce that down to the weekly experience that is preaching.  Post-sermon interactions with folk are complex.

Post-sermon emotions are complex.  Swirling feelings of failure, of inadequacy in representing such an awesome God, of having fallen short of really teaching that passage as it deserves.  This swirl of emotions is not the time to evaluate in detail, to make decisions regarding the future, or over-react to a small thing that, at least in that moment, means too much.

Cling on to the Lord’s hand, make a few notes, get through the turmoil time and then evaluate the comments, feedback, etc. on Tuesday morning.  You’ll probably be thinking clearly and reacting appropriately by then!

Favorable, Yet Flawed Feedback

/ Peter Mead / Leave a comment

I’ve mentioned before that it is not wise to evaluate your preaching by the polite pleasantries passed at the shaking of hands after preaching.  Now I’m reading an engaging and enjoyable book that I will review in due course, but it suggests several reasons for positive feedback in the post-sermon pleasantries that are worth taking into account:

1. Hopefully this doesn’t apply in your church, but many people are actually positive about poor preaching because they haven’t heard any better.

2. Certainly most Christians are relatively polite and pleasant.  Much post-sermon feedback is church culture speaking.

3. Christian listeners appreciate the character of their preachers, even if they are grossly lacking in competence.  That is to say, your preaching may be poor, but you care for their family, buried their grandfather, etc.

4. Most Christians are listening to sermons to have their own spiritual distinctives reinforced.  This writer calls this the reinforcement bells.  If a preacher rings the right bells, which they typically will since people choose the church that suits them, then they will feel “pats on the souls back.”

This is a helpful list.  I am looking forward to telling you more about the book, but I want to get further into it first.  (If you feel bad that I have not cited my source in this post, just ask and I will let you know – once I am back from my vacation/holiday! . . . or wait and the review will soon arrive!)

Thou Shalt Not Bore Through Preaching

/ Peter Mead / Leave a comment

I can’t claim this as an inspired eleventh commandment.  But there have been times when I wished it were there in the text!  In reality I tend to hear myself preaching more than others now, so I need to be careful what I say here . . . but a lot of preaching is just really kind of, well, boring.

We could get into all sorts of reasons for that.  There are numerous ways to de-bore elements of preaching.  But I just want to raise the fundamental issue.  Let’s beware that we don’t bore.  Is it the content?  Sometimes.  Is it the delivery? Sometimes.  Is it the lack of “illustrations” (a common quick-fix diagnosis)?  Sometimes.  Is it the presence of predictable illustrations?  Sometimes.  Is it the attitude of the preacher?  Sometimes.  Is it the personality of the preacher?  Sometimes.  Is it the personal spiritual walk of  the preacher?  Sometimes.  Is it the reality about God?  Never.

There are many reasons why preachers commit the horrifying sin of boring listeners.  But lest I elongate this post and dilute the point unnecessarily, let’s just stop here with two comments.  Let us commit to never boring people with the Word of God.  Let us commit to genuinely responding to God convicting us on this issue (when He does), rather than simply sticking on a band-aid quick fix.

Arrogance and Humility: Whose Definition?

/ Peter Mead / 4 Comments

In my quick review of Piper’s Brothers We Are Not Professionals, I’m in chapter 22.  I presume I’m not the only one who resonates deeply with the issue raised in this chapter?  We live in a relativistic age where ‘arrogance’ is “the condemnation of choice in the political and religious arena for anyone who breaks the rules of relativism.”  (p160)  Any stand taken on biblical grounds will tend to lead to the charge of arrogance.

Piper cites G.K.Chesterton’s insightful description of that which is now fully fledged relativism.  The word ‘arrogance’ is used to hijack the term ‘conviction,’ and on the other side, ‘humility’ is used to hijack ‘uncertainty.’  In fact, the quote, from 1908, is so good, I will share it here:

“What we suffer from today is humility in the wrong place.  Modesty has moved from the organ of ambition.  Modesty has settled upon the organ of conviction; where it was never meant to be.  A man was meant to be doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth; this has been exactly reversed.  Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert is exactly the part he ought not to asset – himself.  The part he doubts is exactly the part he ought not to doubt – the Divine Reason . . . . We are on the road to producing a race of man too mentally modest to believe in the multiplication table.” (Orthodoxy, 1908, quoted in Piper, 162).

We stand in a precarious position.  Any biblical stand we take will be shouted down as arrogant (and not just by the world, but by many in the church).  Detractors will not engage meaningfully, but rather quench discussion under a mask of modesty.  At the same time we must constantly ask God to convict us of any pride on our part, for true pride is insidious and always ready to creep in.  So what do we do?  Do we allow ourselves to be silenced by tactics carefully contrived to checkmate us?  Do we allow ourselves to be held back by a fear of inappropriate motivations on our part?

Pride is a problem, so is inappropriate uncertainty.  We need to stand with conviction, not allowing misapplied labels of arrogance to quench our courage.  We need to address uncertainty, not thwarted by the misuse of the label humility.

We will take some knocks, some blows, perhaps even some suffering.  But if we do not graciously, yet firmly stand for truth, then who will?

Rethinking Reading

/ Peter Mead / Leave a comment

Another helpful thought from Piper and the men he quotes.  Many people hesitate to start reading a solid book because they don’t have the blocks of time they believe it requires.

Piper’s advice? Get into the habit of reading for 20 minutes a day.  By his calculations an averagely slow reader can get through 15 good Christian books a year that way, or a good handful of weighty classics!  In fact, Piper goes on to suggest three blocks of twenty minutes a day.  (Peter’s advice? Don’t try to read for 20 minutes at a busy desk, it doesn’t work.  If you are not a hyper-clean desk person, go sit across the room or elsewhere!)

Having said that, there is always the danger of superficial skimming that results in a “keeping up with Pastor Jones” approach to reading.

Piper’s advice? Don’t superficially skim, instead bore down deep.  “Your people will know if you are walking with the giants (as Warren Wiersbe says) or watching television.”  (Peter’s advice? Get out of the habit of trying to read every word in a book.  Figure out what you want from a book and then dig deep there, but feel no guilt about leaving sections, chapters, etc., unread.)

And then there is the related tendency to only read modern books.  While there is much of value today, there is also a widespread lack of spiritually reviving, heart stirring, soul warming quality as you might find in someone like Richard Sibbes.

Piper’s advice? Don’t content yourself with excessively light, shallow, a-theological books that don’t carry a sense of the greatness of God.  (Peter’s advice? Ok, nothing to add here.  I suppose we would all do well to rethink our reading strategies.)

Sacred Substitutes

/ Peter Mead / Leave a comment

Just following up on Monday’s post on prayer . . . I appreciate the next chapter in Piper’s Brothers We Are Not Professionals – Beware of Sacred Substitutes.  What is the greatest threat to genuine prayer and true meditation on the Word?  It is ministry activity.  “Ministry is its own worst enemy.”  (p59)

How true this is!  Turning to Acts 6:2-4, Piper exhorts the reader to guard against the many sacred substitutes, the real needs, the pressing concerns of ministry.  “Without extended, concentrated prayer, the ministry of the Word withers.” (p60)

Consider what must be sacrificed in order to take genuinely focused time in prayer this week.  Don’t leave prayer until your message is prepared.  Don’t leave prayer until the unplanned needs are addressed.  Don’t leave prayer until your next day off.  Don’t even leave prayer until it can be used to “redeem the time” in the car journey between appointments.

There are many sacred substitutes that come our way.  Even apart from the flesh, laziness, entertainment, and the enemy himself.  Just in the good and the right and the needy and the appropriate – there are many substitutes that will steal us away from the real priority.  “Without extended, concentrated prayer, the ministry of the Word withers.”

Refuse to Believe

/ Peter Mead / Leave a comment

I’m scanning through John Piper’s Brothers We Are Not Professionals.  I resonate deeply with some of what he writes, then disagree with other elements – I suppose that makes for an engaging read.  Anyway, here’s an “I resonate” for us all to ponder in relation to preaching ministry:

“Prayer is the translation into a thousand different words of a single sentence: “Apart from me [Christ] you can do nothing” (John 15:5)

Oh, how we need to wake up to how much “nothing” we spend our time doing.  Apart from prayer, all our scurrying about, all our talking, all our study amounts to “nothing.”  For most of us the voice of self-reliance is ten times louder than the bell that tolls for the hours of prayer.  The voice cries out: “You must open the mail, you must make that call, you must write this sermon, you must prepare for the board meeting, you must go to the hospital.”  But the bell tolls softly: “Without Me you can do nothing.”

Both our flesh and our culture scream against spending an hour on our knees beside a desk piled with papers.” – Page 55

I don’t think I need to add much to this.  Amen, perhaps?  It is easy to respond to the conviction felt within by agreeing that we need to pray more.  It is easy to look ahead and imagine a change of circumstance in which we would pray more.  It is easy to spot a time later in the week when prayer may fit more easily than the current pressing situation.  Why not stop everything now and pray for an hour or two?  What’s more important?  What would the negative consequences be, really?  Ok, one more sentence to finish the post:

“Refuse to believe that the daily hours Luther and Wesley and Brainerd and Judson spent in prayer are idealistic dreams of another era.” – Page 57.

What Should Tension Prompt

/ Peter Mead / Leave a comment

Most people involved in ministry feel tension from somewhere most of the time.  Perhaps there is discord in the church, or opposition to your ministry, or possibilities elsewhere, or some form of spiritual warfare, or a disquiet within (or all of the above).  Honeymoon periods, by definition, do not last long.  The reality of ministry, whatever form it takes, usually includes tension of some sort.

What should tension prompt?

It could prompt fleshly reactions toward others, or within yourself.  It could prompt a passion to prove or vindicate yourself.  It could prompt discontentment in your heart, or a lack of motivation for your present ministry.  It could prompt many things.  It should prompt one:

Allow any tension, from any side, to push you up against God.  The kind of “de-professionalized” passion for God that Piper was praying for in the quote yesterday.  The kind of passionate for God leadership that is the right response whatever the circumstance.  Perhaps this weekend’s ministry is confused by tension from one side or other.  Perhaps you do not feel like you are on a mountain-top of ministry right now.

Allow any of these tensions to prompt you closer to God, to pray fervently at every opportunity.  Don’t distract yourself with entertainment, or sin, or busy-ness, or future plans.  Respond to the challenge by responding to God.  Allow anything to get your attention and draw you to Him.

If most of us face tension from somewhere most of the time, wouldn’t it be great if the fruit of that was greater godliness on our part, greater fervency in our prayers, greater compassion in our relationships, greater brokenness in our spirits, greater sensitivity in our walks, greater humility in our ministries, greater Christlikeness in our characters and greater fruit in everything?

Banishing Professionalism

/ Peter Mead / 3 Comments

I was just prompted by a question to re-read John Piper’s first chapter in Brothers, We Are Not Professionals. Here’s a taste of Piper’s prayer at the end of the chapter:

Banish professionalism from our midst, Oh God, and in its place put passionate prayer, poverty of spirit, hunger for God, rigorous study of holy things, white-hot devotion to Jesus Christ, utter indifference to all material gain, and unremitting labor to rescue the perishing, perfect the saints, and glorify our sovereign Lord.

I suppose one question to ask is this, does the kind of “prophetic” ministry that Piper calls us to somehow stand in contrast to “expository preaching?”  To put it another way, is expository preaching a form of “professionalism?”  I would say not, although definitions are critical.  If by “expository preaching” we mean some kind of insipid, weak, fear-filled, irrelevant but technically satisfactory ministry, then of course there is a contrast. By “professional” does Piper mean “effective expository preaching” or something else?

I think Piper is going after the pastor pursuing the comfortable, dignified role in society, respected like a medical doctor, kind of professionalism – a profession.  If only our churches were led by men who were radically committed to uncomfortable spirituality, to sacrificial response-to-God kind of living.  I suspect that while such leadership would make some uncomfortable, it would give many of us more excitement and willingness to “follow” spiritual leaders, rather than just “fill” the pews kept in order by good and godly managers.

Can a “prophetic” ministry avoid professionalism, but still communicate well, as encouraged on this site?  I don’t think anyone would suggest the OT prophets were poor communicators?  They were master preachers, but they weren’t comfortable preachers.  They weren’t the socially respectable acceptable.  They weren’t nice, or insipid, or predictable, or fearful.  They spoke the Word of God with power and pointedness and precision and pluck (courage didn’t begin with a “p”).  I don’t read Piper ch.1 and think, ‘oh no, there’s no room for expository preaching anymore.’  Actually, I read it and say, “Amen!  If only we had more men of God preaching in our churches!”  What’s missing in contemporary preaching?  There’s a vibrancy, an urgency, a spirituality that is generally missing.  Piper is calling for the kind of radical sold-outness that often drains away in the professionalization of ministry.

We don’t want to sacrifice the authority of the text for the passion of the presenter, nor vice versa.  I suppose most of us preachers should hold our hands up and say “too much too safe too adequate preaching – my bad!”  Time for radical brokenness in our approach to ministry and our view of our own preaching.

Thank you Piper for the prod.  Let’s ponder.  Let’s pray.