Five contemporary traps for preaching
Dr. Mohler's article is worth reading (HT: Preaching Now).Signs of encouragement include a large number of younger evangelical pastors who are unabashedly committed to biblical exposition and represent a resurgence of genuine biblical exposition from the pulpits of churches situated in every part of the country, from the inner city to the suburbs and beyond. This new generation is proving once again that the effective and faithful exposition of the Word of God draws persons to Christ and leads to spiritual growth and to the health of the church. A generation of young ministers, along with others making their way through college and seminary education, may point toward a renaissance of biblical preaching in coming years.
On the other hand, several trends represent issues of genuine concern. In the main, the last few decades have been a period of wanton experimentation in many pulpits and preaching has often been redefined and reconceived as something other than the exposition and application of the biblical text.
posted by Milton Stanley at 9:04 PM
4 Comments:
Bro' Milton,
I couldn't agree with Dr. Mohler's asessment of the currant state of preaching more! He hit the nail on the head.
God knows we need another Criswell, or Olford in our time. I am not discounting the thousands of good men who are faithful to the Holy text, but there are precious few who are widely known today who are Bible preachers.
They say good things and biblical things but they use the Bible to prop up what they want to say rather than being the human instrument that allows the Bible to speak through them.
You can listen to some of the most popular TV preachers and they will not preach enough gospel in a month to fill a thimble.
I am grateful for all those who encourage a return to Bible preaching. Those men who have the ability and gumption to preach through books of the Bible build great sheep.
Grace and Peace,
Royce Ogle
Using the Bible as a prop--that's a good description of a lot of the gospel-poor preaching going on today. Thanks for your comments, Royce.
Thanks for the Mohler excerpt Milton. Wait, that sounds kind of nice: Mohler and Milton. Anyways, I agree with Mohler observations and I come away, by and large, quite encouraged by the resurgence of solid, Christ-centered, expository preaching among young men here in America.
When I was in Cambodia a few months ago, I was also quite encouraged to see what's going on there with preaching. I was there along with our main teaching pastor and together we were putting on a expository preaching conference for a group of 50 Cambodian pastors. These guys had never before been taught expository preaching and man, they just ate it up. They were so thrilled to be taught about and taught how to proclaim what chapters, texts, and paragraphs of the Bible say. In 10 years Cambodia could be a very different place all from just 50 of these guys proclaiming the gospel in their pulpits (I've been writing a little bit about this on my blog).
I'm encouraged by what God is doing among many pastors here in America as well as in Cambodia. I'm pumped that out there on the East Coast you're contributing to this resurgence.
Thanks, Justin. May the Word go forth with power in Cambodia and everywhere!
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