Monday, April 3, 2017

The Sermon and Preaching. Preaching and Preachers, Chapter 3

"Cannot this all be done better by means of group discussions? Why must it be preaching? Why this particular form? Cannot his be replaced by a kind of 'dialogue', as it is now called, or exchange views? Should we not rather encourage more questions at the end of the sermons, and a dialogue between the minister and the people who have come to listen?"

Why preach at all? People don't really like it, so we are told. I don't believe that anyway. People love to be preached to. We loved to be preached to in TV shows, movies, songs. We love to be preached to on Talk Radio and Fox News. We love for people to make pronouncements about what is right and wrong, good and evil. We just don't like Christian preaching. Lloyd-Jones tries to parse out what makes preaching, preaching. It "does something to" the hearer. It isn't an information dump, but a call to decision. Christian preaching should not leave a person merely being entertained, but called upon to action, one way or the other. God isn't debated or discussed, but proclaimed.

But I think his distinctions between sermon and instruction, content and delivery go a bit too far because his definitions are very subjective. The difference between a sermon and preaching could depend on the mood of the congregation. I also disagree with his suggestion that if people will gravitate to hear a preachers if he preaches the truth. Scripture and history attest that this isn't always the case. This is where I believe that Lloyd-Jones can take events or experiences and make the case that this is the way it is for everyone or the way it is supposed to be.

The best part of this chapter is the discussion on where the man gets his message. It has to be the Bible. It is God's message, not the man's message. Preach the Word. Such as we have been given, give. We can't preach anything other than what we have received, and what we have received is God's word. Preaching from the headlines of the paper or preaching morals that we glean from TV and movies isn't Christian preaching. Christian preaching is making Christ know through the declaration of God's truth found in Scripture.

What do you think? Am I being too critical here? I have preached a message that blessed the souls of the congregation. I have preached that same message in a different place where people yawned the whole time and no one listened to  word I said. Did I only preach in the message that was received?

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