Don't Go Down to Egypt!

What is it that grows a church? Here's Spurgeon's answer:

Are you afraid that preaching the gospel will not win souls? Are you despondent as to success in God’s way? Is this why you pine for clever oratory? Is this why you must have music, and architecture, and flowers and millinery? After all, is it by might and power, and not by the Spirit of God? It is even so in the opinion of many. 

Brethren beloved, there are many things which I might allow to other worshippers which I have denied myself in conducting the worship of this congregation. I have long worked out before your very eyes the experiment of the unaided attractiveness of the gospel of Jesus. Our service is severely plain. No man ever comes hither to gratify his eye with art, or his ear with music. I have set before you, these many years, nothing but Christ crucified, and the simplicity of the gospel; yet where will you find such a crowd as this gathered together this morning? Where will you find such a multitude as this meeting Sabbath after Sabbath, for five-and-thirty years? I have shown you nothing but the cross, the cross without flowers of oratory, the cross without diamonds of ecclesiastical rank, the cross without the buttress of boastful science. It is abundantly sufficient to attract men first to itself, and afterwards to eternal life! 

In this house we have proved successfully, these many years, this great truth, that the gospel plainly preached will gain an audience, convert sinners, and build up and sustain a church. We beseech the people of God to mark that there is no need to try doubtful expedients and questionable methods. God will save by the gospel still: only let it be the gospel in its purity. This grand old sword will cleave a man’s chine [i.e., spine], and split a rock in halves. 

How is it that it does so little of its old conquering work? I will tell you. Do you see the scabbard of artistic work, so wonderfully elaborated? Full many keep the sword in this scabbard, and therefore its edge never gets to its work. Pull off that scabbard. Fling that fine sheath to Hades, and then see how, in the Lord’s hands, that glorious two-handed sword will mow down fields of men as mowers level the grass with their scythes. 

There is no need to go down to Egypt for help. To invite the devil to help Christ is shameful. Please God, we shall see prosperity yet, when the church of God is resolved never to seek it except in God’s own way.

Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, 1888, vol. 34, p. 563

Why Preach?

Christopher Ash has written a great piece for the Gospel Coalition on the importance of preaching. 

In it he has a particular challenge to the preacher:

But here's the rub: to be a faithful preacher I need to be gripped, humbled, and transformed by the word of Christ. Moses's successors (the prophets) were not cold functionaries who merely expounded the written Torah; they were men in whom the covenant word burned because they walked in close fellowship with the covenant God (e.g. "Your words were found, and I ate them," Jer 15:16). In the same way, those who expound the apostolic word of Jesus must be those in whom these words burn, who are being humbled and transformed by these words.

And a great reminder for the hearer of the fact that...

As a believer, I don't just need to hear the word of God; I need to hear it taught and pressed home to me by a pastor who knows and loves me. There is no substitute. His skills may be surpassed by more famous preachers; but they do not know and love me, and he does.

You can read the whole article by clicking here.

Teaching Luke

I've been spending my time this week getting to grips with the big picture of Luke's Gospel. As I've been doing so I've come across these videos from William Taylor, Rector of St. Helen's, Bishopsgate in London. William gives some helpful thoughts on how to understand Luke on his own terms and how to begin thinking about preaching or teaching the Gospel. Well worth a watch.

A Certain Desperation

Recently Justin Taylor interviewed Dale Ralph Davis, who's written a number of excellent Old Testament commentaries. One of the questions he asked him was about the role of prayer in Biblical interpretation. Davis gave a very helpful answer, and is equally applicable both to those who are preparing to teach the Bible to others and those seeking to read it for themsleves. Here is what Davis said on the role of prayer in Biblical interpretation:

There’s not much I can say here except that the temptation I run into is ignore it. I’ve been so happy to run into the following quotation from Owen:

For a man solemnly to undertake the interpretation of any portion of Scripture without invocation of God, to be taught and instructed by his Spirit, is a high provocation of him; nor shall I expect the discovery of truth from any one who thus proudly engages in a work so much above his ability.

I originally came across this quote in Richard Pratt’s He Gave Us Stories. All I can say is that’s where I have to come back to again and again. It is very easy for me to start in and pull the books off the shelf and so on and dive into the Hebrew text and not give even a thought to specific prayer about that. I’ve done that before and you’re in the middle of it and you think “Boy, what a Godless approach this is. Here I am dealing with syntax and interpretation and I haven’t even really sought the Lord’s face about it.” I know it is the proper thing to say—”you need to pray before you prepare”—but there needs to be a certain desperation about this which I’m not sure we normally have. Again, all I can really say is that I seek to catch myself in this area and repent and go back to that point and then start over again.

Interview with Christopher Ash

Over at the Unashamed Workman they have been running a series of interviews with preachers entitled 10 Questions for Expositors. This week they interviewed Christopher Ash, the director of the Cornhill training course in London, about his preaching. There are some very helpful insights here for anyone involved in Bible teaching ministry, especially those who preach regularly. Here is the interview in full (you can read it in it's original context by clicking here):

1. Where do you place the importance of preaching in the grand scheme of church life?

I feel so strongly about this that I’ve written a short book on it (The Priority of Preaching). If I give a short answer you won’t read the book…

2. In a paragraph, how did you discover your gifts in preaching?

I’m not sure that I did, but I guess other people might have done. The first time I gave a talk at a summer camp, the man who started the camps asked me afterwards if I had toothache. I was very nervous! Gradually it seems my talks got less bad, and then I was asked to preach from time to time in church. It was very hard work, but people encouraged me to keep at it and in due course to get some training and go into pastoral ministry. So in the end I did.

3. How long (on average) does it take you to prepare a sermon?

In one sense, each sermon takes me all my life, since all my understanding of the bible and such knowledge as I have of God and human nature feed into each sermon. But in a more immediate sense, it depends on how familiar I am with the bible book or passage. If it’s an unfamiliar text, I might spend three to six hours working at the text and then a further three to six hours thinking about structure and application, and then writing the sermon. I find I need to start early, as mulling over it slowly, while going to sleep, while on a bus or going for a walk, often leads to insights that I never got when sitting at my desk. So it’s more like ten or so hours spread over at least a week.

4. Is it important to you that a sermon contain one major theme or idea? If so, how do you crystallise it?

Robin Weekes has answered this for me. It’s not that a passage necessarily has only one main or driving idea (although many do), but that a sermon that tries to pick up and convey too many of the motifs in a passage ends up conveying very little to normal hearers, who are bemused and uncertain what the preacher has been saying. Even if my ‘theme sentence’ is provisional (as it always is) I find that a provisional one (my best shot at the big idea) is better than no coherent theme at all.

5. What is the most important aspect of a preacher’s style and what should he avoid?

We want to speak with a genuine, unforced style, which expresses the bible’s truth through the medium of our personality. It is such a help when a preacher speaks naturally, not in a ‘churchy’ manner, not in a high-falutin’ intellectual style, but in a down-to-earth way that communicates with all sorts of people. When J.C.Ryle found himself ministering to simple country folk, he wrote that, ‘I crucified my style’, by which he meant that he simplified it and made it straightforward.

6. What notes, if any, do you use?

I usually have a full script but do not read it. I find preparing a full script, in sentences rather than just headlines or bullet points, disciplines me to think clearly. With notes or bullet points, I may think I have understood it; but it is only when I put it in English that I realize I haven’t yet got it clear and logical! I go through it with a highlighter and then speak more freely.

7. What are the greatest perils that preacher must avoid?

(a) The more competent we become at exegesis, sermon construction, illustration, etc, the easier it is to produce a ‘correct’ sermon where the text has not impacted my own heart. This is a particular danger when we are under time pressure. I find that it is when I have prayed the truth into my own heart, so that my mind, my affections and my will have been gripped by it, that I can preach with conviction.

(b) It is so easy to slip back from the grace of God in the gospel of Christ, to a moralism that simply exhorts. We think that proper ‘application’ must mean telling our hearers to do something, when in fact it is wonderful application to be gripped by the wonder of the gospel of grace.

(c) In particular, the Old Testament must be preached through the lens of Jesus Christ. It makes no sense without him.

8. How do you fight to balance preparation for preaching with other important responsibilities (eg. pastoral care, leadership responsibilities)

With great difficulty. I try to make sure I do some bible preparation early in the day if I can. Even if the day is then swamped with other responsibilities, the fact that I have started helps me begin to get to grips with the text. Sometimes I manage to get away for sustained preparation in a different place; that is a wonderful blessing. But even then I have to fight the addictive power of e-mails, reading interesting blogs (like this one), dipping in and out of social networks etc etc.

9. What books on preaching, or exemplars of it, have you found most influential in your own preaching?

John Stott’s I believe in Preaching was a tremendous stimulus to me some years ago. The essays in When God’s Voice is Heard (eds C.Green and D.Jackman) did me good, especially Jim Packer’s superb essay on the value of systematic theology for preaching. I love dipping into the sermons of John Chrysostom – so courageous and with such wonderfully vigorous illustrations! Spurgeon’sLectures to my Students – full of practical wisdom and great humour. I trained in ministry under Mark Ashton in Cambridge and learned much from him about application that challenges and gets under the radar defences of the hearers.

10. What steps do you take to nurture or encourage developing or future preachers?

I guess this is my job at PT Cornhill. I spend most of my life trying to do this and am glad to be doing so

Preach the Word!

An excellent rap here from Shai Linne on the first mark of a healthy church: expository preaching. He very helpfully brings out the importance of faithful expository preaching for the church. Well worth listening to, whether you're a fan of rap or not, and whether you're a preacher or not.

Oh, For A Closer Walk

Over at the Proclamation Trust Adrian Reynolds has written a very helpful post on maintaining a close walk with Christ. He has written this with preachers in mind, but what he has to say is equally valuable for every Christian to listen to.

1 Timothy 4:16 shows the vital importance of the preacher cultivating a close walk with Christ. If he is not doing so with prayer and the study of the word, then how can he save himself and his hearers.

Reynolds says that ultimately there is only one answer to the struggles we have with maintaining a close walk with Christ. It is this: a deep hunger and thirst for Christ. This is what we need to be crying out to God for. However, there are also many practical things that we can be doing, as we cry out to God for this hunger and thirst, that will help serve us walking closely with God. He mentions 10 practical things that he has found helpful:

1) Read the Bible for your own soul first. Even it eats into prep time don't think that studying to preach is enough to feed your own soul.

2) Read and pray with a pen in your hand - both to capture thoughts and jot down distractions to be dealt with later. I write myself a prayer every day based on what I have read.

3) Use Bible helps judiciously. You're a pastor for goodness sake - don't get caught into the "I can only read the Bible with a commentary" trap

4) Nothing beats an early morning. I learnt this reading chapter 20 of Book 3 of the Institutes [Calvin's Institutes] which is some of the warmest stuff I have ever read on prayer. Google it.

5) Pray for your people deliberately and by name. Better to pray for one or two well than 5 in a bland way. Don't focus on felt needs, pray in what you are reading for your people. Pray that what you are learning they will learn and tell them about it next time you see them.

6) Tear up your prayer diary every few months. I find routine is a life-killer, so I have to tear up my routine and refresh it regularly.

7) Singing to yourself is not a sign of madness. I sit in the morning with an open hymn book and take one a day (which, by the way, opens my eyes to some beautiful and lovely words from the past)

8) Develop prayer as an attitude not a diary slot. We all know it. Practice it. A few minutes here and there. A cry when you reach a really knotty part of Scripture you're struggling to prepare.

9) Don't be afraid to use helps in dry times. I find Valley of Vision a real help when I struggle to pray (I use the leather version, not much more, nicely laid out and it doens't fall apart with use).

10) Cry out with honesty for your lack of thirst. Admit your sin. Repent of it. Use the psalms to align yourself with Christ once again.

You can read the whole of the article here.

Tuesday Teaching: Preaching to the De-Churched

London is a city FULL of de-churched people and most cities around the UK are running to catch up. In this sermon, from 2009's Advance Conference, Matt Chandler helps us and challenges us to recapture our first love for the sake of those who have been completely turned off the gospel!

Practical Tips for Expository Preachers

Here are five tips that Alistair Begg learned about preparing to preach from an older minister when he was a theological student:

1. Think yourself empty. Survey a passage of Scripture in the proper spirit of unlearnedness. Avoid the proud assumption that you initially know what everything means.

2. Read yourself full. Read widely and regularly.

3. Write yourself clear. Aside from the essential empowering of the Spirit, freedom of delivery in the pulpit depends on careful organization in the study.

4. Pray yourself hot. Without personal prayer and communion with God during the preparation stages, the pulpit will be cold.

5. Be yourself, but don’t preach yourself. There is nothing quite so ridiculous as the affected tone and adopted posture of the preacher who wishes he were someone else. Also – a good teacher clears the way, declares the way, and then gets out of the way.

This comes from Beggs book Preaching for God’s Glory.

On Reading

Have you ever thought about how important reading is in the Christian life? A former minister of mine used to comstantly remind us that we should "always have a Christian book on the go." Reading is one of the ways in which we keep ourselves fresh and growing as Christians. Recently I was reminded of the importance of reading when I came across the following two quotes. Have a read and be challenged to be a reader!

John Wesley had these words to say to when he wrote to a younger pastor. They are something that anyone in Christian ministry would do well to heed, and indeed any Christian. He recognised the huge importance for pastors to be reading, that they might nourish their own souls, and be able to faithfully nourish others:

What has exceedingly hurt you in time past, nay, and I fear, to this day, is lack of reading. I scarce ever knew a preacher who read so little. And perhaps, by neglecting it, you have lost the taste for it. Hence your talent in preaching does not increase. It is just the same as it was seven years ago. It is lively, but not deep; there is little variety; there is no compass of thought. Reading only can supply this, with meditation and daily prayer. You wrong yourself greatly by omitting this. You can never be a deep preacher without it, any more than a thorough Christian. Oh begin! Fix some part of every day for private exercise. You may acquire the taste which you have not; what is tedious at first will afterward be pleasant. Whether you like it or not, read and pray daily. It is for your life; there is no other way; else you will be a trifler all your days, and a pretty, superficial preacher. Do justice to your own soul; give it time and means to grow. Do not starve yourself any longer. Take up your cross and be a Christian altogether. Then will all the children of God rejoice (not grieve) over you, and in particular yours.

Recently Tim Challies quoted from Warren Wiersbe’s book 50 People Every Christian Should Know. If the quote from John Wesley challenges us on the importance of reading, the following quote challenges us about what kind of readers we ought to be. That is, how we read. In his chapter devoted to Alexander Whyte he has this to say:

Alexander Whyte loved books, and he read them to his dying day. The Puritans in general and Thomas Goodwin in particular were his main diet...Whyte constantly ordered books for himself and his friends in the ministry. However, he cautioned young pastors against becoming book-buyers instead of book-readers. “Don’t hunger for books,” he wrote a minister friend. “Get a few of the very best, such as you already have, and read them and your own heart continually.” Whyte often contrasted two kinds of reading—“reading on a sofa and reading with a pencil in hand.” He urged students to keep notebooks and to make entries in an interleaved Bible for future reference. “No day without its line” was his motto. He wrote to Hubert Simpson: “for more than forty years, I think I can say, never a week, scarcely a day, has passed, that I have not entered some note or notes into my Bible: and, then, I never read a book without taking notes for preservation one way or another.

The Importance of Being Under the Ministry of the Word

Sinclair Ferguson shows the relationship between our tongues and our sitting under the ministry of the Word. May we allow the word of Christ to dwell in us so richly so that we cannot speak in any other accent.

Taking Great Pains to Warn About Eternal Pain

Jonathan Edwards was a man who was keenly aware of the dreadful reality of hell, an eternal conscious torment for all those who reject Jesus. He is well known by many simply because of a single sermon he preached, entitled Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, which set before his hearers in vivid imagery the reality and the seriousness of hell. Edwards has much to say to us today (and not only on the matter of hell), he said these words about why we ought to speak about hell, which no doubt were part of the reason why he preached such a sermon:

If there be really a hell of such dreadful and never-ending torments, as is generally supposed, of which multitudes are in great danger—and into which the greater part of men in Christian countries do actually from generation to generation fall, for want of a sense of its terribleness, and so for want of taking due care to avoid it—then why is it not proper for those who have the care of souls to take great pains to make men sensible of it? Why should they not be told as much of the truth as can be?

(Jonathan Edwards, The Distinguishing Marks of a Work of the Spirit of God)

If we truly believe in hell, which the Bible clearly tells us is a terrifying reality for all those who do not bow the knee to Jesus, and if we truly love people,  then ought this not drive us to "take great pains" to warn people of it and point them to the only one in whom there is refuge from the wrath to come (1 Thessalonians 1:10).

A Word to Preachers Before Sunday

No doubt there are many of us wrestling hard and sweating over the text in preparation for preaching this Sunday. As we prepare to preach one of the key things we must be doing in preparation to preach a passage is to be preaching it to ourselves before we dare preach it to others. We must let our hearts be affected by the glorious truths of God's word before we seek to apply them to the hearts of others.Richard Baxter said it well in this plea to his fellow preachers, which we would do well to heed:

In the name of God, brethren, labor to awaken your own hearts, before you go to the pulpit, that you may be fit to awaken the hearts of sinners. Remember they must be awakened or damned, and . . . a sleepy preacher will hardly awaken drowsy sinners. Though you give the holy things of God the highest praise in words, yet, if you do it coldly, you will seem by your manner to unsay what you said in the matter. . . . Speak to your people as to men that must be awakened, either here or in hell. Look around upon them with the eye of faith, and with compassion, and think in what a state of joy or torment they must all be for ever; and then, methinks, it will make you earnest, and melt your heart to a sense of their condition.

Preachers Q&A

Thefollowing video is a question and answer session from a recent Proclamation Trust preachers weekend. Vaughan Roberts and Adrian Reynolds answer a number of questions on preaching.

The Preachers Weekend 2011 from The Proclamation Trust on Vimeo.

Quote: For Those Who Teach

You are required to believe, to preach, and to teach what the Bible says is true, not what you want the Bible to say is true.

R. C. Sproul

Give God the Microphone!

In his book The Priority of Preaching, Christopher Ash has an appendix entitled "Give God the Microphone!". In this appendix he outlines seven blessings of consecutive expository preaching. That is, preaching that takes a book (or section of a book) of the Bible and works systematically through it in a sermon series.

Christopher argues that the staple diet of feeding a congregation ought to be consecutive expository preaching. This does not mean that topical preaching (where the biblical teaching on a certain topic is taught) does not have a place. However, it ought to be the exception rather than the rule. He says: "I am not saying that we ought never to preach topical sermons; I am proposing that the normal regular week by week diet should usually be working through a book of the Bible, and this is the most nourishing basis for the diet of the sheep (ourselves included)."

He then goes on to set before us seven blessings that flow from consecutive expository preaching. Here are the seven blessings:

1) It safeguards God's agenda against being hijacked by ours
Working systematically through a book of the Bible allows us to let God set the agenda for what is heard from the pulpit week by week. It helps keep us from hijacking the teaching with human agendas, influenced by the desires for relevance, entertainment and immediacy. It gives God the microphone allows His word to set the agenda.

2) It makes it harder for us to abuse the Bible by reading it out of context
It helps us to understand the Bible in its contexts, and therefore not to abuse it by twisting it to mean something other than what God has made it mean.

3) It dilutes the selectivity of the preacher
A topical sermon is very likely to reflect the preachers framework, his partial knowledge of the Bible, his prejudices, the bees in his bonnet, and his hobby horses. Preaching consecutively through books of the Bible helps to dilute this.

4) It keeps the content of the sermon fresh and surprising
As each passage is worked through week by week the particularities of each passage shall be brought to light. Consecutive expository preaching asks "What does this passage contribute to the whole of God's revelation?" which makes for a healthy freshness.

5) It makes for variety in the style of the sermon
If we allow the style and tone of the various Bible books to shape the style and tone of our preaching then this will make for a refreshing variety in the style and tone of our sermons as we work through different books.

6) It models good nourishing Bible reading for the ordinary Christian
Topical preaching models a style of Bible reading for the ordinary Christian in which they are dipping in and out of various books of the Bible but not seeing how all the parts fit together. Consecutive expository preaching models a more nourishing style of Bible reading that is much more nourishing and sustainable, as you take a book of the Bible and read through it day by day.

7) It helps us preach the whole Christ from the whole of Scripture
It helps us to have a growing awareness of who Jesus is as the whole Bible testifies to Him, and to build up a picture shaped by the whole of Scripture, not just a few selected key passages. It helps us to proclaim as much of Christ as we can to our people, as we exopse people to as much of the Bibles rich testimony to Him.

Christopher Ash's appendix is worth reading in full, as is the whole of his book.

Quote: "Strike Me Dumb"

In his excellent little book on Christian ministry called "The Art of Manfishing", Thomas Boston has these challenging words to say about preaching:

Lord, rather strike me dumb, than suffer me to preach unconcerned for the good of souls.

Don't Assume the Gospel

What is it that excites you? What is it that excites you corporately as a church? What it is that we rejoice in and celebrate as a church shows where our priorities lie. Therefore, we must ensure that the gospel is what we are constantly rejoicing in, both individually and corporately. We never move on from the gospel. Therefore, we must never cease to let it be the centre of what we delight in. If we do not do so we begin to assume the gospel, which in turn leads to being not far from throwing out the gospel altogether. Don Carson has some helpful words of warning on this:

I have been teaching more decades now that I can count and if I have learned anything from all of this teaching, its this: my students . . . learn what I’m excited about. So within the church of the living God, we must become excited about the gospel. That’s how we pass on our heritage. If, instead, the gospel increasingly becomes for us that which we assume, then we will, of course, assent to the correct creedal statement. But, at this point, the gospel is not what really captures us. Rather, is a particular form of worship or a particular style of counseling, or a particular view on culture, or a particular technique in preaching, or—fill in the blank. Then, ultimately, our students make that their center and the generation after us loses the gospel. As soon as you get to the place where the gospel is that which is nearly assumed, you are only a generation and a half from death.

"If the word do not dwell with power in us..."

A preacher cannot faithfully preach to others who has not first preached to himself. If we who are preachers are not feeding ourselves on the glorious truths of Scripture, then we shall be in no place to feed others. This is a conviction that John Owen held deeply, and which shaped his life and ministry. We would do well to listen to what he says:

A man preacheth that sermon only well unto others which preacheth itself in his own soul. And he that doth not feed on and thrive in the digestion of the food which he provides for others will scarce make it savoury unto them; yea, he knows not but the food he hath provided may be poison, unless he have really tasted of it himself. If the word do not dwell with power in us, it will not pass with power from us. (Works, XVI, p. 76.)

May we, who have the immense privelege and responsibility for feeding others through the preaching and teaching of God's word, not dare teach others before we have taught ourselves. May we be pressing home and applying the words of Scripture deeply to our own hearts before we do the same for others.

Sweating Over the Text

The fact that the only way we can understand Scripture is if God gives us understanding, does not mean that we do not have to study hard to understand the Bible. The two go together. Paul tells Timothy to "Think over what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything." (2 Timothy 2:7). We do need to be those who sweat over the text, dilligently wrestling with it until it gives up its blessing. Yet at the same time we must be doing so in complete dependance of God, who alone can give us understanding. Don Carson has these helpful words to say on the importance of dilligent study of the Bible, and the danger of neglecting it:

Careful handling of the Bible will enable us to "hear" it a little better. It is all too easy to read the traditional interpretations we have received from others into the text of Scripture. Then we may unwittingly transfer the authority of Scripture to our traditional interpretations and invest them with a false, even an idolatrous degree of certainty. Because traditions are reshaped as they are passed on, after a while we may drift far from God's word while still insisting our theological opinions are "biblical" and therefore true. If when we are in such a state we study the Bible uncritically, more than likely it will simply reinforce our errors. If the Bible is to accomplish its work of continual reformation - reformation of our lives and doctrine - we must do all we can to listen to it afresh and to utilize the best resources at our disposal.

D. A. Carson, from the introduction to "Exegetical Fallacies".