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The author's premise is clear, but he never documents it. His argument is essentially, "This what we have done in the past, and we should keep doing it."
In addition, it grates on us to read over and over that the sermon is preaching. It is not. The sermon is teaching, a wholly different thing.
Finally, the author never finds a Bible verse that speaks to his point. He dances around the issue as he justifies historical practice, but never actually gets to point of explaining what the Biblical model for the gathering of the saints is.
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PREACHING IS THE OVERWHELMING WITNESS OF SCRIPTURE AS THE MEANS OF COMMUNICATING THE WORDS OF GOD.
For many years I wondered why Paul called preaching “foolishness” in 1 Corinthians 1:21. (Let's quote the verse. 1Co. 1:21:
For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.So Paul doesn't call preaching foolishness, he calls the message contained in it to be foolish.
In addition, the word "preached" is kérugma, properly, proclamation, the preaching (heralding) of the Gospel – especially its fundamentals (like Jesus' life, death and resurrection, etc.)... that which is promulgated by a herald or public crier, a proclamation by herald; in the N. T. the message or proclamation by the heralds of God or Christ.
Our position is that in the Bible, preaching is almost always referring to the presentation of the Gospel message to the lost.)
Preaching is the glorious means by which the Spirit saves (This is a correct definition.)
and sanctifies sinners, the method by which the Lord builds his church. (No, this is teaching. "Teaching" is a different Greek word, didaskalia, teaching, i. e. that which is taught, doctrine... This is the activity that imparts knowledge about the truths of Christ, holy living, and correct doctrine.)
So how could he refer to it as folly?
After preaching for a couple of decades now, I’ve come to understand Paul’s paradoxical descriptor a bit better. I think he refers to the “foolishness of preaching” because the world sees it precisely that way. No surprise there.
Here’s what is surprising: Christians have sometimes viewed preaching the same way—as foolishness that should be abolished. (No reference for this statement.)
The reformers fought to recover preaching as the central act of Christian worship after centuries of sacerdotalism in the Roman Church. In more recent years, other sermon substitutes (The author conflates preaching with sermons. The lost need preaching, the saved need teaching.)
have been suggested in Lord’s Day worship: drama, storytelling, music, interviews, art, videos and other new technology, the Eucharist/Lord’s Supper (again), and more.
Why?
I think C. S. Lewis lands close to the answer in The Screwtape Letters when Uncle Screwtape gives the young tempter, Wormwood, an ingenious strategy for distracting believers: Use their penchant for boredom against them.
Work on their horror of the Same Old Thing. The horror of the Same Old Thing is one of the most valuable passions we have produced in the human heart—an endless source of heresies in religion, folly in counsel, infidelity in marriage, and inconstancy in friendship. . . . Now just as we pick out and exaggerate the pleasure of eating to produce gluttony, so we pick out this natural pleasantness of change and twist it into a demand for absolute novelty.
Christians are easily bored. (They are? Uniquely? If true, why might this be? Perhaps because the dead ritual of church is merely a rote exercise?
If this man is a pastor, he needs an attitude change. He has a terribly condescending attitude towards his brothers and sisters.)
We tend to lose confidence quickly in methods that don’t produce swift, measurable results. (We do? What results are expected? Are they perhaps unreasonable or unobtainable in some way? How?)
Thus church history is, in part, a narrative of orthodoxy contending with theological and methodological novelty for first place in believing hearts. (The author is dismissive, based on a premise that the issue is novelty. But perhaps it isn't novelty, but rather a recovery of a true and living faith.)
And often, the devilish activity focuses on messing with the preached Word.
Surely a man standing before a gathered group, preaching the Bible for 30 minutes to an hour each week, cannot accomplish much, we’re told. (Who says this?)
But therein lies the foolishness: a steady diet of Christ-centered, Scripture-saturated expositional preaching (The author continues to confuse teaching and preaching.)
is exactly what sinners need to become more and more like Jesus. (Sinners cannot become more like Jesus. Only the saved can.
After preaching for a couple of decades now, I’ve come to understand Paul’s paradoxical descriptor a bit better. I think he refers to the “foolishness of preaching” because the world sees it precisely that way. No surprise there.
Here’s what is surprising: Christians have sometimes viewed preaching the same way—as foolishness that should be abolished. (No reference for this statement.)
The reformers fought to recover preaching as the central act of Christian worship after centuries of sacerdotalism in the Roman Church. In more recent years, other sermon substitutes (The author conflates preaching with sermons. The lost need preaching, the saved need teaching.)
have been suggested in Lord’s Day worship: drama, storytelling, music, interviews, art, videos and other new technology, the Eucharist/Lord’s Supper (again), and more.
Why?
I think C. S. Lewis lands close to the answer in The Screwtape Letters when Uncle Screwtape gives the young tempter, Wormwood, an ingenious strategy for distracting believers: Use their penchant for boredom against them.
Work on their horror of the Same Old Thing. The horror of the Same Old Thing is one of the most valuable passions we have produced in the human heart—an endless source of heresies in religion, folly in counsel, infidelity in marriage, and inconstancy in friendship. . . . Now just as we pick out and exaggerate the pleasure of eating to produce gluttony, so we pick out this natural pleasantness of change and twist it into a demand for absolute novelty.
Christians are easily bored. (They are? Uniquely? If true, why might this be? Perhaps because the dead ritual of church is merely a rote exercise?
If this man is a pastor, he needs an attitude change. He has a terribly condescending attitude towards his brothers and sisters.)
We tend to lose confidence quickly in methods that don’t produce swift, measurable results. (We do? What results are expected? Are they perhaps unreasonable or unobtainable in some way? How?)
Thus church history is, in part, a narrative of orthodoxy contending with theological and methodological novelty for first place in believing hearts. (The author is dismissive, based on a premise that the issue is novelty. But perhaps it isn't novelty, but rather a recovery of a true and living faith.)
And often, the devilish activity focuses on messing with the preached Word.
Surely a man standing before a gathered group, preaching the Bible for 30 minutes to an hour each week, cannot accomplish much, we’re told. (Who says this?)
But therein lies the foolishness: a steady diet of Christ-centered, Scripture-saturated expositional preaching (The author continues to confuse teaching and preaching.)
is exactly what sinners need to become more and more like Jesus. (Sinners cannot become more like Jesus. Only the saved can.
And what about personal study? Rather than being spoon-fed Sunday after Sunday, how about equipping people to devote themselves to the Word, gaining maturity, then being released into their own ministries?)
It may not look like much, but it’s everything.
And it should remain the centerpiece of corporate worship for at least three reasons.
1. The Bible bristles with preaching and preachers. (I.e., preaching should be central because it's in the Bible. There's a lot of things in the Bible, like miracles, worship, judgments, victories, and historical events, but for some reason those aren't central.)
Preaching is the overwhelming witness of Scripture as the means of communicating the words of God. (As we noted above, preaching is the proclamation of the Gospel as a herald. While we concede there may be unregenerate people in the congregation, preaching [heralding] the Gospel might not be as important as teaching [explaining the principles of] the truths of the faith.)
If Scripture is the church’s regulating principle—and most Christians throughout the history of the church have believed it is—then this is really the only reason we need for keeping Sunday mornings sermon-centric. (The author seems content with making undocumented statements.)
Moses preached (No, he taught.)
God’s Word to God’s people, giving two lengthy expositions/exhortations in Deuteronomy on Israel’s covenant obligations. Ezra, in Nehemiah 8, took up the Torah and led Israel in “reading from the Law of God clearly, and gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading” (Neh. 8:8). He read and taught (emphasis added) the Word before the assembled people, who “answered ‘Amen, Amen,’ lifting up their hands. And they bowed their heads and worshiped the LORD with their faces to the ground” (Neh. 8:6). God’s Word drove worship.
Jesus preached (Taught.)
the most famous sermon of all in Matthew 5–7. Peter and Paul thundered forth with some of the most powerful sermons in history as recorded in Acts. The church was birthed in Acts 2 through gospel proclamation. (The author continues to conflate preaching and teaching. Further, we await his biblical case that Sunday church services should be focused on the sermon. That is his premise, after all.)
And then there’s Paul’s charge to Timothy, a timeless admonition for all preachers: “Preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching” (2 Tim. 4:2).
Martyn Lloyd-Jones summarized the point well: “The primary task of the church and of the Christian minister is the preaching of the Word of God.” Scripture makes this view plain. So the real question the church must answer here is, “Has God really said?”
2. The preached Word is God’s ordained agent of transformation. (Reason two is essentially reason 1 expressed differently. But we need to ask, is the preached word the change agent, or the Holy Spirit who enlightens the word?)
God has ordained the preached Word, working in unison with the Holy Spirit, as the method by which he turns mortal enemies into adopted sons. (Again the author is able to accurately represent preaching.)
In Romans 10, Paul asks, “How are they to hear without someone preaching?” (This again is "heralding," not instruction.)
It may not look like much, but it’s everything.
And it should remain the centerpiece of corporate worship for at least three reasons.
1. The Bible bristles with preaching and preachers. (I.e., preaching should be central because it's in the Bible. There's a lot of things in the Bible, like miracles, worship, judgments, victories, and historical events, but for some reason those aren't central.)
Preaching is the overwhelming witness of Scripture as the means of communicating the words of God. (As we noted above, preaching is the proclamation of the Gospel as a herald. While we concede there may be unregenerate people in the congregation, preaching [heralding] the Gospel might not be as important as teaching [explaining the principles of] the truths of the faith.)
If Scripture is the church’s regulating principle—and most Christians throughout the history of the church have believed it is—then this is really the only reason we need for keeping Sunday mornings sermon-centric. (The author seems content with making undocumented statements.)
Moses preached (No, he taught.)
God’s Word to God’s people, giving two lengthy expositions/exhortations in Deuteronomy on Israel’s covenant obligations. Ezra, in Nehemiah 8, took up the Torah and led Israel in “reading from the Law of God clearly, and gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading” (Neh. 8:8). He read and taught (emphasis added) the Word before the assembled people, who “answered ‘Amen, Amen,’ lifting up their hands. And they bowed their heads and worshiped the LORD with their faces to the ground” (Neh. 8:6). God’s Word drove worship.
Jesus preached (Taught.)
the most famous sermon of all in Matthew 5–7. Peter and Paul thundered forth with some of the most powerful sermons in history as recorded in Acts. The church was birthed in Acts 2 through gospel proclamation. (The author continues to conflate preaching and teaching. Further, we await his biblical case that Sunday church services should be focused on the sermon. That is his premise, after all.)
And then there’s Paul’s charge to Timothy, a timeless admonition for all preachers: “Preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching” (2 Tim. 4:2).
Martyn Lloyd-Jones summarized the point well: “The primary task of the church and of the Christian minister is the preaching of the Word of God.” Scripture makes this view plain. So the real question the church must answer here is, “Has God really said?”
2. The preached Word is God’s ordained agent of transformation. (Reason two is essentially reason 1 expressed differently. But we need to ask, is the preached word the change agent, or the Holy Spirit who enlightens the word?)
God has ordained the preached Word, working in unison with the Holy Spirit, as the method by which he turns mortal enemies into adopted sons. (Again the author is able to accurately represent preaching.)
In Romans 10, Paul asks, “How are they to hear without someone preaching?” (This again is "heralding," not instruction.)
He answers: “So faith comes by hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ” (v. 17). How then is the Word of Christ to be proclaimed? By the foolishness of preaching on the lips of weak clay pots known as preachers. (There is no such thing as a preacher in the sense the author uses it. There is no biblical mention of an office of preacher. Preaching is something someone does, not who someone is.)
Yes, we are weak, but he is strong, and God’s work done God’s way brings him glory: “But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us” (2 Cor. 4:7).
One of the most powerful illustrations of the creating power of God’s Word is located in Ezekiel 37, where God tells the prophet to speak to the dry bones so they will live: “O dry bones, hear the word of the LORD” (Ezek. 37:4). Immediately the bones come together. God breathes into the formerly dead, and “they lived and stood on their feet, an exceedingly great army.” His proclaimed Word brings life—saving and sanctifying life—where formerly there was only death. (Actually, Ezekiel prophesied. Ez. 37:4:
The preached Word has always been God’s agent of awakening. The Reformation recovered the centrality of preaching in worship; it didn’t invent it. The early church featured powerful preaching through men like Chrysostom, Jerome, Augustine, and Athanasius. And later, preaching spawned the First and Second Great Awakenings through Jonathan Edwards, George Whitefield, and John Wesley, along with scores of lesser-known men.
As technology has improved, the call for alternatives to preaching has seemingly grown louder. (Still no examples.)
But technology has always served gospel proclamation; it hasn’t replaced it. Would anyone argue that Gutenberg’s printing press was anything less than a massive revival for the preached Word? Radio took the sound of preaching to the masses. Television brought it into our living rooms. There are a wealth of sermons and edifying resources available on the internet, and I’m grateful for the way God’s used them to stir up a love for sound doctrine in so many. Nevertheless, preaching remains the central act of Christian worship. (This is the premise the author is supposed to demonstrate, but he simply repeats it.)
Technology will change again and again. If we replace preaching to “keep up with the times,” then our worship will, by necessity, always be changing. But Scripture never permits us to make that change.
3. The otherworldly nature of the church is seen clearly in preaching. (It feels like the author is packing his list. He seems to just pick out a characteristic to pair with preaching, and attempts to explain this pairing as if uniquely works this way. All the while never quoting or referencing the Bible...)
God calls his church to be unlike the world. The world should never be able to explain the church. We gather on Sundays from every conceivable socioeconomic background, race, region, country—black, white, Asian, Hispanic, rich, poor, tall, short, athletic, non-athletic, rural, urban, suburban. And we gather to hear a book proclaimed that was written thousands of years ago. (Hmm. We thought we were gathering to corporately worship the Most High God...)
Yes, we are weak, but he is strong, and God’s work done God’s way brings him glory: “But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us” (2 Cor. 4:7).
One of the most powerful illustrations of the creating power of God’s Word is located in Ezekiel 37, where God tells the prophet to speak to the dry bones so they will live: “O dry bones, hear the word of the LORD” (Ezek. 37:4). Immediately the bones come together. God breathes into the formerly dead, and “they lived and stood on their feet, an exceedingly great army.” His proclaimed Word brings life—saving and sanctifying life—where formerly there was only death. (Actually, Ezekiel prophesied. Ez. 37:4:
Then he said to me, “Prophesy to these bones and say to them, ‘Dry bones, hear the word of the LORD!Yes, we’ve become a visual culture, but Christianity is a verbal faith. Don’t let the visual eat up the verbal. (Why not? If we really are a visual culture, perhaps we ought to verbalize in the way people receive their information, as opposed to insisting that our methods and preferences be conformed to.)
The preached Word has always been God’s agent of awakening. The Reformation recovered the centrality of preaching in worship; it didn’t invent it. The early church featured powerful preaching through men like Chrysostom, Jerome, Augustine, and Athanasius. And later, preaching spawned the First and Second Great Awakenings through Jonathan Edwards, George Whitefield, and John Wesley, along with scores of lesser-known men.
As technology has improved, the call for alternatives to preaching has seemingly grown louder. (Still no examples.)
But technology has always served gospel proclamation; it hasn’t replaced it. Would anyone argue that Gutenberg’s printing press was anything less than a massive revival for the preached Word? Radio took the sound of preaching to the masses. Television brought it into our living rooms. There are a wealth of sermons and edifying resources available on the internet, and I’m grateful for the way God’s used them to stir up a love for sound doctrine in so many. Nevertheless, preaching remains the central act of Christian worship. (This is the premise the author is supposed to demonstrate, but he simply repeats it.)
Technology will change again and again. If we replace preaching to “keep up with the times,” then our worship will, by necessity, always be changing. But Scripture never permits us to make that change.
3. The otherworldly nature of the church is seen clearly in preaching. (It feels like the author is packing his list. He seems to just pick out a characteristic to pair with preaching, and attempts to explain this pairing as if uniquely works this way. All the while never quoting or referencing the Bible...)
God calls his church to be unlike the world. The world should never be able to explain the church. We gather on Sundays from every conceivable socioeconomic background, race, region, country—black, white, Asian, Hispanic, rich, poor, tall, short, athletic, non-athletic, rural, urban, suburban. And we gather to hear a book proclaimed that was written thousands of years ago. (Hmm. We thought we were gathering to corporately worship the Most High God...)
All of God’s “ordinary” means of grace are countercultural, and preaching is no exception. He designed it this way so he alone would get the praise. (What this last assertion means, or how it relates to his obscure point, is itself obscure.)
To say we should dump preaching in favor or drama, video, discussion, music, or anything else (Who does this?)
is to misunderstand the nature of the church and her work. (We are not confident the author understands the nature of the church and her work...)
To say we should dump preaching in favor or drama, video, discussion, music, or anything else (Who does this?)
is to misunderstand the nature of the church and her work. (We are not confident the author understands the nature of the church and her work...)
In bringing us into his church, God calls us out of ourselves. Statistics show that the average American adult spends 10 hours a day connected to media; are churches wise to accommodate that trend? Wouldn’t it be better to call us away from our smartphones and tablets for two hours each week (out of 168) to hear a word from the Lord? (It seems clear that the author thinks church is the place Christians gather on Sunday. So he's not actually talking about the church as an entity, but rather the activities that should take place when the church gathers at a place called church.)
Genuine Christian worship is not an experience that can be simulated (The author keeps mentioning worship without explaining it. He appears to think that worship is the Sunday morning service, especially the teaching that occurs. But worship is the specific activity of exalting God and His attributes, His wonderful deeds, and the greatness of His glory.
Genuine Christian worship is not an experience that can be simulated (The author keeps mentioning worship without explaining it. He appears to think that worship is the Sunday morning service, especially the teaching that occurs. But worship is the specific activity of exalting God and His attributes, His wonderful deeds, and the greatness of His glory.
We can call other things worship, but worship first and foremost is the direct focus on the exaltation of God.)
(or replaced) by any manmade thing, no matter how ingenious. Yes, we’ve become a visual culture, but Christianity is a verbal faith, so we must not let the visual eat up the verbal. (Why? What's wrong with this happening? He never explains.)
Preach the Word
I trust that those calling for the abolition of preaching mean well, (He never quotes anyone who advocates this.)
but to say preaching needs replacing strikes me as more audience-driven than Word-driven. To say preaching is outmoded seems to deny the deepest need of the human heart—rescue from sin and self—and to affirm the primacy of felt needs and preferences. (This may indeed be the deepest need of the lost heart, but it's not the deepest need of the saved.)
To argue that mediocre preachers should be replaced by slicker, savvier communicators, or something better and perhaps stronger, is to forget that God’s strength flows through the unlikely conduit of human weakness (2 Cor. 12:10). (Let's quote the verse. 2Co. 12:10
As Screwtape told his nephew, we are easily horrified by the Same Old Thing—unless that thing centers on us. The Jews of Paul’s day demanded signs and the Greeks clamored for wisdom, but Paul gave them what they really needed:
But we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to the Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. (1 Cor. 1:23–25)
Sinners have always needed transformation through God’s Word faithfully proclaimed. (Again he states it correctly.)
(or replaced) by any manmade thing, no matter how ingenious. Yes, we’ve become a visual culture, but Christianity is a verbal faith, so we must not let the visual eat up the verbal. (Why? What's wrong with this happening? He never explains.)
Preach the Word
I trust that those calling for the abolition of preaching mean well, (He never quotes anyone who advocates this.)
but to say preaching needs replacing strikes me as more audience-driven than Word-driven. To say preaching is outmoded seems to deny the deepest need of the human heart—rescue from sin and self—and to affirm the primacy of felt needs and preferences. (This may indeed be the deepest need of the lost heart, but it's not the deepest need of the saved.)
To argue that mediocre preachers should be replaced by slicker, savvier communicators, or something better and perhaps stronger, is to forget that God’s strength flows through the unlikely conduit of human weakness (2 Cor. 12:10). (Let's quote the verse. 2Co. 12:10
That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.We think that applying this verse to justify mediocre "preachers" is an affront. If someone is mediocre at something, they should either find something else to do or hone their skills.)
As Screwtape told his nephew, we are easily horrified by the Same Old Thing—unless that thing centers on us. The Jews of Paul’s day demanded signs and the Greeks clamored for wisdom, but Paul gave them what they really needed:
But we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to the Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. (1 Cor. 1:23–25)
Sinners have always needed transformation through God’s Word faithfully proclaimed. (Again he states it correctly.)
That hasn’t changed. And Scripture itself makes this priority number-one for the gathered church. (The author has yet to demonstrate this premise.)
Why would we dare give God’s people anything else?
Editors’ note: This article was originally published at The Gospel Coalition.
Why would we dare give God’s people anything else?
Editors’ note: This article was originally published at The Gospel Coalition.
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