The Need for God's Supremacy in Christian
Preaching
In a series of talks called Preaching as Worship: Meditations on
Expository Exultation, John Piper notes that while contemporary worship
songs are very God-centered and God honoring, contemporary preaching (for the
most part) is not. Why is there such a division? Both want to be interesting
to people and make them more Christ-like--and rightly so.
The division seems to boil down to a lack of confidence in the power of
God's truth. In our worship songs, it seems that God-centered lyrics are
considered acceptable to engage people's interest and devotion because the
lyrics have the added "help" of the music. Lest anyone be bored with the lyrics
that contain "too much theology," the beautiful music is there to pick up the
slack. With preaching, however, there is no added help to pick up any slack--no
music from the band or humming from the congregation to support the message and
keep people's interest. Because of this, we think that God-centered preaching
has to go if the people are going to stay attentive. In other words, at the
root of our deficient preaching is the mistaken notion that in-depth talk of
God, His glory, and the great truths of the Bible will not move the heart and
soul.
As a result of this mistaken notion, the tendency is to preach about
ourselves and "contemporary issues" such as dating, self-esteem, and "how-to"
messages instead of the glories of God. And when the word of God is preached,
our tendency is to tone it down to make sure that it is acceptable to the
hearers. Rather than preaching about the supremacy of God, we preach about a
funny story and try to tie it in with a Biblical theme; rather than preaching
biblical truth that will increase our joy in the Lord, we preach about how to
feel good about ourselves and have more fun. We teach about friendship with God
without mentioning the need for the fear of God; we teach more about how to make
someone a disciple of Jesus Christ than we do of Christ Himself. And sometimes
we teach about living a victorious Christian life as if it is simply a matter of
having enough will power to appropriate the blessing.
John D. Hanna has said, "In the quest to make the church more important
to society, the church is finding itself less appealing to an increasingly
apathetic world because it has little to offer that is distinctive. Our growing
accommodation of the gospel message to immediate felt needs, with the hope of
attracting the less interested, may well cause the church to forget that its
true work is about an indescribable miracle of God's grace..." (The Coming
Evangelical Crisis, p. 168). What follows is an exhortation to bring God's
supremacy back into Christian preaching. For churches where God's supremacy is
reflected in the preaching, this is encouragement to keep it up and keep
imporving. For churches where God's supremacy has been replaced, for the most
part, with other things, this is a plea to wake up.
Let's not buy into the mistaken notion that the preaching about the
glories of God will bore people out of their minds. And let's not try to be
practical without first being theological--for theology is the very foundation
of worship, joy, and obedience. Instead, let's exalt the greatness of God in
our songs and our preaching. Preaching centered around God's supremacy
and His great plan of redemption will not only enlighten the mind, but will
expand the heart and fill it with bursting joy. The head and the heart cannot
be separated, for the way to the heart is through the mind. And nothing can
bring greater joy to the heart than beholding the glory of God. This should be
our aim in the preaching at each service.
The aim in our preaching should not be entertainment or to hear, week after
week, things that we already know. Our model is not David Lettermen but the New
Testament. Our aim will be, as the Bible commands, to increase our satisfaction
and happiness in God through beholding His greatness. So when I say that our
aim is not to be entertained, I don't mean that it should be boredom instead.
But I do mean to point out that "fun" and "happiness" do not always go
together--there is such a thing as what C.S. Lewis called "a kind of happiness
that makes you serious."
I'm not advocating a dry, boring, emotionless message where we come to
hear a lecture on the meaning of Greek words or an academic debate over
insignificant points of doctrine. But I also oppose a weakly meeting where we
come to hear a casual pep-talk, a simple devotional thought strung together with
a few funny stories. What I am advocating is preaching that continues with us
through the week and increases our happiness and joy in God to levels that we
have never before reached. This will require us to stay away from the cocky
familiarity that is so common in approaching God today and start involving
ourselves in talks that are a concentrated, organized, profound (yet
understandable) proclamation of the biblical text on the great themes of the
Bible. J.I. Packer said "Doctrinal preaching certainly bores the hypocrites;
but it is only doctrinal preaching that will save Christ's sheep. The
preacher's job is to proclaim the faith, not to provide entertainment for
unbelievers--in other words, to feed the sheep rather than amuse the goats"
(A Quest for Godliness p. 285).
What kind of preaching will this be? It will be after the manner of the
Puritans. Peter Lewis explained that "It was the genius of the Puritan
preaching that in style it was plain [understandable] without being dull;
in emphasis, an admirable balance of doctrine and practice; in
character, faithfully devoted to the exposition of the Word of Scripture,
both letter and spirit, which they loved" (Peter Lewis, The Genius of
Puritanism, p. 47). The Puritan Richard Baxter made clear the need for
in-depth teaching that is understandable when he said: "If you would not teach
men, what do you do in the pulpit? If you would, why do you not speak so as to
be understood?" Gary Johnson said, "We cannot preach at all without preaching
some sort of doctrine [be it good or bad!]; and the type of religious life that
grows up under our preaching will be determined by the nature of the doctrines
we preach" (The Coming Evangelical Crisis, p. 65).
We cannot shrink from the "tough texts" in our preaching. Does God take
pleasure in the death of the wicked (Deuteronomy 28:63)? Does God control all
things--especially your seemingly free moral choices (Romans 9:19)? Does God
ordain sinful actions (Acts 2:23)? Does God choose who will be saved (Acts
13:48)? There is much gold to discover as we dig into these texts (and the
hundreds of others like them)! The apostle Paul declared "I did not shrink from
declaring to you the whole purpose [counsel] of God" (Acts 20:27). If we wish
to be faithful to the example of the apostle Paul, we cannot continue ignoring
these parts of the Bible.
We will also have to proclaim afresh the most central tenets of
the Christian faith, which are unfortunately much ignored in our day. How can
God be both three and one at the same time and where is this taught in the
Bible? How can Jesus be both God and man at the same time and where is this
taught? How can we be considered as perfectly justified in God's sight while we
are yet sinners? What did Christ accomplish when He died and who did He do it
for? But this cannot be all. We will also have to ask things such as, How
shall we preach the gospel? How can we best witness to our friends? How can we
succeed at living holy lives? How can we make it through when bad things
happen? How can I overcome lust? Pride? Anxiety? Impatience? How can I be
filled with the Holy Spirit and live in His power? What does God's word say on
relationships? But the difference between how we will deal with such issues and
how much contemporary preaching deals with them is that we will not bring these
issues down to the level of man-centered pop psychology. Rather, we will bring
these issues up into the greatness of God, for satisfaction in God's greatness
is ultimately the solution to all of our problems.
So it should be clear that we do not need to ignore contemporary issues
in order to be glorifying to God. But neither do we need to ignore the glory of
God in order to deal with contemporary issues. Instead, the apparent divide is
solved when we recognize that it is ultimately the glory of God that will most
satisfy our souls. When God is glorified in us, we become satisfied in Him.
Therefore, the most effective way to deal with the very important practical
questions is by approaching them from the angle of how they relate to the
supremacy of God. For example, overcoming lust is not simply a matter of How
can I muster up the will power to reject it? but How can I stay satisfied in the
glory of God so that the temptation to lust looses its appeal? In regards to
sharing our faith, preaching the gospel is not simply a matter of bringing the
person to the point of decision, but showing off the excellencies and greatness
of God's character through the redemption that is in Christ so that the person
will want Christ.
In conclusion, preaching is supposed to offer something deeper than
entertainment and a boost to our self-esteem. It is supposed to offer something
that will fuel our worship and our quest for holiness, something that will
kindle great love for God in our hearts. This comes from teaching on the
majesty and glory of God, with a view to living out the things we learn in our
everyday lives so that God's excellency is manifest in the world. I hope that
we will take heed of these words of Jonathan Edwards: "The highest end and
happiness of men is to view God's excellency, to love and receive expressions of
His love and therefore our greatest business is to meditate on and use means
[like preaching] to understand God's bounty [riches] and to express suitably our
love...which we call worship."
Goals for Preaching with the Supremacy of God at Heart
1. It will be expository. This simply means that it will
explain--or expose--the biblical text for what it means. This of course
presupposes that our preaching will be focused upon the word of God, for that is
what we need the most.
2. It will engage the mind. Preaching should not be
anti-intellectual. If you can come to college for four years to take hundreds
of hours of classes to prepare for your career, you can hear a biblical message
that engages your mind and makes you think. We must obey Paul's command: "Do
not be children in your thinking; yet in evil be babes, but in your thinking be
mature" (1 Corinthians 14:20, all Scripture from NASB).
Preaching feeds our faith by engaging our minds: "Then I will give you
shepherds after My own heart, who will feed you on knowledge and understanding"
(Jeremiah 3:15).
3. It will be understandable. Preaching that engages the mind
does not need to be confusing, complicated, or hard to understand. Preaching
is of no use unless it is understood.
4. It will show the glories of God. The preaching will not just
explain our favorite biblical texts that we cling to so dearly, thinking that we
have the Bible and our God all figured out (thereby preventing us from going
deeper). We must all press on to maturity. What do I mean by preaching that
shows the glories of God? I mean preaching that exalts His supremacy in our
hearts--preaching that tells us who God is and how great He is. Preaching that
portrays Him as authoritative, powerful, and reliable. Preaching that shows off
His attributes, such as love and justice, mercy and wrath, compassion and
jealously, patience and wisdom. This kind of preaching deals with and teaches
from the "tough texts" and other topics I mentioned above and explains things
such as God's triune nature and has Christ's work at the cross as the
centerpiece.
5. It will satisfy us with the greatness of God. This is
because God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him. This
will create a great furnace of worship and love in our hearts, and is also the
foundation of holy lives. If we are going to increase our satisfaction in God,
we cannot shrink from preaching theology: "...constantly nourished on the words
of the faith and of the sound doctrine which you have been following" (1 Timothy
4:6). Salvation itself is at stake in each message (1 Tim. 4:16).
6. It will transform us into the image of God. True spiritual
growth and transformation comes as we behold and delight ourselves in God's
glory. "But we all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of
the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as
from the Lord, the Spirit" (2 Cor. 3:18).
7. It will transform our wills, minds, and hearts. Much
contemporary teaching seeks to make us do acts of the will without trying to
ignite in us true and deep feelings for God. You cannot divide a person like
that--our wills, minds, and hearts must all be engaged, or we will not be
engaged as whole persons. The current thinking that it is our acts of will that
count and not necessarily the feelings behind them is what particularly
distresses me. Feelings are necessary to true worship, obedience, and love.
Jesus condemned the Pharisees for obeying and worshipping with their wills but
not their hearts (Matt. 15:7-9). Micah said that we are to love mercy,
not just do it (Micah 6:8). Just as religious feelings without action are
worthless, so also religious actions without genuine feelings are empty. Christ
doesn't just want us to do good works, but to be zealous for good works
(Titus 2:14). In fact, it would be very hard to persevere in obedience very
long if your heart was not in it. Preaching that tries to change our wills
without igniting our hearts attempts to be practical, but falls flat. At our
meetings, therefore, we will recognize that the will must be supported by the
heart, which follows the head, and preach in a way that ignites holy affections
for God, through the renewing of our minds, which will in turn transform our
wills.
All Scripture quotations are from the New American Standard Bible, copyright 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1975, 1977, by the Lockman Foundation.
MP
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