Bright Wings

Because the Holy Ghost over the bent World broods with warm breast and with Ah! Bright Wings.

September 23, 2009

Thoughts on Hearing a Sermon

[Even if you don’t read this whole post - I strongly encourage you to scroll down to the personal inventory questions at the end smile ]
I had the blessing of sitting under some great preaching last week. This is a bit rare, me being a preacher and all. Usually it is me doing the finger pointing and poking while you guys have to sit and take it. The shoe was on the other foot last Wednesday as I sat in a room full of preachers and had Voddie Baucham laid the smack down on us. The sermon was a faithful exposition of Titus 2 as well as a very powerful challenge to us as pastors. Voddie strongly challenged our entrenched notions of church life and the standard ministry paradigms that we accept and live within. Often, these paradigms are driven more by cultural conventions and expectations rather than a biblical mandate. The sermon went from encouraging nudges to stinging rebuke and back to helpful criticism. I had a lot to think about, pray about, and most likely change because of Voddie’s preaching.

After the sermon I was very disheartened by the responses of my fellow pastors. I spoke with four or five different pastors from different churches and each one came up to me and said the EXACT same thing with almost the EXACT same demeanor. There was a nervous chuckle, an elbow to the ribs, and a sarcastic tone: “Well, I guess we’re doing it all wrong!” There was a general feeling in the room of indignation, “How dare he question me? Who does he think he is?” I was ashamed. Here was a group of dudes who are charged week in and week out to proclaim truth and challenge believers toward sanctification and transformation, and the minute they get the sermon stinger on their own hiney they balk and whine.

I got to thinking about preaching and how to hear it, especially as we got a glimpse of Jesus’ preaching style in Luke 10.

Jesus told a story about loving your neighbor that has become so familiar to us that we can tend to forget how striking it would have been in the original context. Jesus is interacting with a lawyer over the way to eternal life, specifically dealing with what I call the ‘Shema’ life found in two well known and commonly paired passages from Torah - Deut. 6:4-5 and Lev. 19:18. Love God with your heart and demonstrate this heart love with love for neighbor.  This is true discipleship. Immediately the lawyer seeks to justify himself. In the face of the challenge of the Law we try to skirt the issue, escape the duty, find a loophole in the tax code. He asks, “Who is my neighbor?” And Jesus proceeds to tell the now famous parable of the Good Samaritan.

We often look at the parables as sweet, quaint, and helpful little truth nuggets. This is exactly the opposite of Jesus’ intention in preaching through parables. Jesus says in Matthew 13:13, “this is why I speak in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear”. Somehow, by the sovereign work of God and the nature of the human heart, the parables become conviction to the simple and humble toward repentance and faith and condemnation to the wise and learned toward self satisfaction and pride.

In the parable of the Good Samaritan we find a half dead man in a ditch, the victim of robbers. There is a three fold dramatic build up that Jesus uses in the story as the characters are introduced. First the Priest. An easy target. The crowd would have reveled in the condemnation of this representative of the elite religious class. It is a ‘safe’ dig - and easy shot at a group that had grown to be clearly corrupt, hypocritical and in need of reform. Then Jesus moves a tier down to the Levite. Part of the priestly tribe but not of Aaron’s house. Still, the boo and the hiss could be heard as this man of the cloth walks by on the opposite side of the road.

At this point in the story, the people would be ready for the hero. And there would be an expectation that the hero would look like them. The hero, the righteous man, the one who truly loves and lives the ‘Shema’ life would be an Everyman. Joe the plumber. You and me, right? The hearers of Jesus’ sermon would have a set of preconceived notions about where this sermon should go, what is acceptable, and what is off limits. A ‘positive and encouraging’ word from Jesus might go like this, “But a Jewish merchant, like you, comes along. And he took compassion on the man…” It would make us feel better about ourselves, and yet, encourage us to do more of the same.

But this is not Jesus’ style. He doesn’t allow his hearers to remain satisfied with themselves. He refuses to be ‘positive and encouraging’ when he must be ‘prophetic and admonishing’. So the build up of the story goes like this, “Not the Priest, not the Levite…But a Samaritan...”  His hearers would’ve spat on the ground. Many would’ve scoffed and walked away. How dare he make a Samaritan dog the hero? Is he saying that a Samaritan can live the Shema life better than me? Wait, is Jesus affirming the wickedness of Samaritan half breeds? Could he be affirming intermarriage with wicked Gentiles? Who does he think he is? He doesn’t know me! How dare he meddle in my life!

The Apostle Paul tells us that the sign of a hard hearted and wicked generation would be the unwillingness to hear truth, and the willingness of so-called preachers to peddle pablum (2 Tim. 4:3). How many times have I heard my fellow pastors admit that they spend a good deal of their time modifying the message to the market. How many times have I heard people willingly admit that they refuse to be a part of a fellowship because they don’t want preaching that is honest, direct, and sometimes fiery.

The beautiful thing about the story of Jesus and the lawyer is the end. It seems the lawyer stuck around for the conclusion of the sermon. It seems that he was listening, and got the message loud and clear. I don’t know what came of him, but he heard some preaching, affirmed its truth, and walked away with the strong exhortation, “Go thou and do likewise.”  As a preacher, that is what I pray for in our church family. Hear it, recieve it, do it.

If I may, I’d like to offer five points of personal heart inventory for you to go through as you consider how you sit under preaching.

1. Do I recognize and affirm the important role of preaching and exhortation from God’s Word as delivered by the Pastor-Teacher?

2. Do I come to the sermon with an open heart, an engaged mind, and a tender conscience?

3. If provoked and challenged, do I deal honestly and transparently with the Word and prophetic exhortation?

4. Have I allowed personal sensitivity to hinder application and obedience? (Example - You have a difficult marriage with a difficult spouse so you filter every marital exhortation through your sensitivity in this area rather than honestly considering the truth of God’s Word or the direction of your pastor.)

5. Do I pursue thoughtful, prayerful, and accountable application and obedience to the preached word? (Example - “That is an interesting point. I haven’t thought much about that. Let me talk that through with a brother in Christ. I need to be accountable to change and grow in this area…” etc.)

By God’s grace I’ve been blessed with a congregation that for the most part takes all five points of inventory pretty seriously. I wish I had done a better job of taking inventory myself last week as I went in to hear the sermon and as I walked out with a clear charge from God’s man. 

Tags: Pastors and Preaching

posted by Erik Braun