Sermon Checklist – Top 10 Do’s and Don’ts for Preachers (Part I)
- Preach Christ and Him Crucified
Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 1:23-30: “23 But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling block, and unto the Greeks foolishness; 24 But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God. 25 Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men. 26 For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called: 27 But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; 28 And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are: 29 That no flesh should glory in his presence. 30 But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.”
So many preachers who step up to the microphone every given Sunday are so content to speak about so many things. Modern trends, culturally relevant and motivational topics, pop psychology and practical advice. All of it perhaps interesting. None of it possessed of true power. Unfortunately, many have lost sight of their true calling. Pastors are not called upon by the Almighty to be the poor man’s Tony Robbins. Pastors are called upon by God to preach Christ and Him crucified. Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God. And yet, there are so many sermons and Bible studies that are centered around everyone and everything except Jesus. To be fair, we take the Scripture as it comes and we talk about what it talks about. But, at the forefront of our minds we must always remember that Jesus is not a part of the story, He is the story. Jesus is not a part of human history, He is its apex.
The Bible is God’s self-revelation. The Bible is about God and His Christ. And if we make the Scriptures about us or anything or anyone other than God and His Christ we are missing it. And to the extent that we lift our eyes away from Jesus and focus our attention elsewhere is the extent to which we bury the lead. Everyone and everything else in Scripture is the black velvet. He alone is the diamond. There is none like Him. None remotely compares.
In 1977, Alec McCowen gave his first solo performance of St. Mark’s Gospel and it was an immediate hit. He performed on Broadway, the White House and all over the world. This one-man play was hailed as a “theatrical marvel,” and it was even nominated for a Tony award in 1979. For his performances, McCowen would stand on a minimally ornamented stage and recite the entirety of the gospel of Mark word for word from the King James Version. McCowen was hailed by the world as a “conduit of genius.” The world simply didn’t get it. It was not the actor or the performance, but the words he spoke, the story he told. What the world simply did not understand is that there is an intrinsic dynamism in the words of the Almighty and there is inherent power – wonder working power – in the gospel of Jesus Christ.
- Preach Expositionally
There is nothing as essential to the spiritual growth of a body of believers than depth and clarity in the consecutive and systematic teaching of God’s word. Which means that if what comes out of our mouths is not Scripture or commentary on Scripture backed by Scripture then we’re wasting our breath and everyone’s time. We need to teach, and God’s people need to hear, the Bible exposited word for word, verse by verse, chapter by chapter, from cover to cover.
The Bible declares in 2 Timothy 3:16, “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.” Rendered literally from the Greek text, 2 Timothy 3:16 begins by declaring that “All Scripture is God-breathed.” What exactly does that mean? This speaks of what theologians call the “creative breath of God.” Literally, the Bible was produced by God’s activity. B.B. Warfield notes that this is in accord with “the Hebraic conviction that God produces all that He would bring into being by a mere breath.” Consider that for a moment. In the beginning, God said “Let there be light” and there was light. The One True and Living God, the very One who spoke heaven and earth into existence, inspired the Scriptures. Literally, breathed them out. Every word of it. Which means the Bible is not ink on paper. The Bible is a miracle. Hebrews 4:12 declares this, “For the word of God is quick, and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”
Beloved, what we hold in our hands is the inspired word of God. All of it and it is pure power. The word of God is not static or stale, impotent or irrelevant. The word of God is living and breathing and it is powerful beyond measure. The word of God contains devastating power that cannot be contained once it is unleashed. So unleash it.
Far too many pastors stand behind far too many pulpits and purport to speak for the Almighty and yet refuse to use His words. And the results for the Church writ large have been uniformly devastating. In just the past few years, the Church has had to endure a near constant stream of public failures – moral, doctrinal, structural – and its voice has been largely relegated to irrelevance. The reason for this is simple: the Church is malnourished. There is a wearying scarcity of deep expository preaching and we have become dangerously enamored with topical sermons that are superficial and palatable. And now, the landscape of Christianity is overrun with prosperity gospel dispensaries and churches that major in pablum. Because we now live in a post-Christian culture where sin and relativism are aspirational virtues, the default assumption is that survival necessitates we view the body of Christ as a crowd funded organization. To fill the coffers, one must fill the pews, and to do that we have to tell people what they want to hear.
Wrong. We do not tell people what they want to hear. We tell them what they need to hear, come what may. We will be those who possess the courage to opt for “failure” doing exactly what the Lord desires, rather than to be those who yield to the cowardice that exchanges one’s calling for the “success” that comes with truth dilution. We will be those who trust that God is faithful to honor those who honor His word. We resolve to preach the whole counsel of God (Acts 20:27). We will be guilty of the blood of no man (Acts 20:26). We refuse to tell people what they want to hear out of some misguided attempt at self-preservation or vain glory. We speak for the Almighty and we use His words. All of them.
And, in the end, we trust in a God who is faithful, confident in the knowledge that His word effectually and positively changes the dynamic of every gathering of the faithful because a Bible-saturated church is a Spirit-filled body (cf. Ephesians 5:18-6:9 and Colossians 3:16-4:1). A Spirit-filled body will bear the fruit of Christian virtue (Galatians 5:22). A Spirit-filled church will worship in spirit and in truth. A Spirit-saturated body will fellowship together united as one (1 Corinthians 12:13). A Spirit-led church will be holy and sanctified and evangelistic in mission. In short, Bible-saturated believers are the only ones who ever change the world.
John Calvin was a great many things – a giant of the Christian faith, a writer without peer, and a superlative thinker. And although he was a second-generation Reformer, his facility with Scripture and his exegetical skill elevated him to a place of primacy amongst the Reformers as the most articulate proponent of its doctrines. In fact, it was his Institutes that became the principal document of Protestant theology in the 16th century. But, what many forget is that Calvin was also a pastor and an expository preacher who taught consecutively through the Bible verse by verse, from cover to cover. Calvin was teaching through Scripture in this way when, in 1538, he was expelled from Geneva for his attempts at reform. But, three years later in 1541 he was invited back. On the Sunday of his return, he entered the pulpit in St. Peter's and he began to teach from the very chapter and the very verse of the Bible where he had left off preaching three years earlier. Timothy George writes, “Nothing could have been less dramatic or more effective…. In this way Calvin signaled that he intended his life and his theology to be, not a device of his own making, but a responsible witness to the word of God.”
Would to God, may that be said of us.
- Start with Scripture
Every homiletics course in seminary, every TED lecture, every fount of human wisdom exhorts every public speaker to begin with something dynamic, powerful and engaging. Tell your homiletics professor you intend to begin your sermon with the reading of Scripture and they blanch at the suggestion. There is a fundamental disconnect here that belies the unspoken presumption that there is something more dynamic, more powerful and more engaging than the word of God. This presumption, of course, is never spoken out loud. Who would dare articulate such a thing? But, what other conclusion can one draw from the near universal refusal to begin sermons on Sundays with the reading of God’s word?
The very first thing out of our mouths when we step into the pulpit must be the word of God. The Bible sets the agenda, not the preacher. God’s wisdom is our greatest desire and our most fundamental need. And yet preachers persist in this deranged desire to package the immutable. The Lily needs no gilding. There is nothing more beautiful and more effectual than the word of God. The only way to convey this truth to God’s people is for God’s spokesmen to act accordingly and to do so with conviction.
- Don’t Tell Jokes
This is a serious thing we’re trying to do here and any determined effort at levity cheapens it. There is nothing inherently wrong with laughter and humor is a blessed gift. But, when pastors seek to insert jokes into their sermons in an effort to intentionally manufacture hysterics the results are always negative and the congregation is invariably left to wonder why such efforts were made in the first place. People know when they are being manipulated. It’s the easiest thing to see. Consequently, these misguided attempts at banter come off as patronizing commercial breaks before the real work of ministry can commence. We are called to be the spokesmen of the Almighty. A vague facsimile of a stand-up comedian working his set behind the pulpit degrades the calling.
The most oft cited objection to this exhortation of course is that humor softens the edges of hard truths – makes it more palatable and easier to swallow. People let down their guard for that moment in time making them more readily available to take in the truths of Scripture. A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down. Unfortunately, pastors who give their congregations regular doses of sugar inevitably fail, over time, to get them to stomach anything else. Perhaps it is normal that children need some sugar to down the cough syrup. But, when forty-year-olds still require the same, that is a developmental disability, and nobody is to blame but the parents.
How did we ever come up with this idea that we are called to make people laugh – that it is somehow necessary for pastors to entertain? When did that become a part of the job description? Did I miss a memo? Why are churches holding raffles and performing skits on Sundays? When did churches become entertainment venues instead of places of worship? And why on earth are we trying to compete for the attention of those who would rather watch football?
When we seek to compete with the National Football League, we cannot win. When we seek to teach the word of God with depth and precision to the glory and worship of God, we cannot lose.
Too many pastors pitch the battle for lost souls on the wrong field. Why do you think we’re losing so badly?
(To Be Continued…)