Preaching in the Presence of Lists

February 9, 2011February 6, 2011 / Peter Mead / 1 Comment

At various times you will be preaching in the presence of lists. Not the to-do lists that are manically collected by some church-goers, bursting out of their Bibles’ strained clasps. The lists that God inspired.

It may be tempting to just skip them or dismiss them (easy to make disparaging remarks that we don’t really mean). But if you aren’t preaching the list, and it is in sight, what to do?

Help people, even in passing, to know why it is there. It isn’t there to put off Bible readers in their cyclical reading aspirations. It isn’t there to tempt people to put a new spin on received pronunciations. It is there for a reason.

Let’s take the descendants of Esau in Genesis 36 as an example.

Why is it there? It’s good to remember when these books were written and for whom. Whether Genesis was written or compiled by Moses, it was part of the five books which were for the Israelites as they entered into the promised land. It was important for them to know where they had come from, their history, God’s promises and so on.

One of Moses’ (and God’s) concerns was that they not mingle with the inhabitants of the land or near neighbours, in such a way as to become disloyal to the one true God. This chapter, with all its people and connected place names, would be a helpful reminder to them of where some of these other people came from. Certainly the chapter keeps pointing out that Edom was from the “unchosen” line of Esau – and Israel would often have issues with Edom later on!

It probably seems obvious to you, the studied preacher, to consider when the list was written and for whom. I suspect that might never enter the minds of some of your listeners. Unless you point it out, of course.

(And then encourage people that they don’t have to pronounce every name if they are on a fast read through – it’s amazing how people appreciate permission to press on in their Bible reading!)

The Obvious Early Connection

February 7, 2011February 6, 2011 / Peter Mead / 1 Comment

The more traditional approach to preaching was apparently to do all the explanation and then ask where the truth might connect to listeners’ lives at the end. Actually, good preachers have always made their listeners feel connected to the message much earlier than that. There is one point of early connection between listeners and Bible text that is usually fairly obvious.

Ever since Genesis 3 we have all lived in a fallen world. Abram did. David did. Paul did. You do.

This means it shouldn’t be too hard to find a connection between text and world. The people in the text are fallen people in a fallen world. So are we. So unless your study and preparation is taking you down a fruitful pathway other than this, it is probably worth asking what is the fallen world issue in the text? Is it rebellion? Is it doubt? Is it suffering? Is it fear? Is it self-love?

Once you can see what the tension is in the text, brought about by the Fall, then you can probably make a connection to today. So far, so good. But don’t miss the next step.

Make that connection overt.

It is no good knowing it and assuming others spot it. Make it clear. Evident. Stated. It is easy to have this kind of “fallen condition focus” (as Bryan Chapell calls it) in our minds, but then fail to say so in our sermons. You start into the context, tell a bit of historical background, explain a bit culturally, dive into the text, explain freely and before you know it you are almost out of time and start to make some sort of application. Oops. You just did what we said it was better to avoid. Why? Because if a sermon feels like a historical lecture, your listeners won’t, well, listen.

Look for point of connection. Make clear point of connection. And do it early.

One Simple Truth

January 28, 2011January 28, 2011 / Peter Mead / 2 Comments

Last time we thought about ways to trim the message. This is not to appease the unsubstantiated claims that people cannot concentrate like they used to (evidence suggests otherwise). Rather it is to enable the central truth of the message to come across more clearly, rather than being hidden by excessive padding.

The other side of this matter is that central truth. Is it too “big?” Sometimes we simply try to cram in too much information. Our main idea takes forty-eight words to summarize. This is a problem. I think it is important to realize the value of the cumulative effect of effective communication. Communicate effectively a biblical truth this Sunday, then another next Sunday, let them build. This is so much more helpful than trying to achieve everything in every message and effectively achieving very little because it was all just too much!

I suppose it is harder to put it more clearly than Andy Stanley (which is often the case, to be honest!) . . . just preach one simple truth.

I’m tempted to make some analogy along the lines of comparing the ineffective feast people offer to someone who has been starving, when actually what they can effectively assimilate is a small dose of something specific (but the feast feels like you’re feeding them, even if they do end up with no benefit from the overdose) . . . I’m tempted to do that, but that might be unnecessary elongation of this post.

One simple truth.

Every Conviction is Biblical – Training in Application

January 19, 2011January 12, 2011 / Peter Mead / Leave a comment

Last time we raised the issue of how easily people take a biblical detail and turn it into a deep conviction. Consequently as preachers we have a responsibility to train people to appropriately apply the Scriptures. So many are so good at being so focused on misapplied details that they fail to respond to the intended message of the text. So, three thoughts about application in our preaching:

1. Do it. As I’ve said and written many times, we must not abdicate our role by simply handing over to God the matter of “applying the truths we have seen in His Word.” He does, and He uses us as part of that. Some people in our churches are fascinated by the Bible and will chat about historical and linguistic and cultural and all sorts of other details with us. Yet they may never move on to applying the Word to their lives. We must model that understanding is not enough. What does it mean? And also, how should I respond to this?

2. Expand it. Don’t always offer the same applications – be good, be better, try harder, witness more, pray more, etc. For one thing this is moralism rather than Christianity. But also be sure that your applications aren’t always to do lists. People in some churches get overwhelmed with lists of hints for better living and are scared by their Bibles, not because of the awesome God they might encounter in its pages, but because of the ticker tape parade effect if they open their Bible and the half sheets of bulletins with to-do lists should spray out and cover their living room floor. Application is not just about conduct and behavior. It is also about beliefs – show people that changing their belief system in light of Scripture is critical application. It is also about affections and values – show them that having their heart moved is the deepest and primary need in responding to a personal God revealing Himself in the pages of Scripture.

3. Restrict it. Application of the Bible can easily be carelessly done (especially, it seems, in the area of convictions about how things should be done). As preachers we need to implicitly, and sometimes explicitly, help people to learn how to apply the Word. This will involve pulling people back from wrong approaches, as well as training in right approaches. I paraphrase Haddon Robinson’s comment that “there is more heresy per square inch in the area of application than in any other aspect of Bible study.”

In the next post I want to offer some approaches to application that we should be careful of and train people to avoid.

Every Conviction is Biblical

January 18, 2011January 12, 2011 / Peter Mead / 1 Comment

Many Christians will readily admit that they struggle to apply the teaching of the Bible to their own lives. Strangely though, very few will admit that their convictions may not be thoroughly biblical. Every church, every tradition and every denomination has its own little quirks and unique approaches to things. What is true of churches is true of the people in the churches too. The problems come not from having quirks, but from defending them as biblical when in fact they are not.

How should the church service proceed, how should it be led, how should the music be handled, what is not acceptable in terms of instruments, what can happen in the church building on a Sunday, what time should the service begin, how exactly should the communion table be set out, how many cups can be used, and the list goes on. It is amazing what church details people will hold as strong biblical untouchable convictions. After all, they have a verse to support their position!

So it seems to me that preachers have a prime responsibility to guide, instruct and model in this minefield of application. Some preachers never apply. Others always offer the same applications (trust God, go share your faith, live good lives, etc.) But if we don’t go beyond this, then people will never learn to apply in the areas of the sometimes bizarre church convictions. Surely we want the people in our churches to be enjoying the fullness of personal relationship with the Trinity through Christ, rather than perpetuating sometimes bizarre convictions about all sorts of details and almost believing that Christianity consists in those convictions?

In the next post I want to share some thoughts on application in preaching, specifically in reference to the kind of “incidental detail of Scripture held as deep biblical conviction” that we sometimes come across. Hopefully there is none of this in your church. But don’t be surprised if there is.

Less of a Beating

January 14, 2011January 11, 2011 / Peter Mead / 3 Comments

It’s not true in every case, but for many people it is. Let’s say Person A has an issue with Person B. Perhaps Person A runs through how he might address Person B beforehand, or perhaps he is talking it through with his wife first. When Person B isn’t present, Person A tends to be much stronger in tone. But once they are face to face, Person A will typically be more winsome, more loving, more caring for the feelings of Person B. (There are exceptions, but let’s not get into psychologically profiling people who struggle interpersonally!)

There’s something in this that is analogous to preaching, I think. Let’s suppose you are preaching a biblical passage that contains an instruction from Jesus to his disciples. As preachers we have a tendency to turn any biblical text into an assault on the congregation. It could be encouraging, comforting, tender, sensitive, or gentle, but in the hands of an unthinking preacher, it will easily come across as harsh exhortation. Why does that happen?

I think there are various reasons for this phenomena including a misunderstanding of God, or of how people function, or are motivated, or what Christianity is, or often, just a lack of awareness of how we come across. But I wonder if there is also something in the difference between abstraction and in-person communication that I raised in the first paragraph?

We can easily take the words in a text and pull them out of their historical and interpersonal setting, turning them into a more harsh and abrasive instruction than was the case originally. Pulling an exhortative statement from its context and preaching it as bare instruction will usually feel more like the command that must be obeyed (drill instructor) than an instruction set in the context of interpersonal communication.

Did the disciples feel Jesus was barking out orders when he spoke to them of trusting in God, or of loving one another, or how they should pray, etc.? I suspect not. Somehow in person there would have been a more winsome force involved, the engagement of lives as the setting in which His instruction would have intrigued, motivated, drawn out, stirred, and moved them.

What to do? My suggestion is to be wary of excising the instruction from its narrative setting in order to preach it as instruction today. Better to help listeners imagine being there, being in the sandals of the disciples, feeling what they felt, stirring what stirred in them. Essentially it is about honouring the narrative force of the text rather than over-processing it into bite sized directions for today. Don’t treat every text as a mere collection of principles to be plucked out and fired at our listeners. Instead help the listeners to encounter the people in the text and to be stirred by that, very different, experience.

Get the Idea? – Part 2

December 29, 2010December 30, 2010 / Peter Mead / Leave a comment

This is the middle post in a series of three on Big Idea preaching. Specifically, I’ve been struck by how many people recommend Haddon Robinson’s book, yet seem to not have grasped what it teaches. I understand that they are impressed by the well written chapters dealing with various elements of sermon preparation and delivery (I was impressed first time through), but the powerful notion of the Big Idea is not instantly grasped (took me a while!) So yesterday we thought about The Big Idea being about communication. But more than that . . .

Continue reading →

7 Dangers of Fanciful Interpretations – part 2

December 17, 2010December 16, 2010 / Peter Mead / 3 Comments

Continuing yesterday’s list of 7 dangers of fanciful interpretations:

4. Fanciful interpretation may lead to preacher puffery. If you get lots of empty praise, which you probably will if you preach the equivalent of donuts and cupcakes, there is a very real danger that you may believe the hype and get puffed up. You may get far less feedback from people who are deeply convicted, or who need time to be with the Lord because of what they’ve heard from His Word. So actually the fanciful approach is a short-cut to puffery (unless you learn to discern the value of feedback and praise!)

5. Fanciful interpretation may lead to unnecessary division between believers. On the one hand there are those who will be deeply troubled by what they hear from you. On the other hand there will be noise from the less discerning who get very hyped up by your sugary fare. Chances are that these two groups will have some difficult conversations when the latter look to the former to celebrate the teaching they’ve enjoyed so much!

6. Fanciful interpretation may put off thinking unbelievers. Some people do think and may sit there looking at a Bible as you talk. What if they evaluate Christianity and decide that we’re all apparently unthinking or fanciful in what we believe? Some people are able to see through the lack of intellectual credibility of some Christian communicators. Then we all get tarred with the same brush. More importantly, Christ is rejected based on the false assumption that the Christian faith is intellectually deficient or inconsistent.

7. Fanciful interpretation disappoints God. It doesn’t honour God to treat His Word as if what He inspired isn’t good enough, or interesting enough, or relevant enough.

And other dangers?

7 Dangers of Fanciful Interpretations

December 16, 2010 / Peter Mead / 3 Comments

Fanciful interpretations get great feedback, but they do great damage. Fanciful interpretations get some people very excited, but those who know their Bibles, or have been to Bible school tend to look glum in the midst of the hysteria. Is this because all who have training are killjoys? Or is it perhaps because they see through the hype like a parent watching children getting excited about excessive amounts of sugar?

You can usually spot the indications of fanciful interpretation. One big red flag is when people are saying, “I would never have got that from that passage, wow!” Or even, “That was so rich, deep, original, (you choose the description)!”

But if people are so obviously blessed and encouraged, what is wrong with it? Let me offer seven problems with fanciful interpretation:

1. Fanciful interpretation teaches listeners bad Bible study. You may have convinced yourself that that particular reference to a boat has a deeper meaning relating to postmodernism, or that the name of the valley is an anagram of a suburb of Manchester, or whatever. But let’s say, for argument’s sake, that your clever interpretation doesn’t seem to do any harm and is motivating for the listeners on a spiritual level (perhaps a spiritual theology of David’s brothers’ names, or the significance of a geographical feature for the Christian life). Surely no harm is done? It is if the listeners then copy your way of handling Scripture and come up with an application you find objectionable (the cults do this all the time).

2. Fanciful interpretation offers nutritionally empty fare. Perhaps you’ve come across the notion of empty calories? Something made with highly processed sugar and white flour and unnatural ingredients. These things tend to taste good (temporarily), but have no nutritional value. In fact, over time and in excess, they can do great harm to you. The same is true of overly sweet, overly processed Bible fancies that stir excitement but offer no nutritional value.

3. Fanciful interpretation may cause listeners to give up on their Bibles. After all, if they can’t see how you got there, maybe instead of copying your approach, perhaps they’ll just feel inadequate and give up on their Bibles. They may look forward to hearing you again (which is the motivation for some speakers), but their Bibles will gain dust in the meantime.

The rest of the list tomorrow . . .

Behold My New Phone

November 25, 2010November 25, 2010 / Peter Mead / 2 Comments

I’d like to revisit the theme of the last two posts from another angle. Perhaps an analogy might help. Sitting across from a friend in Pizza Hut, I decide to “preach” my new mobile phone to him.

I place it on the table and say what it says on it. “Samsung.” Then I describe it a bit, sharing a bit of the knowledge I’ve gleaned in my research. “It’s a Samsung Galaxy S. Free with most usage contracts. It runs Android 2.1 currently, and it’s mostly black.”

Then I construct a message based on the phone. “You see the N in Samsung? This makes me think of the iPhone, because that has an N in it too. The iPhone is very popular now and the new operating system has really improved on the old 3GS, even with all the controversy over the signal dropping. Now for my next point, do you see the two S’s in the name? This makes me want to talk about Sony Vaio laptops – they really have come down in price lately, not as elite as they used to appear in the market.”

I could go in any number of directions with “my message” based on the Samsung sitting in front of me. I could talk about mobile phones, or technology, or communication, or any subject of my choice. If I could make enough connections to the phone, my friend might even think I was clever!

But all the while my Samsung phone is sitting there, black, dormant, inactive, unused, undemonstrated. The focus is on my cleverness in message construction, technology association and sheer verbosity.

How different it would be if I would pick it up, turn it on, and show my friend the phone in action, let him see the resolution, experience the new text input method, enjoy an app or two. Suddenly I’m not preaching my message based on the surface details of the phone. Now I’m preaching the phone!

The same is true of preaching a Bible text. Some of us are happy to have the text sit open in front of us while we construct our message based on the text. We make the most random associations in order to preach from the Bible book we would have preferred to be preaching from. We jump off relatively incidental details (at least in the way we use them) to get to the message we are itching to share.

All the while the text sits there. Inspired dynamite ready to be detonated in the hearts and lives of listeners, lying dormant while we wax on eloquently with our message based on the text, sort of. Can I be so bold as to summarize my point in three words? Preach the text!