So I don't think that the controlling
question, how can i preach the gospel
from this text, has over the last 40 years or so
produced the kind of preaching that makes for strong
Bible-saturated, doctrinally rich, mature, stable
counter-cultural churches with a passion for radical obedience to God's
word. I don't think it has served us well. So I'm
going to offer you an alternative to those who think
that preaching Christ or preaching the gospel
from every text means dealing in some general comments
about what the text says, hovering just above
the text, seldom explaining the very words and phrases, and then
moving on to the real concern of making a gospel crescendo with Christ and his
atonement and the forgiveness of sin so everybody can walk out
relieved.
I think that kind of preaching tends to dull the expectations of the people
that they might actually see fresh, new, beautiful, tough, deep
scary, wonderful things in the text. I think it tends to
treat the actual words and phrases and logic
of the inspired text as having minor significance,
by giving the impression that they don't need to be treated with any particular
rigor or care. They're just preparations for the main
thing that's coming.
I think it tends to train people in bad habits
of how to read their Bibles by diminishing the rigor and earnestness
of meditating on the words of God day and night.
I think it tends to weaken the seriousness
of practical biblical imperatives on how to live the Christian life in all
holiness and purity and love by inserting
inserting the substitutionary atonement at critical moments when the emphasis
should be falling on the urgency of obedience because that's
the urgency of the text.
So I want to commend to you an alternative
to making every text a pathway to the gospel
to having the driving question in your sermon preparation be: How can I
preach the gospel from this text. I want to wave a yellow flag
in front of the saying that is so often attributed to Spurgeon.
"Take your text and make a beeline to the cross."
Nobody knows if Spurgeon said that
at least I can't find any Spurgeon scholars who
can show that he did but that doesn't matter it's not the point here's the
point: Instead of taking your text and making a
beeline to the cross. I think you should take the cross and
make a beeline to your text.
Instead of building your sermon toward the cross
build your sermon on the cross.
Instead of preaching Biblical imperatives as pointers
to Christ's perfection and imputed righteousness,
I think we should preach imputed righteousness
as the power to obey Biblical
imperatives. Or to put it in another way,
standing on the power and the promises bought
for God's elect by the blood of Jesus wrestle wrestle with the words
and phrases and sentences and flow of thought in the text.
Wrestle with them until you see the reality that's
really there in those words and then
show it to your people and show them how you
saw it. And then offer it to them offer it to them as a blood bought
gift urging them with all your might to see it and understand it and embrace it
and be glad in it and obey it and share it. Let the reality of the text
be the crescendo of the sermon.