God Transforms The Receptive Preacher (Why It Starts With God)

"Preaching, in one sense, merely discharges the firearm that God has loaded in the silent places." Calvin Miller, Spirit, Word, and Story, pg35

In my thesis, the goal is to show why God is the author, subject, and power of our preaching. To some it might seem obvious that this should be the case. But a visit to most churches in our communities will tell us a different story. There is a lot of good sermonizing, story telling, moralistic teaching, and "showmanship." There is also a lot of bad versions of those things. However, I would contend that when we walk into these "sermons" we are not actually hearing sermons. Maybe speeches under the church guise of sermons, but they are speeches nonetheless. They may inform, motivate, or tug at our heart strings, but they rarely transform. I am convinced by the word of God that true transformational preaching only occurs when our starting point is God. Allow me to explain.

God, by being His very nature, is a free being to do whatever He pleases, as long as it does not go against His nature. Therefore, truth about God can only be known to us by whatever means He pleases to reveal Himself. The very act of God's creation of this world is His revelation of Himself. For whatever reason that He saw fit, He created all things according to His word, just as described in Genesis 1 and 2. This is the powerful revelation of Himself in creation. The psalmist praises the glory of creation in Psalm 19 and Paul says that we are all without excuse as a result of this creation in Romans 1. Our very existence begins by the power of God. And what's more, it came about as a result of His word.

8 times God speaks and something comes into being in Genesis 1. God speaks and it is done. He has the power to reveal Himself through His word(s). And this is why preaching must start with God. If all of life begins with the word of God, how much more then the preaching of God's Word? Preaching is not born out of our cleverness, nor our talent for speaking, nor our ability to grip the audience, nor our ideas that we'd like to talk about. Preaching is born out of the silence of listening for God's whispers of revelation.

In Matthew 13, Jesus tells a parable of a sower and 4 different types of soils. When asked why He spoke in parables, Jesus answered, "Therefore I speak to them in parables; because while seeing they do not see, and while hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand." (Matthew 13:13). This is the state of many a preacher today. Speaking they do not speak (the things of God). In order to be able to truly preach the word of God, we must come to Him waiting patiently to hear. And if we are not careful, we will walk into the pulpit blind, deaf, and dumb. We will know that the preacher has been with God because, as Albert Mohler Jr. says, "no man can give at once the impression that he himself is clever and that Christ is mighty to save."

We must begin with God, because if we do not, we have nothing to say. Our wisdom and eloquence may be enough to captivate an audience, although usually it is not, but the wisdom of God is the only wisdom with any power. Speaking of the power of plainly preaching the Gospel Paul says in I Corinthians 2:1-13:

And when I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.

Yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature; a wisdom, however, not of this age nor of the rulers of this age, who are passing away; but we speak God’s wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory; the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood; for if they had understood it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory; but just as it is written, “Things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard, And which have not entered the heart of man, All that God has prepared for those who love Him.”

For to us God revealed them through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God, which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words.

Truly transformational preaching is marked by the words of John the Baptizer. He must increase, I must decrease. Or to say it differently, the louder I get, the quieter God gets in my preaching. A right understanding of preaching will lead us to the same conclusion as Calvin Miller. "A great preacher brings to the pulpit great sermons from the presence of God." Only when the preacher has been with God, in prayer and the word, will he be able to come before the church body ready to preach. Anything offered not from the presence of God is at best a grand speech and at worst a pointless one. And yes, I have been guilty of both. But may God grab hold of His heralds and whisper the words of life into their ears.

Who's Writing Our Sermons?

"For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well-pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. For indeed Jews ask for signs and Greeks search for wisdom; but we preach Christ crucified, to Jews a stumbling block and to Gentiles foolishness, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men." I Corinthians 1:21-25

"Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God, which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words." I Corinthians 2:12-13

Paul was very clear on this matter. He did not author this message of Christ and Christ crucified. Not Paul, nor any Jew, nor any Gentile had authored this message which Paul preached. It's too crazy to the world! How ridiculous does it seem to us that God, the master and creator of the universe would be willing to die for a creation that had rejected Him? How many husbands would naturally be inclined to welcome back a wife who had cheated on him multiple times and had never shown much affection for him? Better yet, what if your friend kept taking back a wife who had cheated on him multiple times? What kind of words would you use to describe that friend? Most of the words would have derived from one, "foolish."

Paul's message was so crazy, that it had to have come from God. Paul takes no credit for the message he preached. How can preachers learn from this? By asking the question, "who writes my sermons?" I am finding that far too often there is a tendency for preachers today to fill their sermons with the wisdom of this world. We begin with a need we see in the world and then search for that scripture which helps us to alleviate the pain of that need. We then get caught up in "writing" sermons, chocked full of ideas, stories, and advice.

But preaching is not a religious advice talk. It is not just another form of communication. It is the means by which God has ordained for the truth of the Gospel to be spread. It is by hearing that sinners are saved, it is by the power of the Word that the dead are brought to life. Life is inherent in the words of Christ and if that life is to be had, then it is the words of Christ that must be spoken in our sermons. We need to be sold out on the fact that God is the author of our sermons. He does the writing, we do the preaching. That's how it worked for Moses, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Paul, Peter, Luther, Spurgeon, and all other faithful ministers of the Word. Where God spoke, they spoke.

So who writes our sermons? Do we spend more time digging for truth in the text or more time thinking of a creative way to explain the text? Is our energy in understanding and applying God's word to our own lives or in figuring out how to captivate people's attention? Are the sermons we preach full of scripture and the power of the cross or are they full of quotations and the power of the laugh? Who is writing your sermons?

Keeping the Word of God and the Spirit of God Together

Another way of putting the same truth is to say that we must keep the Word of God and the Spirit of God together. For apart from the Spirit the Word is dead, while apart from the Word the Spirit is alien. (John R.W. Stott Between Two Worlds, pg 102)

Oh what powerful implications for preaching this has! Far too often we see the caricatures of a boring type of preaching that feels antiquated versus a mindless rambling of "spirit filled" preaching which is nothing more than emotionalism.

The first is practiced every Sunday in a church near you, under the cover of "Bible based" preaching. In reality the Word of God has been robbed of all it's power and authority. In reality, it is not the commandments of God that are being preached but the traditions of men. It is boring, dull, and old, because there is no conviction that the Spirit is alive, that Jesus is alive, that God is active. We sit and wonder, for the few moments before we fall off into thoughts about what wonders lunch will hold for us, what in the world does this sermon have to do anything. It appears, either by the preachers life or his tone or his content, that even he does not believe what he is proclaiming. The Word of God has become devoid of the Spirit of God and it is dead.

However, flip on your television and catch one of the entertaining acts of religious programming. Full of "spirit" and activity, there is no chance that you will fall asleep while watching one of their acts. "But what about all the amazing things they do and how God has blessed them?" What about those things? All they have accomplished is to convince us that this individual who is preaching is quite charismatic and resourceful. But in actuality it has nothing to do with how God has blessed them. Certainly they have a "spirit" but it is one alien to the Spirit of God. And if there is any spirit alien to God's Holy Spirit, I will let you judge for yourself what kind of Spirit that is. I can speak like this because as you listen to these spiritual entertainers you will find a huge gaping hole where God's word ought to be. They might briefly mention a text of scripture, but only as a comma in the sentence of their great words. They will call on the name of Jesus, but I imagine, (as in Acts 19), the demons are saying "Jesus I know, Paul I have heard of, but who are you?" They do not handle the Word of God with any care and therefore practice bad, sick doctrine. And when a doctor handles a patient with bad medicine, they kill them. So, as many of these men claim, they are prophets, just of the false kind. Wolves in sheep's clothing. Aliens to the people of God.

What we are to find is a place where the preacher has come to the Word. Where in it he has found the Words of life and is seeking to have them abundantly. What we are to find is a preacher who relies upon the Spirit of God to do the work of growing the seeds he is planting. What will embolden our churches is a preacher who, like Paul, can say, "Therefore, I testify to you this day that I am innocent of the blood of all men. For I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole purpose of God." (Acts 20:26-27) Preaching is needed to send forth the glorious Gospel of God's salvation and His saving acts. But the Spirit is the teacher and power by which those things are understood. Without the Spirit, the sermon is dead. Without the Word, the sermon is demonic. But with the Word and with the Spirit, the sermon is the thunder and lightning of God almighty. The Word will penetrate the heart and the Spirit will ignite it like dynamite. That kind of preaching is powerful and effective. When God speaks to us through what He spoke in His Word.

Trinitarian Preaching

"Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness;"
Genesis 1:26a

In the last week, I have done a lot of thinking. I have been looking into the power of the Holy Spirit in preaching and I think that is an important piece of the preaching puzzle. But I realize that God is much bigger than just power in preaching. The Holy Spirit is hovering over us, just as He was in the beginning of creation. But let me bring some other things to the forefront of our minds.

The Spirit of God hovers over and empowers and strengthens and enlightens our preaching. But what good would the preaching be without the Word? I find it eternally fascinating to compare John 1 and Genesis 1. Jesus is the Word and all creation came into being through God speaking. Consider that for a moment. Stop and meditate on that for a day. When God speaks, Jesus comes out. Can we say the same for our preaching? Our material in preaching is really like a broken record. Or as Derek Webb has stated, we are like mockingbirds with no new songs to sing. It is Jesus. Jesus yesterday, today, and forever. The power of the Gospel comes alive in the Spirit, but truthfully the power of the Gospel is Jesus. So when we preach, the power and the force in the room might be the Holy Spirit, but the foundation (corner stone) for that power is the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Jesus. What happens in our spirit when we hear preaching matters, but what comes out of the mouth of the preacher matters just as much. And if it's not the Word, then it ain't preaching. (Yes I know that ain't ain't a word.)

But now consider this. Preaching doesn't just end with the Word and the Spirit. God sent Jesus to bring us back to God. His coming wasn't just so that we would fall in love with the man Jesus, but that we would fall in love with the God who was manifested in the man Jesus.

"Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." (2 Corinthians 5:18-21)

That is why I preach. To be an ambassador, a herald if you will. But why preach the Word and why do it in the Spirit? To beg you on behalf of Christ, "be reconciled to God!" God sent the Son to reconcile the world to Himself. He sent the Spirit to teach us and guide us to Him. All of this to the end that we might know Him. If preaching doesn't seek to reconcile you to God, through the work of Christ Jesus and by the power of God's Holy Spirit, then it ain't preaching. So that leaves the question, how trinitarian is our preaching?

From my own personal observations, it seems that preaching has become something of a topical mess. Most preachers use their time to proclaim moral encouragements, logical arguments, or exciting entertainment. But very little of what is today called preaching is seeking to reconcile people to God through Jesus. Sure there is often an invitation offered at the end to invite people to believe. But when the sermon is all about how to be a better you, the Gospel becomes muddled and people have nothing to respond to. Do you want to know if preaching is trinitarian? Look for these things. Is Christ magnified? Is He made much of? Does the preacher want you to hear the cross, hear the Word? Does the preacher seem to be speaking in the power of the Spirit? Does it seem that God is using the words of this mere man to communicate great truths? Are you convicted in your own spirit by God's? And finally, has the whole goal been to be reconciled to God? Have you been influenced to move closer into relationship with God? If these things are happening you might be involved in trinitarian preaching. And may God pull you close to Himself through it.