Essential Reading On Preaching - SBTS PDF

ESSENTIAL READING ON
Preaching
- featuring -
Preaching in a Secular Age
by R. Albert Mohler Jr.
equip.sbts.edu
ESSENTIAL READING ON
Preaching
R. ALBERT MOHLER JR.

HERSHAEL W. YORK
DAN DUMAS
DAVID E. PRINCE
BRIAN CROFT
TIMOTHY PAUL JONES
MICHAEL A.G. HAYKIN
TOM J. NETTLES
JEFF ROBINSON
DAVID SCHROCK
MICHAEL POHLMAN
Essential Reading on Preaching
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Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English

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ISBN-13: 978-1546928898
Contents
CHAPTER 01 CHAPTER 08
03 Preaching in a secular age 43 ‘A power to move men:’

R. Albert Mohler Jr. John Broadus on preachers
and preaching
CHAPTER 02 Tom J. Nettles
09 Why some preachers get
better and others don’t CHAPTER 09
Hershael W. York 49 Should I ever break from an
expository sermon series?
CHAPTER 03 Hershael W. York
15 Expository ministry: A
comprehensive vision CHAPTER 10
Dan Dumas 53 I am a sinner preaching
to sinners
CHAPTER 04 Jeff Robinson
21 David Brainerd: Preach
for holiness by preaching CHAPTER 11
the gospel 57 What has preaching to do
David E. Prince with discipleship?
David Schrock
CHAPTER 05
27 5 ways to fight CHAPTER 12
‘preaching hangover’ 63 The centrality of the Bible
Brian Croft in preaching
Michael Pohlman
CHAPTER 06
31 Preaching for conversions 67 Resources

Timothy Paul Jones
69 Contributors
CHAPTER 07
35 ‘A poore under-rower’: The
life and ministry of John Owen
Michael A.G. Haykin
01
Preaching in
a secular age
With the advance of secular pluralism,
expository preaching must become the
church’s strategy for survival.
BY R. ALBERT MOHLER JR.
A
lmost anyone seeking to carry out a faithful pulpit ministry
recognizes that preachers must now ask questions and
engage issues we have not had to consider in the past. I
began my chapter on preaching and postmodernism in We Cannot
Be Silent with these words, “A common concern seems to emerge
now wherever Christians gather: The task of truth-telling is stranger
than it used to be. In this age, telling the truth is tough business and
not for the faint-hearted. The times are increasingly strange.” We
now live, move, and have our being in a secular age. But the only
authentic Christian response to the challenge of secularization is
faithful, clear, and informed expository preaching.
THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF BELIEF

Without the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, the Industrial
Revolution, and even without certain technological advances,
secularization never would have been possible. Theorists
explained the modern age would necessarily and inevitably
produce a secular society because modernity provided alternative
answers to the most fundamental questions of life and made
God irrelevant.
ESSENTIAL READING ON PREACHING
With great foresight in his 1965 The Secular City, Harvey Cox
wrote the future of the Western world, particularly its cities, was
predominantly secular. Cox further argued this coming secular city
would provide a larger range of worldviews as alternatives to what
had been offered before. This multiplicity of worldviews would be
one of the hallmarks of the secular city. As a result, Christianity — the
once ubiquitous worldview of Western society — would be displaced,
giving way to a seemingly infinite number of worldview options.
The renowned sociologist Peter Berger has considered why
secularization achieved dominance in some parts of Western
society, but has yet to do so in others. As he notes, secularization
happened just as the theorists predicted with respect to Europe,
a continent with almost imperceptible levels of Christian belief
and no memory of a Christian heritage.
Secularization happened at the same rate and to the same degree
in American universities — which are, in many respects, isolated
4
islands of Europe on American soil. Consider for instance the

University of Tennessee, which recently ordered that gendered
pronouns be replaced by gender-neutral pronouns like “ze.” While
this administrative mandate was later overturned, the point remains
that even in places such as Knoxville, Tennessee, major American
universities are on the same trajectory of secularization as many
of the most secularized parts of Europe.
While America is not characterized by the hardline secularism
and open ridicule of religion in European nations, Berger argued the
United States is still largely secularized. In 20th-century America,
he explained, Christianity and religion in general were transformed
to something non-cognitive and optional. Consequently, many
of our friends and neighbors continued to profess faith in God,
but that profession was ultimately devoid of any moral authority
or cognitive content. From the outside looking in, America did
not appear to be secularizing at the same rate as the European
continent, but in reality professions of faith in God had little real
theological or spiritual content.
PREACHING IN A SECULAR AGE
Berger predicted that this collapse would result in adherents

to religious principle quickly giving way to the secular agenda in
the face of opposition, which is exactly what happened. When
the cultural tide turned against our society’s empty religious
commitments, people were happy to jettison their moral judgment
on homosexuality to retain their social capital.
For preachers, Berger’s observations are tremendously important.
We, above all others, need to realize the culture no longer shares
our worldview and the very language we use may mean something
entirely different in the ears of our listeners. The meaning of words
like morality, personhood, marriage, or virtually any other moral
term has radically shifted for many postmodern Americans, making
our job as preachers that much more difficult.
Additionally, as Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor explains in
The Secular Age, the way people hold to theological convictions and
religious principles in the modern era is fundamentally different
5
than how people believed in the past. Modernity has made religious
belief provisional, optional, and far less urgent than it was in the
premodern world.
Taylor notes belief is now a provisional choice, an exercise of
personal autonomy. When people identify as believers in Jesus
Christ they are making a far more individualistic statement than
was possible in years past. Furthermore, they are doing so in the
face of alternative worldview options that were simply unavailable
until very recently.
Perhaps the central insight from Taylor’s book is his categorization
of the premodern, modern, and postmodern time periods with
respect to the worldview options available in a culture. As Taylor
argues, Western history is categorized by three intellectual epochs:
pre-Enlightenment impossibility of unbelief; post-Enlightenment
possibility of unbelief; and late Modern impossibility of belief.
In the pre-Enlightenment era it was impossible not to believe. No
other worldviews were available to members of society other than
supernatural worldviews, particularly the Christian worldview in the
West. While society had its heretics, there were no atheists among
them. Everyone believed in some form of theism, even if it was
polytheism. As Taylor simply states, it was impossible not to believe.
That all changed with the Enlightenment and the availability
of alternative worldviews, which made it possible to reject the
supernaturalism of Christianity for a naturalistic worldview. Taylor’s
careful phraseology here, however, is also important to note. While
it was certainly possible not to believe, it was also the case that it
was not likely that people would reject the Christian worldview
because the theistic explanations for life were simply more pervasive,
binding, and persuasive than non-theistic worldviews.
The intellectual conditions in Europe and on American university
campuses have now secularized such that it is impossible for
those under such conditions to believe in God. In other words,
we have arrived at the third intellectual epoch of Western society:
impossible to believe. As Taylor observes, to be a candidate for
6
tenure at a major American university is to inhabit a world in which

it is virtually impossible to believe in God. Under the first set of
Western intellectual conditions, not everyone was a Christian, but
all were accountable to a Christian worldview because there was
no alternative. Secularization in American culture has reversed
the conditions: not everyone is a non-Christian, but all must
operate under a secular worldview that denies the legitimacy of a
Christian worldview. In 300 years, Western intellectual conditions
have moved from an impossibility of unbelief to an impossibility
of belief.
So what does this mean for us as preachers? We must recognize
these intellectual conditions now prevalent in Europe and in the
American universities are quickly filtering down from the elites
to the general culture. The mechanisms in this process are fairly
easy to trace. A number of polls reveal the greatest predictor for
whether you will find yourself in an increasingly secular space
comes down to whether you live near a coast, a city, or a university.
Given that the future of America is increasingly defined by most
PREACHING IN A SECULAR AGE
of its population being coastal, urban, and university-educated,

you can see that the future of America is also increasingly secular.
We are not preaching to people who hear us in the same way as
previous generations in Western societies. The question remains:
What does preaching look like in the secular city?
PREACHING: THE CHURCH’S MEANS OF SURVIVAL

With our cultural analysis behind us, I would like to consider the role
of preaching in a secular age as a survival strategy for the church.
In a secular age, preaching will be met with one of three responses.
First, we will find ourselves preaching in a context of hostility. At
least in the immediate future, much of this hostility will look like
cultural marginalization. Those who listen to us will now do so by
paying social capital, not gaining social capital — a cultural situation
notably different from our grandparents or even our parents.
Second, our preaching will also often be met with befuddlement.
7
For many among the intellectual elites, Christian preachers are
not an object of derision as much as they are creatures of oddity.
The plausibility structures of society are so different from our
own that many people simply cannot understand us.
Finally, we will find that we will not only be met with hostility
and befuddlement, but also indifference. Many in our society will
not even care enough about our message to spend their energy
attacking us.
One of the problems is that our approach to preaching in relation
to other theological disciplines is wrongly skewed. For years in
the theological academy, homiletics has been seen as something
of a finishing school for clergy. We have imagined that the true
theological heavy lifting occurs in the disciplines of theology,
exegesis, or church history, while homiletics was merely the
practical work for those who were moving on to the professional
and less theologically involved environment of the pastorate.
This alienation between the classical theological disciplines
and homiletics is detrimental to the life of the church. While
there are benefits to specialization in academic disciplines, we

should also recognize that segmenting theological study along
the lines of specialization has come at a cost in the lives of many
modern preachers. The preacher’s task is exegetical and theological.
Homiletics cannot be divorced from theology and exegesis simply
by virtue of the fact that what we proclaim in the pulpit is a biblical
theology originating from the exegesis of God’s Word.
Preachers need to be competent in many arenas of life. They need
managerial competence. They need organizational competence.
But above everything else, the preacher needs theological and
exegetical competence. The curriculum in our seminaries and
theological institutions must reflect this commitment to train
preaching theologians, and not just men who are entertaining.
By preaching the church expands and by preaching the church
remains faithful in a hostile culture. In a secular age, we can no
longer rely on the luxury of having other cultural voices do the
8
work of instilling our people with a Christian worldview. The

plausibility structures of the culture now work at crosscurrents
to the message we preach on Sunday mornings. No longer does
the culture indicate one “ought” to listen to preaching or one
“ought” to give credence to the Christian moral tradition. Those
days are behind us.
Fundamentally, the survival of the church in the secular city
comes down to a promise and a command given us in Scripture.
Jesus promised, “I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall
not prevail against it” (Matt 16:18). The church’s only recourse
in a secular city is to do as we have been commissioned: “Preach
the Word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke,
and exhort, with complete patience and teaching” (2 Tim 4:2). We
need to remember both of these words from Scripture in order
to serve faithfully in the secular city. Jesus has given his church a
strategy for survival in the face of cultural hostility. That strategy,
it turns out, is the apostolic call to preach.
02
Why some preachers

get better and others
don’t
No one denies that a preaching class
and some coaching can help anyone
become better. What we question is the
possibility that someone with no natural
giftedness and ability can be taught well
enough that he can become really good.
BY HERSHAEL W. YORK
I
often have to answer the strangest question anyone could ask a
preaching professor: “Do you think preaching can be taught?” I
always want to respond, “No, I’m just going through the motions
for the money.” Of course I never do, not only because it’s best not
to say the smart aleck things I sometimes think, but because I know
what they mean when they ask. It’s not really an unfair question.
No one denies that a preaching class and some coaching can
help anyone become better. What we question is the possibility
that someone with no natural giftedness and ability can be taught
well enough that he can become really good.
For the last 16 years I’ve sat in a seminary classroom, listening
to student sermons on an almost daily basis, and I’ve heard every
kind of sermon and every level of preacher.
I’ve seen guys so nervous that they had to stop and vomit during
the sermon, and I’ve been so moved by a student’s sermon that I
felt I had been ushered into the presence of the risen Christ. I’ve
seen guys who were no better the fifth time they preached for
me than they were the first time, but I’ve seen guys whose initial
sermon was depressingly awful turn it around so radically by the
end of the semester that I almost couldn’t recognize them as the
same preacher.
On the first day of the semester, or the first time I hear a student
preach, I have no way of knowing if he has what it takes or is willing
to do what he must to be the preacher he needs to be, but I can
usually tell by the second sermon if he does, because that is when
he has to act on what I told him after his first sermon.
What makes the difference?
1. CALLING
10
The most frustrated preacher is the one who has a sense of duty,
but not a burning calling.
Preaching is not just another helping profession, a Christian
version of politics or the Peace Corps. The call to preach is a
definite demand issued by the Holy Spirit that ignites a fire in
one’s bones that cannot be extinguished by the hard-hearted,
stiff-necked or dull of hearing.
A preacher who has been called must preach what God has spoken
simply because God has spoken it. The success of one’s ministry
will depend on the strength of his calling. His willingness to work
at his preaching will be proportional to his conviction that God
has called him to preach and to be as fit a vessel for God’s use as
he can be.
The Holy Spirit must undergird everything else from preparation
to delivery, and that will not happen apart from that calling.
2. TEACHABILITY
Being a preaching professor is like getting paid to tell a mother
WHY SOME PREACHERS GET BETTER AND OTHERS DON’T
that her baby is ugly. It might be the truth, but it’s not a truth
anyone wants to hear.
Most guys I have taught dread my comments and cringe when I
tell them they missed the point of the text or seemed unprepared.
They tire of hearing me tell them they lacked energy or failed to
establish a connection with the audience.
Every now and then, however, someone smiles gratefully as I
offer corrections and suggestions.
Someone may even say, “I want you to be really tough on me. Tell
me everything I’m doing wrong, because I really want to do this
well.” That guy is going to be fine, because his spirit is teachable
and he’s willing to pay the cost of personal discomfort in order to
be effective. He understands that he is a vessel in service of the
text, and his feelings are not the point.
3. PASSION
11
Almost all my students are passionate about Christ, about reaching
the lost, and about the Word of God. The problem is not that they
don’t feel passionate, but rather that they do not show passion.
What I feel is never the point, whether good or bad, but rather
how I act.
If my delivery of the Word does not convey that passion, then my
audience will not be moved to be passionate about it either. The
prophets were all passionate. The apostles were passionate. Jesus
was passionate. Why else would farmers, fishermen, and housewives
come and stand in the Galilean sun for hours just to hear him?
I once heard a missionary preach at the Southern Baptist Pastors’
Conference. He was dynamite, preaching a great expository
sermon with incredible energy and moving the entire audience
by his treatment of the Word and his testimony of baptizing tens
of thousands of Africans. Astonished by his great preaching, I
approached him and held out my hand to introduce myself.
“Hershael,” he said, shocking me that he knew my name, “we
went to seminary together.” Embarrassed, I admitted that I did
not remember him. “You had no reason to,” he explained. “I was

very quiet, never spoke in class and never went out of my way to
meet anyone.” I asked him to explain what happened.
“When I got on the mission field, no one would listen to my
preaching of the gospel. I was putting them to sleep. When I came
stateside and preached in churches, they were bored to tears.
Finally, I realized that the only way to be effective was to preach
the Word in the way it deserved to be preached, so I became willing
to go beyond my natural personality and comfort zone and allow
God to make me effective. I prayed for the Word to so grip me in
the pulpit that I would never be boring again.”
His teachability led him to show a passion that was not natural
to his introverted personality. It was supernatural.
4. RECKLESS ABANDON
The generation of students I now teach have grown up with the
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written word — on screens, smartphones, blogs, Kindles, and now

iPads. Through video games they have raced cars, built civilizations,
won wars, destroyed zombies, and killed hundreds.
They communicate orally far less than any previous generation,
and when they do so, they typically do it with less passion. Yet God
still uses the preaching of his Word — an oral event — to edify
the church, encourage the saints, and engage the lost.
So to preach the Word, a young man has to be willing to get
completely out of the comfortable cocoon he’s built in his
personality and habits, and recklessly abandon himself to risk
being a fool for Christ.
I tell my students, “That little voice inside your head saying
‘That’s just not who I am’ is not your friend. Sanctification is
the process by which the Holy Spirit overcomes ‘who I am’ and
shapes me into who he wants me to be. So if I need to preach with
a reckless abandon that is foreign to my natural way, I will beg the
Holy Spirit to help me do it for Christ.”
WHY SOME PREACHERS GET BETTER AND OTHERS DON’T
5. PAY THE PRICE

Frankly, very few students I teach fail to get the meaning of the
text. They often demonstrate an exegetical and hermeneutical
sophistication that astounds me. They are serious about the Word.
But they make the mistake of thinking that if they just feel that
way, and if they just say the words, the preaching will take care of
itself. And if they keep thinking that, if they insist on “data dump”
sermons that just concentrate on the content and not also on the
delivery, there’s not much I can do for them. They will be the kind
of preachers they want to be.
But if someone has a burning calling, a teachable spirit, a
passionate heart, and a reckless abandon to pay the price to
preach well, then not even the limitation of their own background,
personality, or natural talents will keep them from preaching the
Word of God with power.
13
03
Expository ministry:
A comprehensive
vision
When God speaks, creation obeys. When
he spoke the universe into existence, it
happened (Gen 1:3-26). When he speaks
into the cold, dead hearts of sinners, a
new creation appears (2 Cor 5:17). When
preachers exposit the Word of God and
announce that Jesus is the Christ, the
church is built (Matt 16:16-18).
BY DAN DUMAS
W
hen God speaks, creation obeys. When he spoke the
universe into existence, it happened (Gen 1:3-26).
When he speaks into the cold, dead hearts of sinners,
a new creation appears (2 Cor 5:17). When preachers exposit the
Word of God and announce that Jesus is the Christ, the church
is built (Matt 16:16-18). Whenever God’s Word is proclaimed,
something comes into existence that wasn’t there before.
Even a casual observation of the evangelical landscape reveals
that much of this church-building, Christ-centered, truth-driven,
gospel-proclaiming, expository preaching has turned into, well,

something else. If the church is going to flourish, then something
needs to change.
THE PREACHING
If you’re reading this, it’s likely that you’re familiar with expository
preaching. Maybe you’ve heard it before, maybe you hear it every
week or maybe you do it every week at your church. Expository
preaching happens when a preacher lays open a biblical text so that
its original meaning is brought to bear on the lives of contemporary
listeners. Expository preaching is a call to deliver from the pulpit
what has already been delivered in the Scriptures. If this happens
at your church every week, then praise God. This is the kind of
preaching God’s people have always needed — and nothing has
changed. It’s the kind of preaching that Christ modeled when he
explained to his disciples “the things concerning himself in all the
16
Scriptures” (Luke 24:27). It’s the kind of preaching commanded in

the Great Commission, practiced in the early church, reinforced
in Paul’s Pastoral Epistles and demonstrated throughout church
history. It’s not the job of the preacher to improve upon the
program God instituted in the first place.
Unfortunately, many churches aren’t getting expository preaching
from the pulpit. This is a primary cause for the epidemic of biblical
illiteracy in the pews. Preachers aren’t teaching the Bible, and
they’re not teaching their people how to read it and study it for
themselves. Not surprisingly, people grow disinterested in the Bible.
Faithful, expository preaching is instead being replaced with
whatever scratches the itching ears of our self-centered, consumerist
culture. Ironically, this pursuit of relevance has achieved just the
opposite. People don’t see the immediate impact the Bible has
on their lives because preachers are too busy trying to chase the
bankrupt idol that is relevance.
Why has expository preaching been exchanged for this
pragmatism? Because it’s hard work. It takes serious commitment
EXPOSITORY MINISTRY: A COMPREHENSIVE VISION
to spend time studying week-in and week-out, praying through the

text, allowing it to marinate the preacher’s own soul, spending
time in the original languages, trying to place himself in the first
century, and reading the insights of men past and present with
more wisdom than he.
If God’s people are going to be presented “mature in Christ”
(Col 1:28), then biblical, expository preaching needs to return
to the sacred desk of local churches. If you’re working faithfully
to exposit the Scriptures, then this book will encourage you to
excel still more and give you some allies along the way. If you’re
wondering if the Bible is what your people really need, then this
book will call you back and remind you that God provides all his
people need in his Word (2 Tim 3:16). All he calls preachers to do
is open the Bible, study it, and proclaim its message.
THE PREACHER
17
Expository preaching, however, is about more than preaching.
It’s about preaching and the preacher; the ministry and the man.
People need preaching grounded in and guided by the Scriptures,
and they need preachers grounded in and guided by the Scriptures.
There’s a reason the majority of the biblical qualifications for
leadership in the local church center on character (1 Tim 3:1-13;
Titus 1:6-9). Such a noble calling requires noble character. The
last thing the church needs is a preacher who preaches against
adultery one day, and is found guilty of it the next, or a preacher
who preaches self-control, but clearly lacks it in the way he uses
the Web, consumes, and eats.
Churchgoers know they can trust the preaching in their pulpit
only as far as they can trust the preacher who steps into it every
week. The fruitfulness of a man’s ministry will never exceed that
of his life.
God’s people need expository preaching from godly men who lead
expository lives and do expository ministry. If the man is going to
be an expositor in the pulpit, then he had better be an expositor in
the study, in the home, in the prayer meeting, at the kids’ soccer
games, and all the other places where he lives out God’s call on
his life (i.e., everywhere). The same commitment demanded in
the study lays claim on the entirety of the preacher’s life and is to
be applied relentlessly, the commitment to live out God’s Word as
the final authority rather than our own minds. A commitment to
this kind of lifestyle is the recipe for faithful, expository preaching
and faithful, expository ministry.
And a funny thing happens when preachers start living faithfully
and start preaching the Bible: their people start to want more of it.
Your church members will begin to recognize that God’s Word is
to be desired more than gold, and is sweeter than the honeycomb
(Ps 19:10). They start to crave the “solid food” of God’s Word
(Heb 5:12). They can’t get enough of it. They want to hear more
preaching and teaching. They want to know how to get more out
of the sermon. They become grateful for faithful preaching. They
18
want to know how to read and study the Bible for themselves.
They want to know what resources they can take advantage of in
their personal study.
And if you’re a preacher, you want this for your people, but you
must remember that your church will never esteem God’s Word
any higher than you do.
THE PEOPLE
But we’re not just equipping and encouraging preachers here. We’re
going beyond the preaching, past the preacher to his people, the
recipients of the expositor’s ministry. The goal is never to have
one guy in the church (the preacher) who knows how to read his
Bible and how to use it to have an impact on people’s lives. Local
churches should brim with people equipped to use their Bibles in
their own lives and that of those around them.
When Luther and the Reformers advocated for the priesthood
of all believers, they were reminding Christians that individual
people are ultimately responsible for the eternal state of their soul.
EXPOSITORY MINISTRY: A COMPREHENSIVE VISION
Whether you’re in a church with consistently edifying sermons

or with crummy, boring preaching, you are the one who will stand
before God. So it’s important for you to know how to grow in
the grace and knowledge of Christ (2 Pet 3:18). Fortunately, God
has not left us alone in this glorious task. He has given us fellow
believers, the local church, pastors, the canon of Scripture, and the
Holy Spirit. Indeed, he has “granted to us all things that pertain
to life and godliness” (2 Pet 1:3).
19
04
David Brainerd:
Preach for holiness by
preaching the gospel
David Brainerd was a missionary to the
American Indians in New York, New Jersey,
and eastern Pennsylvania. Brainerd’s
primary method in his mission work was
Christ-centered preaching. According to
Brainerd, Christ was the energizing center
of every sermon but he is also the mark,
or the goal of every sermon.
BY DAVID E. PRINCE
D
avid Brainerd was a missionary to the American Indians in
New York, New Jersey, and eastern Pennsylvania. Born in
Connecticut in 1718, he died of tuberculosis at the age of
29 in the home of his friend Jonathan Edwards. Edwards preached
the funeral sermon for Brainerd and published his diary.
Brainerd would have a hard time being accepted by any missionary
board today. His health was poor and he was expelled from Yale
in 1742 for accusing some faculty member of being carnal and
unconverted, which meant that he could not serve as a pastor in
the region. Brainerd was devastated and felt cut off from pursuing
his calling until he began serving as a missionary to the American
Indians in 1743.
CHRIST IS THE CENTER AND GOAL OF EVERY

SERMON
Brainerd’s primary method in his mission work was Christ-centered
preaching. He explained his approach to preaching in his journal:
“I cannot but take notice, that I have, in the general, ever since my
first coming among these Indians in New Jersey, been favoured
with that assistance, which to me is uncommon, in preaching
Christ crucified, and making him the centre and mark to which all
my discourses among them were directed.” According to Brainerd,
Christ was the energizing center of every sermon but he is also
the mark, or the goal, of every sermon.
His preaching was both Christocentric and Christotelic. He
22
explains his homiletical method as focusing on “the being and

perfections of God,” man’s “deplorable state by nature as fallen
creatures,” “the utter insufficiency of any external reformations
... to open [Jesus’] all-sufficiency and willingness to save the chief
of sinners,” and “thereupon to press them without delay.”
Thus, Brainerd’s normal expositional pathway was:

1. The perfections of God.
2. The fallenness of man.
3. The utter insufficiency of self-justification.
4. The utter sufficiency of Christ to save.
5. The urgent call to respond to Christ by faith without delay.
CHRIST IS THE SUBSTANCE OF EVERY BIBLICAL

SUBJECT
Brainerd explained that no matter the biblical subject, “I have been
naturally and easily led to Christ as the substance of every subject.”
He elaborated regarding his relentless Christ-focus in preaching:
DAVID BRAINERD: PREACH FOR HOLINESS BY PREACHING THE GOSPEL
If I treated on the being and glorious perfections of God, I was

thence naturally led to discourse of Christ as the only “way to
the Father.”—If I attempted to open the deplorable misery of our
fallen state, it was natural from thence to show the necessity of
Christ to undertake for us, to atone for our sins, and to redeem
us from the power of them. If I taught the commands of God,
and showed our violation of them, this brought me in the most
easy and natural way, to speak of and recommend the Lord Jesus
Christ, as one who had “magnified the law” we had broken, and
who was “become the end of it for righteousness, to everyone that
believes.” And never did I find so much freedom and assistance in
making all the various lines of my discourses meet together, and
centre in Christ, as I have frequently done among these Indians.
It is important to note that for Brainerd preaching Christ from

every text did not involve personal ingenuity and hermeneutical
23
gymnastics. He consistently uses the words “easily” and “natural”
when he refers to preaching Christ from every text. He wrote, “I
have been drawn in a way not only easy and natural, proper and
pertinent, but almost unavoidable, to discourse of him, either in
regard of his undertaking, incarnation, satisfaction, admirable
fitness for the work of man’s redemption, or the infinite need
that sinners stand in of an interest in him; which has opened
the way for a continual strain of gospel-invitation to perishing
souls, to come empty and naked, weary and heavy laden, and cast
themselves upon them.”
CHRIST IS THE CENTER IN WHICH ALL THE LINES OF

REVELATION MEET
Brainerd was convinced that the Spirit had enabled him to preach
Christ in plain speech, “with such freedom, pertinency, pathos, and
application to the conscience, as, I am sure, I never could have made
myself master of by the most assiduous application of mind.” He
notes that formerly he read Acts 10, the Apostle Peter’s discourse
to Cornelius, and “wondered to see him so quickly introduce the

Lord Jesus Christ into his sermon, and so entirely dwell upon him
through the whole of it, observing him in this point very widely
to differ from many of our modern preachers: but latterly this has
not seemed strange, since Christ has appeared to be the substance
of the gospel, and the centre in which the several lines of divine
revelation meet.”
PROMOTE MORALITY BY PREACHING CHRIST

Brainerd preached with the conviction that “morality, sobriety,
and external duties” are best “promoted by preaching Christ
crucified.” He believed that the external duties of Christianity
flow from the internal power of genuinely embracing divine grace
in Christ. The proper relationship between the gospel indicative
and imperative is not to pit one against the other. Rather, it is to
understand that their relationship is irreversible. The imperative
24
rests on the foundational gospel indicative and is consequential.

Brainerd explains:
And God was pleased to give these divine truths such a powerful
influence upon the minds of these people, and so to bless them
for the effectual awakening of numbers of them, that their lives
were quickly reformed, without my insisting upon the precepts of
morality, and spending time in repeated harangues upon external
duties. When these truths were felt at heart, there was now no
vice unreformed,—no external duty neglected. … The reformation
was general; and all springing from the internal influence of divine
truths upon their hearts; and not from any external restraints,
or because they had heard these vices particularly exposed, and
repeatedly spoken against.
Brainerd believed that according to Christ and his apostles,

“smooth and plausible harangues upon moral virtues and external
duties, at best are like to do no more than lop off the branches of
DAVID BRAINERD: PREACH FOR HOLINESS BY PREACHING THE GOSPEL
corruption, while the root of all vice remains still untouched”

and the only way to get to the root of the sin problem was by
the gospel of sovereign grace in Christ. Brainerd also contended
that when the root of sin was severed by a focus on the gospel
people naturally moved toward positive spiritual disciplines such
as corporate worship and prayer. He explained that it was “not
because I had driven them to the performance of these duties by a
frequent inculcating of them, but because they had felt the power
of God’s word upon their heart,—were made sensible of their sin
and misery, and thence could not but pray, and comply with every
thing they knew was duty, from what they felt within themselves.”
THE SOUL-HUMBLING DOCTRINES OF GRACE BRING

HOLINESS
Brainerd clarifies that he does not oppose the preaching of
morality, but only insists that morality must be preached as a
25
consequence of faith in the gospel, and not abstracted from the
gospel. He summarizes his thoughts about his preaching: “That
the reformation, the sobriety, and external compliance with the
rules and duties of Christianity, appearing among my people, are
not the effect of any mere doctrinal instruction, or merely rational
view of the beauty of morality, but from the internal power and
influence that divine truths (the soul-humbling doctrines of grace)
have had upon their hearts.”
All who preach, would do well to follow the approach to preaching
taught by Jesus, modeled by his apostles, and faithfully applied
by Brainerd in his mission work among the American Indians.
This article originally appeared on the blog, Prince on Preaching.

05
5 ways to fight
‘preaching hangover’
You may call it something different,
but every pastor knows it well. It is the
mental, emotional, and spiritual crash
that takes place on Monday as a result of
pouring your heart and soul out in the
proclamation of God’s Word to God’s
people the day before.
BY BRIAN CROFT
Y
ou may call it something different, but every pastor knows it
well. It is the mental, emotional, and spiritual crash that takes
place on Monday as a result of pouring your heart and soul
out in the proclamation of God’s Word to God’s people the day before.
Personally, it has affectionately become known as “the preaching
hangover.”
There is no easy remedy, medication, or quick fix that can prevent
it. There are, however, several practical efforts I make every Monday
that are tremendously helpful to fight through the fog. Here are
five suggestions for your consideration:
1. PRAY AND READ SCRIPTURE

I know this seems like a no-brainer for a pastor. The fact is
sometimes on Monday morning ... I don’t feel like it. Yet, this is
still what gives life to our weary souls and we must make ourselves
continue to engage, even if we are struggling to want to think about
anything, even God and his Word. I find pushing through the fog
by reaching for the Bread of Life is what gives a helpful kick start
as we begin the weekly grind again.
2. KNOW YOUR LIMITATIONS

Many pastors take Monday as their day off. For those of us who
choose a different day off to spend with our family, we have to
proceed with Mondays carefully. I am in no condition to deal with
any heavy, thought-provoking, emotional counseling or conflict
situations, at least until after lunch.
You may be different, but the “hangover” affects us all in some
way that requires discernment as we plan the day. Be careful you
don’t put yourself in a position in your day that requires you to
28
make a big decision when you are not nearly as sharp as you need
to be to make it.
3. EXERCISE
I exercise 4-5 times a week, but if there is a day when it is especially
important to do so, it is Monday. If you only exercise one day a
week, I recommend it be Monday. It hurts ... many times more
than normal following a Lord’s Day, but a good 30-plus minute
cardiovascular workout is exactly what I need to help shake the
preaching hangover.
4. ASSIGN ACHIEVABLE TASKS

The preaching hangover is by no means an excuse to be a sluggard
and unproductive. Give yourself attainable tasks and make sure
you push through to achieve them. If it is your day off, make sure
you are working hard to perk up and engage with your family so
your wife and children do not get your “sluggard day.” If you are
trying to be productive in the office, but have a hard time studying
FIVE WAYS TO FIGHT “PREACHING HANGOVER”
for very long as I do, schedule other tasks that are within your
frame of mind to accomplish.
For me, Monday is full of checking emails, simple administration,
running errands, and meeting with folks that I know will be more
light, encouraging, and less likely to be a blindside confrontation.
You may be able to handle more than I typically can. Just make sure
they are tasks that are reasonable for you to accomplish in the day.
5. SILENCE
Do whatever you must to provide some silence and solitude
for yourself. Sometimes I combine this with my exercise in the
morning. I like to go to a park, run, then sit in silence for a little
while away from people, just you and God. Silence can be life-
giving when we are often bombarded with words and people the
day before. This has become essential for my personal soul care
and my ability to work through the Monday fog.
29
I hope in some way these suggestions will trigger ideas that will
be of help to you to clear the cobwebs of the preaching hangover.
Just remember, when you do have to face a long, weighty, conflict-
full Monday because the needs of the congregation demand it.
God’s grace is sufficient to walk through it.
06
Preaching for
conversions
The true power of such appeals is not
found in the eloquence of the speaker or
in the emotions of the listener but in the
faithfulness of the God who still speaks
through his Word.
BY TIMOTHY PAUL JONES
I
n the churches where I first came to know Jesus Christ, no
service was complete without an invitation — a time for the
people in the pews to respond to the message by making their
way down the aisle. Especially during weeklong revival services,
“Just as I Am” inevitably ran out of verses before the polyester-
clad preachers ran out of steam. And so, with “every head bowed,
every eye closed, and no one looking around,” the preacher would
call for “one more, just one more” as the pianist continued to
play. As a child, I remember watching these visiting revivalists
through half-closed eyes, waiting for the preacher’s furtive nod
to the pianist that would bring the invitation to an end.
Whatever you may think about invitations in general or about
those preachers’ particular methods, one thing is clear: They weren’t
afraid to preach with the expectation of conversions.
Neither were the preachers and prophets whose words the Holy
Spirit has preserved in the pages of the New Testament.
John the Baptist heralded the coming of Christ with a call to turn
from one way of life to another (Mark 1:3-5). When Jesus made his
way back to Galilee from the desert of temptation, his proclamation
to the people was, “The kingdom of God is at hand! Repent and
believe the good news.” (Mark 1:15). Repentance was an imperative
in Simon Peter’s message on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2:38). In
a letter to the Corinthians, the Apostle Paul put it this way: “We
are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We
implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God!” (2 Cor 5:20).
Proclamation from Southern Baptist pulpits has historically
reflected this openness to preaching for conversions. John A.
Broadus — second president of The Southern Baptist Theological
Seminary and the pastor who baptized missionary Lottie Moon
— never seemed ashamed to aim his proclamations with an
expectation of conversions. An eyewitness declared that, when
Broadus preached to troops during the Civil War, “Again and again
would the vast congregations be melted down under the power of
32
the great preacher, and men ‘unused to the melting mood’ would
sob with uncontrollable emotion.” In a message on the resurrection,
Broadus declared that Christ “rose triumphant over death and over
sin and over Satan on our behalf” and then implored his hearers,
“Have you experienced this new life? Have you continued in it?”
Broadus ended another sermon by asking pointedly, “To which
class shall we belong, to those who receive or those who reject
the Light of the World, our only Savior?” In this, the practices of
Broadus stood in continuity with his teachings on revival preaching:
“Urge immediate decision and acceptance of the gospel terms,
with public confession of Christ,” Broadus instructed his students.
GOSPEL PREACHING AND POPULARITY

In a culture intoxicated with the rationalization and justification of
every possible lifestyle, calls for “immediate decision and acceptance
of the gospel terms” will never be particularly popular. After all,
to urge such decision is to declare implicitly that the way hearers
are is not the way hearers ought to be — this, in a world where
PREACHING FOR CONVERSIONS
the way people are is widely assumed to be the inescapable result

of social and biological inclinations. Possibilities for popularity
plummet even further when proclaimers of the Word introduce
the inconvenient truth that explicit faith in Jesus represents the
sole pathway for persons to become how they ought to be.
Early in my ministry, there were a couple of years when I flirted
with theological liberalism and found myself uncertain about the
exclusivity of the gospel. During those months, I looked back on the
decision-seeking preachers of my childhood with embarrassment
and disdain. Convinced that I had grown beyond the need to call
for conversions, I placed as many miles as possible between my
pulpit and the proverbial sawdust trail.
I soon realized that — without a passionate conviction that the
gospel of Jesus Christ is necessary and exclusive — preaching
quickly degenerates into therapeutic moralisms, denuded of power
and authority. I assuaged my conscience during those months by
33
appealing to an aphorism supposedly spoken by a popular medieval
saint: “Preach the gospel at all times; if necessary, use words.”
What I wasn’t willing to admit at the time is that, because the
gospel includes assent to specific truths about a specific person,
preaching the gospel requires words. A gospel without words is
something less than the life-giving gospel of Jesus Christ.
WHAT I LEARNED AT A FUNERAL

Oddly enough, it was at a funeral that I glimpsed the full folly of my
false wisdom. A drug overdose had claimed a young woman’s life,
and the funeral director asked me to officiate at a memorial service.
When I arrived at the funeral home, I wasn’t certain whether I was
at a memorial service or a rock concert. The family had littered
the front lawn with beer bottles, and a few family members had
clustered near the corners of the building, smoking something
stronger than tobacco.
Moments before the service, the sister of the deceased woman
slipped into the chapel, bypassing the activities outside. She asked
if she might share a few words with the mourners after my message,
and I agreed. After an opening hymn, I proceeded to present the
well-polished platitudes that I had prepared for the service. When
I stepped aside, the sister stepped to the microphone. Roughly
and without the slightest rhetorical flourish, she shared how Jesus
Christ had saved her and how other members of their family would
likely suffer the same fate as her sister unless they turned from
their present way of life. Sitting beside that casket, I watched as
God used this woman’s words to transform the hearts of some
of her hearers.
At first, I watched the scene with condescending smugness. Then,
God began to break me. This woman, plainspoken and only recently
converted, was speaking the truth that I should have proclaimed
with clear and shameless confidence. I, who had been called and
trained to preach the gospel, had bartered that calling for a fleeting
sense of inclusivity. That moment represented far more than my
34
recognition of the utter bankruptcy of theological liberalism. The

conviction that I felt in that moment also marked the beginning of
a journey back to boldness in my preaching. I can’t claim that my
preaching has been perfect ever since that moment. I can say this,
however: From that moment onward, my preaching has centered
on the cross of Christ, and I have never hesitated to preach with
the expectation of conversions.
There may have been times when those old-time evangelists
leaned too hard on emotional appeals as we sang one more verse
of “Just as I Am.” But this I know: It is equally dangerous to err in
the other extreme. As long as there are persons who have yet to
embrace the gospel, there is a need for preaching — and not just
any preaching. What is needed is gospel-centered preaching that
boldly appeals to lost men and women to turn to Jesus Christ. The
true power of such appeals is not found in the eloquence of the
speaker or in the emotions of the listener but in the faithfulness
of the God who still speaks through his Word.
07
‘A poore under-rower’:
The life and ministry
of John Owen
Owen’s love and concern for the
preaching of the Word reveals a man
who was Puritan to the core.
BY MICHAEL A.G. HAYKIN
C
harles II once asked one of the most learned scholars
that he knew why any intelligent person should waste
time listening to the sermons of an uneducated tinker and
Baptist preacher by the name of John Bunyan. “Could I possess
the tinker’s abilities for preaching, please your majesty,” replied
the scholar, “I would gladly relinquish all my learning.” The name
of the scholar was John Owen, and this small story — apparently
true and not apocryphal — says a good deal about the man and
his Christian character. His love of and concern for the preaching
of the Word reveals a man who was Puritan to the core. And the
fragrant humility of his reply to the king was a virtue that permeated
all of his writings, in which he sought to glorify the triune God
and help God’s people find the maturity that was theirs in Christ.
A NONCONFORMIST HERITAGE
John Owen was born in 1616 and grew up in a Christian home in a
small village now known as Stadhampton, about five miles southeast
of Oxford. His father, Henry Owen, was the minister of the parish
church there and a Puritan. The names of three of his brothers have
also come down to us: William, who became the Puritan minister
at Remenham, just north of Henley-on-Thames; Henry who fought
as a major in Oliver Cromwell’s New Model Army; and Philemon,
who was killed fighting under Cromwell in Ireland in 1649.
Of Owen’s childhood years only one reference has been recorded.
“I was bred up from my infancy,” he remarked in 1657, “under the
care of my father, who was a nonconformist all his days, and a
painful labourer [diligent worker] in the vineyard of the Lord.” At
12 years of age, Owen was sent by his father to Queen’s College,
the University of Oxford. Here he obtained his B.A. on June 11,
1632, and immediately went on to study for the M.A., which he
was awarded on April 27, 1635. Everything seemed to be set for
Owen to pursue an academic career. It was not, however, a good
time to launch out into the world of academia. The Archbishop
36
of Canterbury, William Laud, had set out to suppress the Puritan

movement, and to that end had begun a purge of the churches and
universities. By 1637 Owen had no alternative but to leave Oxford
and to become — along with many other Puritans who refused
to conform to the Established Church — a private chaplain. He
eventually found employ in the house of Lord Lovelace, a nobleman
sympathetic to the Puritan cause. However, when the English Civil
War broke out in 1642 and Lord Lovelace decided to support the
king, Owen left his service and moved to London.
A “CLEAR SHINING FROM GOD”

The move to London led to an experience that Owen would never
forget. By 1642 Owen was convinced that the final source of truth
in religion was to be found in the Holy Scriptures. But he had yet
to personally experience the Holy Spirit bearing witness to his
spirit and giving him the assurance that he was a child of God.
Owen found this assurance one Sunday when he decided to
go with a cousin to hear Edmund Calamy the Elder, a famous
‘A POORE UNDER-ROWER’: THE LIFE AND MINISTRY OF JOHN OWEN
Presbyterian preacher, at St. Mary’s Church, Aldermanbury. On

arriving at this church, they were informed that the well-known
Presbyterian was not going to preach that morning. Instead a
country preacher (whose name Owen never did discover) was
going to fill in for the Presbyterian divine. The preacher took as
his text that morning Matthew 8:26: “Why are ye fearful, O ye of
little faith?” It proved to be a message that Owen needed to hear
and embrace. Through the words of a preacher whose identity is
unknown God spoke to Owen and removed once and for all his
doubts and fears as to whether he was truly regenerate or not. He
now knew himself to be born of the Spirit.
The impact of this spiritual experience cannot be overestimated.
It gave to Owen the deep, inner conviction that he was indeed a
child of God and chosen in Christ before the foundation of the
world, that God loved him and had a loving purpose for his life,
and that this God was the true and living God. In practical terms,
37
it meant a lifelong interest in the work of God the Holy Spirit that
would issue 30 years later in his monumental study A Discourse
Concerning the Holy Spirit. As he later wrote: “Clear shining from
God must be at the bottom of deep labouring with God.”
PREACHING BEFORE PARLIAMENT

In 1643 Owen was offered the pastorate in the village of Fordham,
six miles or so northwest of Colchester in Essex. Owen was
here until 1646 when he became the minister of the church at
the market town of Coggeshall, some five miles to the south.
Here, as many as 2,000 people would crowd into the church
each Lord’s Day to hear Owen preach. Thus, although Owen
would later speak slightingly of his preaching to King Charles
II — as seen in the anecdote with which this article began — it
is evident that he was no mean preacher. The backdrop for these
early years of Owen’s pastoral ministry was the English Civil War
when England knew the horrors of bloody fields of battle, and
father was ranged against son and neighbor against neighbor on
the battlefield. Well has this period been described as “the world
turned upside down.”
During these tumultuous days Owen clearly identified himself
with the Parliamentary cause. He developed a friendship with
the rising military figure Oliver Cromwell and was frequently
invited to preach before Parliament. By late 1648 some of the
Parliamentary army officers had begun to urge that Charles I
be brought to trial on charges of treason since he had fought
against his own people and Parliament. Charles I was accordingly
put on trial in January 1649, and by the end of that month a
small group of powerful Puritan leaders had found him guilty
and sentenced their king to death. On Jan. 31, the day following
the public execution of the king, Owen was asked to preach
before Parliament.
Owen used the occasion to urge upon the members of
Parliament that for them, now the rulers of England, to obtain
38
God’s favor in the future they must remove from the nation all
traces of false worship and superstition and wholeheartedly
establish a religion based on Scripture alone. Owen based his
sermon on Jeremiah 15. He made no direct reference to the events
of the previous day nor did he mention, at least in the version
of his sermon that has come down to us, the name of the king.
Nevertheless, his hearers and later readers would have been
easily able to deduce from his use of the Old Testament how he
viewed the religious policy and end of Charles. From the story
of wicked King Manasseh that is recorded in 2 Kings 21 and
with cross-references to Jeremiah 15, he argued that the leading
cause for God’s judgments upon the Jewish people had been such
abominations as idolatry and superstition, tyranny and cruelty.
He then pointed to various similarities between the conditions
of ancient Judah and the England of his day. At the heart of the
sermon was a call to Parliament to establish a reformed style
of worship, disseminate biblical Christianity, uphold national
righteousness, and avoid oppression.
IRELAND AND OXFORD

Later that same year, Owen accompanied Cromwell on a military
campaign in Ireland, where Owen stayed from August 1649 to
February 1650. Though ill much of this time, he preached frequently
to numerous multitudes of men and women hungry to hear the
gospel. When Owen returned to England the following year, he
confessed that “the tears and cries of the inhabitants of Dublin
after the manifestations of Christ are ever in my view.” Accordingly,
he sought to convince Parliament of the spiritual need of this land
and asked:
How is it that Jesus Christ is in Ireland only as a lion staining all

his garments with the blood of his enemies; and none to hold
him out as a lamb sprinkled with his own blood to his friends? Is
it the sovereignty and interest of England that is alone to be there
transacted? For my part … I could heartily rejoice, that … the Irish
39
might enjoy Ireland so long as the moon endureth, so that Jesus
Christ might possess the Irish. … If they were in the dark, and loved
to have it so, it might something close a door upon the bowels of
our compassion; but they cry out of their darkness, and are ready
to follow every one whosoever, to have a candle. If their being
gospelless move not our hearts, it is hoped their importunate cries
will disquiet our rest, and wrest help as a beggar doth an alms.
Although Owen’s pleas were heeded and this period saw the
establishment of a number of Puritan congregations — both
Congregationalist and Baptist — in Ireland, the inability of the
Puritans in Ireland to work together with likeminded brethren for
the larger cause of the Kingdom of Christ hindered their witness.
Cromwell appointed Owen to the oversight of Oxford University
in 1652 as its vice chancellor. From this position Owen helped to
reassemble the faculty, who had been dispersed by the war, and
sought to put the university back on its feet. He also had numerous
opportunities to preach to the students at Oxford. An important
work on holiness came out of his preaching during this period.

The Mortification of Sin in Believers is in some ways the richest of
all of Owen’s treatises on this subject. It is based on Romans 8:13
and lays out a strategy for fighting indwelling sin and warding off
temptation. Owen emphasizes that in the fight against sin the
Holy Spirit employs all of our human powers. In sanctifying us,
Owen insists, the Spirit works “in us and upon us, as we are fit to
be wrought in and upon; that is, so as to preserve our own liberty
and free obedience. … he works in us and with us, not against us
or without us; so that his assistance is an encouragement as to
the facilitating of the work, and no occasion of neglect as to the
work itself.”
“THE CHURCH IN A STORM”

Oliver Cromwell died in September 1658 and the “rule of the
saints,” as some called it, began to fall apart. Two years later a
40
number of Cromwell’s fellow Puritan leaders, fearful that Britain

was slipping into full-fledged anarchy, asked Charles I’s son, also
called Charles and who was then living in exile on the continent,
to return to England as her monarch. However, those who came
to power with this monarch, Charles II, were determined that the
Puritans would never again hold the reins of political authority.
During Charles’ reign and that of his brother James II, the Puritan
cause was thus savagely persecuted.
A number of Owen’s close friends, including John Bunyan, suffered
fines and imprisonment for not heeding these laws. Although Owen
was shielded from actual imprisonment by some powerful friends,
he led at best a precarious existence until his death. He was once
nearly attacked by a mob, who surrounded his carriage. At one point
he was tempted to accept the offer of a safe haven in America when
the Puritan leaders in Massachusetts offered him the presidency
of Harvard. Owen, though, recognized where he was needed most.
Despite the attacks on the Puritans, these years were also ones of
great literary fruitfulness for Owen. His exhaustive commentary on
Hebrews appeared between 1668 and 1684. A Discourse Concerning the

Holy Spirit came out in 1674 and an influential work on justification,
The Doctrine of Justification by Faith, in 1677. Owen’s Meditations and
Discourses on The Glory of Christ (1684; 2nd ed. 1696), which English
historian Robert Oliver has rightly termed “incomparable,” was
written under the shadow of death in 1683 and represents Owen’s
dying testimony to the unsurpassable value and joy of living a life
for the glory of Christ.
He fell asleep in Christ on Aug. 24, 1683. He was buried on Sept.
4 in Bunhill Fields in London, where the bodies of so many of
his fellow Puritans were laid to rest until that tremendous Day
when they — and all the faithful in Christ — shall be raised to
glory. His final literary work is a letter to a close friend, Charles
Fleetwood, written two days before his death. In it, he told his
friend: “I am leaving the ship of the church in a storm, but whilst
the great Pilot is in it the loss of a poore under-rower will be
41
inconsiderable. Live and pray and hope and waite patiently and
doe not despair; the promise stands invincible that he will never
leave thee nor forsake thee.”
08
‘A power to move men’

The legacy of SBTS co-founder John A.
Broadus: renowned preacher who was a
teacher of preachers.
BY TOM J. NETTLES
W
hen John A. Broadus died in 1895, his colleague
William H. Whitsitt remarked, “Unrivaled genius and
usefulness, exquisite learning, peerless eloquence,
iron industry, apostolic piety, have all been scattered here by the
touch of death. It would seem that a man of such endowments
and achievements should be formed to live a thousand years.”
Broadus served on the first faculty of The Southern Baptist
Theological Seminary as professor of New Testament, Greek,
and homiletics. He also served, following the death of James
Petigru Boyce, as the second president of the seminary, 1888-
1895. The praises poured out at his death merely gave intense
summary to judgments stated throughout his life. The variety of
contributions he made to Baptist life, the worldwide conversation
he maintained, the global attainments of his students, and the
ageless impact of his diversified scholarly contributions give him
an ongoing witness even among those who will never know they
have benefited from him.
Though his accomplishments were of Renaissance proportions,
we remember him particularly as a preacher, a teacher of preachers,
and a theoretician of preaching. When theological education was
seen as barely tolerable if not undesirable, Broadus’ preaching
made it just the thing that everyone should pursue. In an 1892
article titled “Educating a Preacher,” the editor of the Baptist

Record wrote:
Education has done for Dr. Broadus just what it ought to do for
every preacher who has the advantage of the schools. Not that
all of them can come up to him, but they should try to be just
as simple and as natural as possible. … We fear that many prefer
pomposity to simplicity as they regard it as a work of greatness.
The writer then clinched his analysis through anecdote:
A Virginia planter, having heard Broadus preach, rose to make a

public observation. “Brother Moderator, I am a plain, uneducated
man. I’ve heard a great deal said about the scholar who spoke just
now, and I listened carefully to what he had to say and I did not
hear him say a single word that I did not understand. Now, sir, if
44
educating a preacher makes him talk that way, I want to help.”
Though his talent in public declamation clearly exceeded most of

his peers, he often labored to minimize the tactics of his apt delivery.
Preaching in Fredericksburg in 1853, he gave special attention to
simplicity of content and delivery. “The sermon was rather languid,
and certainly one of the most commonplace that even I have ever
preached,” he wrote his wife, Maria, about his sermon on Colossians
1:28. Even though the church was crowded and overflowing, he “felt
no disposition to rise above a mere unpretending repetition of what
they have been hearing from their childhood.” The effects of the
sermon rose far beyond the languid or commonplace as Broadus
“soon perceived that many in the congregation were deeply moved,
and as I spoke of Jesus the Saviour, the all-sufficient, the loving,
the only Saviour, and warned then not to reject him, not to put off,
warned them to flee the wrath to come, many wept.” Among those
moved to weeping like children, were “strong men, they say, and
near to the door where the atmosphere is often so chill.”
‘A POWER TO MOVE MEN’
Ten years later, preaching in the Confederate camps, he remarked

again on the difficulty of matching delivery to the grandeur of the
subject. “How difficult we find it to preach well.” Musing if anyone
had really preached, he lamented, “Oh, it is so hard to preach as
one ought to do! I long for the opportunity, yet do not rise to meet
it with whole-souled earnestness and living faith, and afterwards
I feel sad and ashamed.”
Knowing the difficulty of preaching well and the serious
stewardship that lay on the lives of those called to preach, Broadus
did all he could to help men be “Mighty in the Scriptures.” His
Lectures on the History of Preaching, while admittedly a bare survey,
nevertheless show Broadus’ massive knowledge of the whole field
of homiletics. He used this knowledge to point to both flaws and
powers of the expositors of the past.
Augustine, for instance, was “a great preacher” and a “richly gifted
man,” but “unsafe as an interpreter.” His sermons, nevertheless,
45
are “full of power.” If not always correctly, Augustine carefully
“explains his text, and repeats many times, in different ways,
its substantial meaning.” Augustine’s effective use of dramatic
question and answer, apostrophe, digression, and direct address
evoked Broadus’ exclamation, “Away with our prim and starch
formalities and uniformities!” At the same time, such freedom
must be controlled; and in Augustine it “is controlled, by sound
judgment, right feeling and good taste.”
His analysis of Reformation preaching allowed him to make
several strong points about one of the premier aspects of
proclamation. “The methods of preaching are, after all, not half
so important as the materials,” he observed. “Protestantism was
born of the doctrines of grace, and in the proclamation of these the
Reformation preaching found its truest and highest power.” None
of this, in fact, should change, for until “human nature changes
and Jesus Christ changes, the power of the gospel will still reside
in the great truth of salvation by sovereign grace.” Others may
go their way, but the faithful preacher must “boldly and warmly
proclaim the truths … so new to every needy heart, of sovereignty

and atonement, of spiritual regeneration and justification by faith.”
His commentary on Matthew always presents “Homiletical and
Practical” suggestions at the end of a major exegetical section. For
example, in his homiletical suggestions on the Parable of the Sower
in Matthew 13:18-23, Broadus noted, “Even if preaching were in
itself perfect, it would have a very different effect upon different
classes of hearers. Our work cannot be fairly tested by its actual
results, but rather by its tendencies, aims, and adaptation. Yet a
religious teacher should earnestly seek for tangible results, both
in winning and building up.”
In A Treatise on the Preparation and Delivery of Sermons, his
homiletical tour de force, Broadus showed himself a master of
preaching, not only in practice but in highly articulated theory.
In the introduction, Broadus set his discussion in a framework
that explained how he could remain so deeply connected to the
46
plain, simple, and earnest people of local congregations, while

instructing both aspiring and highly trained theologians worldwide
in the craft of sermon building. In the context of a defense of
the conscientious use of the principles involved in effective
communication — rhetoric, that is, “thoughtful observation of
the way in which men do speak, when they speak really well” — he
pointed to four things essential for good preaching: piety, natural
gifts, knowledge, and skill. Buried in that discussion are words
that reflected Broadus’ endearment to the masses:
Now the things which ought most to be thought of by the

preacher, are piety and knowledge, and the blessing of God. Skill,
however valuable, is far less important than these; and there is
danger that rhetorical studies will cause men to forget that such
is the case. It is lamentable to see how often the remarks upon
preaching made by preachers themselves … are confined to a
discussion of the performance and the performer. Unsympathizing
listeners or readers have, in such cases, too much ground for
‘A POWER TO MOVE MEN’
concluding that preachers are anxious only to display skill, and

gain oratorical reputation.
In a veiled autobiographical depiction of the power of preaching,

Broadus portrayed a scenario of a man “who is apt in teaching,
whose soul is on fire with the truth which he trusts has saved him
and hopes will save others” involved in preaching. The herald
engages his fellow-men, “face to face, eye to eye” and in this living
interchange “electric sympathies flash to and fro between him
and his hearers, till they lift each other up, higher and higher, into
the intensest thought, and the most impassioned emotion.” The
sympathies continue to surge “higher and yet higher, till they are
borne as on chariots of fire above the world.” In this, the greatest of
any human endeavor, “there is a power to move men, to influence
character, life, destiny, such as no printed page can ever possess.”
47
09
Should I ever break

from an expository
sermon series?
I am a shepherd who preaches, not a
preacher who shepherds. In other words,
I am not merely a Bible teacher exegeting
the text, but a pastor walking through life
with the people I serve and applying the
texts I exegete.
BY HERSHAEL W. YORK
P
reaching through books of the Bible is my jam. I love to
take months and work through a book, as I did recently in
Hebrews over the course of 44 sermons. I am convinced and
see persistent evidence that the best way Christians learn the Word
of God is through the systematic and regular study of its books.
Only careful exposition that builds line upon line, precept upon
precept, truth upon truth, will give those in my care a strategic
grasp of biblical truth over a span of years.
Since the Bible has 66 books and two testaments but I only have
one life to preach it, I may change the lens from one book to another
so that I’m looking more or less closely at its treasures. While I have
to decide whether to take months or weeks in any one book, my
standard method of preaching and teaching is systematic exposition.
But I am a shepherd who preaches, not a preacher who shepherds.

In other words, I am not merely a Bible teacher exegeting the
text, but a pastor walking through life with the people I serve and
applying the texts I exegete. Every so often a life event occurs that
requires — even demands — that I deviate from my schedule, that
I park the plan for a while to preach to a specific need that occupies
the minds and troubles the hearts of my people.
To ignore it would be spiritual malpractice.
A doctor might have a patient on a healthy diet and particular
pharmaceutical regimen for a heart issue, but if a kidney stone
suddenly lodges somewhere in the patient, the doctor has to
treat that. Pastors, too, must keep their eyes on the acute as well
as the chronic.
THINGS HAPPEN
Imagine a pastor is preaching through Romans, and he’s preparing
50
a message for the following Sunday from Romans 13:1-7 on

submitting to government authorities. That Friday night at a
church-sponsored soccer league, one of his members gets in
his car to leave the game early and doesn’t see the toddler that
has run away from her parents, and he tragically runs over and
kills the little girl.
I can hardly imagine a greater heartbreak in a church family
or one needing more skillful and loving attention. If that pastor
stubbornly sticks to his schedule and preaches on the Christian’s
responsibility to government, he will miss his people’s acute
need to hear biblical truth and know God really is in control.
He will fail to seize the unique teaching moment borne out of
desperation and pain. Maintaining a preaching calendar can
hardly be thought more virtuous than seizing a moment to glorify
Christ in suffering.
Many times I’ve been preaching through a book when a massive
event occurred in our community or nation and I found that,
amazingly, the very passage I was scheduled to preach directly
SHOULD I EVER BREAK FROM AN EXPOSITORY SERMON SERIES?
applied to the situation. I’ve often been stunned that a sovereign

God planned my preaching schedule to work in confluence with
particular incidents and experiences. Those moments encourage
the pastor’s heart since they bear witness not only to the providence
of the Lord but also to his leadership of the pastor.
At other times, however, there’s a need to address something
in our corporate or national life that has no real relationship to
my intended text. I neither want to twist the meaning of the text
nor ignore the life event that stands like an elephant in the room.
If what I had planned doesn’t address the questions tearing at
everyone’s mind, I will step aside from my schedule and choose
a text that provides a biblical perspective people need to hear.
A GENERATIONAL TRAGEDY
No Sunday in my lifetime illustrates this point better than Sept.
16, 2001 — the Sunday after the Twin Towers crumbled. Planes
51
had just begun to fly again. Airports were still empty. No one knew
if another attack was imminent or how the United States might
retaliate. Were we heading for war? How should Christians think
about Muslims? How do we process the anger we feel? Why would
God let this happen?
What should a faithful pastor do? John MacArthur preached “A
Biblical Perspective on Death, Terrorism, and the Middle East”
from James 4. John Piper preached “A Service of Sorrow, Self-
Humbling, and Steady Hope in Our Savior and King, Jesus Christ”
from Romans 8:35–39. Tim Keller, preaching in the city where the
attacks occurred and to many who had lost friends and loved ones,
preached “Truth, Tears, Anger, and Grace” from John 11.
These men are noted expositors, and though their sermons
could certainly be considered faithful expositions of the text,
none slavishly stuck with the original plan. Because they were all
pastors first, they laid aside their plan in order to shepherd the
hearts of their people who were hurting, angry, frightened, and
searching for divine wisdom.
SHEPHERDING IN A FALLEN WORLD

My methodology is not my goal, but the tool by which I accomplish
my goal. My great ambition is to see Christ formed in his people
through his Word planted in their lives. And sometimes, when
local, national, or world events break our hearts and captivate
our consciences — when they seize our minds or rob our peace,
when they threaten to divide us or to lead some astray — the most
faithful thing I can do is preach a fitting Word from “another” text.
The people who weekly sit under my preaching are accustomed
to the system I use. If I depart from it for a Sunday, the deviation
itself both comforts and informs them. They know their pastor is
living in their same world. I highlight the sufficiency of the Word
not only by systematic study, but also by demonstrating its ability
to speak to every situation. Not only do I teach them the content
of the Word, but also its comfort of the Word.
I am committed to exposition every time I stand in the pulpit.
52
I have nothing to give my listeners besides God’s Word. That

is inviolate. But even though the best way to teach the Word
is systematically and sequentially, life doesn’t always happen
systematically and sequentially. The faithful shepherd knows
when to step out of the routine because a large shadow has been
cast across his flock, and he knows where to lead them to find the
illumination and help they need.
This article originally appeared at The Gospel Coalition.

10
I am a sinner
preaching to sinners
I am not worthy to be a minister, but
Christ was worthy for me. I do not and
will not measure up, but Jesus perfectly
measured up for me. The gospel is true
for God’s people in the pew and it is true
for me, his herald, as well.
BY JEFF ROBINSON
I
have served as a pastor around six years now, and one reality I
still cannot reconcile is the notion of preaching to other people
the myriad texts (all of them, so far) I find exceedingly difficult
to obey myself. I preach about slaying the deadly viper of pride, but
then I am proud of the way I exposited and communicated the text.
I tell my people that they should pray without ceasing, and yet my
prayer life is too often as inconsistent as summer rainfall in Kentucky.
I preach about seeking God’s grace to lower the thermostat on our
tempers after I have fired angry darts at my wife and children on
the way to church, “Shut up, we’re going to worship!”
You get my drift. For a man called to preach God’s Word each
Lord’s Day, this creates an existential crisis.
A particular Sunday presented a prime example of the tension
that grips me when preaching God’s Word, a tension that always
morphs into a full-blown fear that each week behind the sacred
desk I am a trafficker in unlived truth. The text was Matthew 5:9

from the Sermon on the Mount: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for
they will be called sons of God.” Great verse. Great opportunity to
talk about selflessness in relating to others, displaying both love
to God and love to neighbor and the like.
I made this application point: “When we are in conflict with
others, we must talk less and listen more. We must learn to turn
the other cheek in the way we respond verbally to others.” Ouch.
I was getting paid to talk. And in conflict with others, sometimes
I still struggle mightily to be like my Lord to turn the other cheek.
On the way home that particular Sunday I kept thinking, I just
preached on peacemaking and my own pastor (that would be me) falls
miserably short of God’s glory in this area.
DYING MEN PREACHING TO DYING MEN

How are God’s undershepherds to come to grips with this daunting
54
reality? How do we reconcile the all-too obvious truth that we

are sinners preaching to sinners? How do we get some in our
congregations over the notion that we are popes, we are monastics
who descend from the cloister each week where we’ve been holed
up all week, dodging the world, the flesh, and the devil? Sin dwells
even in monasteries because sinners live there.
But many of the people to whom we are called to minister don’t
really believe this about us, and when we sin — and we will —
some of them write us off as phonies or Pharisees or worse. In the
early months of my first pastoral ministry, a man told me I wasn’t
qualified to be a pastor because I sinned. He seemed a bit stunned
when I admitted that, though I believed his case for ministerial
perfectionism unbiblical, I acutely felt the tension of my standing as
a saved-by-grace-sinner calling other sinners to walk God’s inspired
line. I told him, “If you think that one thing you just mentioned is
the worst weakness I have, you don’t know the half of it!”
Veteran pastor and counselor Paul Tripp, in his excellent
book Dangerous Calling: Confronting the Unique Challenges of
I AM A SINNER PREACHING TO SINNERS
Pastoral Ministry, rode to my rescue by reminding me again

that I am, in the words of the great Puritan Richard Baxter,
a dying man called to preach to dying men. I must sit under
my own preaching and teaching. My weekly preparation must
never be less than devotional. And for any pastor to survive
this sanctifying meat-grinder known as the pastoral ministry,
it must never become clinical.
Pastors differ from garden-variety pew-sitters only in this fact: we
have the unique privilege — and profound advantage — of being called
to study in significant depth God’s chosen sin-killing, heart-renewing,
image-restoring agent: the Bible. Yes, we are our own pastors, and we
must listen to our preaching each week, which is to say, we must do far
more than “handle” God’s Word: it must handle us as well. Thus, we
must ask difficult questions about canceled sin that still clings to our
hearts like barnacles on an old shrimp boat. We must ask God to use
his Word to expose our besetting sins and hidden weaknesses so that
55
we become more and more like Christ.
PASTORS ARE PAPER PLATES

And we must remind our people that, despite popular misconceptions
about the perfections inherent in God’s ministers, the inspired witness
says we are mere clay pots, Walmart crockery, weak men in the midst
of our own sanctification — just like the hearers of the sermons we
preach. We stand in desperate need of wave upon wave of grace to
wash upon the shores of our lives every moment, and we must not
hide that face from our people behind a mask of subtle perfectionism.
Best of all, I do not have to be paralyzed by the expectation of
perfection — whether it arises from my mind or the congregation’s
— because Jesus was perfect for me. I am not worthy to be a minister,
but Christ was worthy for me. I do not and will not measure up, but
Jesus perfectly measured up for me. The gospel is true for God’s
people in the pew and it is true for me, his herald, as well.
May God grant his ministers grace to hear and heed their
own preaching.
11
What has preaching to

do with discipleship?
Following Jesus means obeying the Great
Commission, with its command to make
disciples of all the nations. But what does
that mean? And how do we do it?
BY DAVID SCHROCK
D
iscipleship programs. Discipleship pastors. Discipleship
pressure.
So much talk about discipleship in the church today.
And rightly so.
Following Jesus means obeying the Great Commission, with its
command to make disciples of all the nations. But what does that
mean? And how do we do it?
In a few other articles I’ve answered what it means to be a disciple
and who makes disciples. But today, I want to begin to address
the question: How do we disciple?
A BRIEF INTRODUCTION
Many helpful books have been written on discipleship. My (old)
favorite is Robert Coleman’s Master Plan of Evangelism; my (new)
favorite might be Discipling: How to Help Others Follow Jesus by
Mark Dever. Both are simple reads. The former tracing Jesus’
pattern of discipleship; the latter giving practical instructions on
“helping others follow Jesus,” which is Dever’s simple definition
of discipling. If you have never read a book on discipleship, I’d

recommend you pick up one of these two — then read the other.
In the meantime, let’s try to put a few how-tos in place, with or
without any prerequisite reading. Without limiting or listing the
number of ways discipleship can be carried out, here are three
ways we might conceive of discipleship.
Discipleship by preaching — All discipleship begins with this

core spiritual discipline. While preaching by itself is inadequate
for maturing a disciple; it is not nothing. Therefore, biblically and
practically, it is the place to begin.
Discipleship by association — The fundamental means of
discipleship is initiating a relationship (formal or informal) that
helps another follow Jesus. Such association may come through
adoption (a Christian man reaching out and “adopting” a younger
Christian man), enlistment (a younger Christian woman prayerfully
58
seeking an older Christian woman), or conversion (a man receives

Christ, whereby the Christian witness is now responsible to give
this baby Christian spiritual milk)
Discipleship logistics — In any trade, a skillful apprentice needs
good tools. The same is true with disciple-making. Thus, (1) the local
church, (2) intentional conversations, (3) scheduled appointments,
and (4) good biblical resources are four ways discipleship can and
should be implemented.
Truly, these elements only scratch the surface of disciple-making,

but in the next few weeks I hope to return to them to outline
somewhat of a basic “how-to” for biblical discipleship. Today,
let’s just consider the first aspect of discipleship by preaching.
DISCIPLESHIP BY PREACHING
Biblical discipleship begins with a biblical pulpit. For example,
Acts 14:21–22 reads, “When they had preached the gospel to that
city and had made many disciples, they returned to Lystra and to
WHAT HAS PREACHING TO DO WITH DISCIPLESHIP?
Iconium and to Antioch, strengthening the souls of the disciples,

encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying that through
many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God.”
From these two verses we find two principles for discipleship.
First, all disciples are made through preaching — in one form
or another.
Because faith comes by hearing the gospel (Rom 10:17), Christ-
centered, gospel-rich preaching is the starting point. For no matter
how good a “discipleship program” a church has; it’s disciple-
making won’t rise above its preaching. Why? Because pastors are
the lead exemplar for sharing the gospel, reading the Scripture,
and applying the Bible to all of life.
By implication, a gospel-centered pulpit (shorthand for the
weekly preaching of any local church) should result in gospel-
centered members who are motivated and equipped to “preach”
the gospel. In this way, the pulpit is not set against the pews, but
59
rather the clear preaching of the gospel on Sunday empowers
church members to proclaim the gospel through the week —
hence, increasing the decibel level of the gospel. A disciple-
making church, therefore, is centered on and sent out by a
gospel-centered pulpit.
“Disciple-making,” therefore, as a church-wide passion will
rise or fall with its emphasis (or the lack thereof ) from the
pulpit. In Paul’s ministry, his preaching called for conversion —
i.e., repentance and faith (Acts 20:21) — and conformity to the
whole counsel of God (Acts 20:27). As someone who modeled
personal discipleship, Paul’s preaching was the starting point
for disciple-making.
In our day, conversion may come in a Sunday service or a Tuesday
lunch meeting. But the abiding truth remains: disciples are born
by the preaching of the Word. So, we ask: What is the church
making who has a complex system for “discipleship,” but little
emphasis on the Word of God? Discipleship does not end with
gospel preaching, but it must begin with it.
Second, all disciples need the Word to strengthen and encourage

them.
Because the Great Commission calls for making disciples who
obey all that Jesus’ commanded, not converts who merely “pray
a prayer,” ongoing teaching is necessary. More exactly, disciples
need to be strengthened by the Word and encouraged by people
who know them.
As Paul and Barnabas returned to the churches in Galatia in Acts
14, they did both. When they traveled to be with the churches they
had planted in Galatia, Luke records how they were “strengthening
the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the
faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter
the kingdom of God” (v. 22).
Later, Paul would write the Galatians a whole letter to strengthen
them in their faith and to make sure that false teachers did not lead
them astray. He did this with many of his churches, and hence so
60
much of our disciple-making efforts today depend on his church-

directed letters.
Indeed, Christ’s disciples always need the Word of God and they
need faithful teachers to help them understand what it means
and how it applies. Every local church should have these gifted
teachers — they are called elders. But local churches should also
have other non-elders (godly, mature men and women) who give
themselves to imparting biblical truth to others.
A DISCIPLE-MAKING CHURCH
While every church has its own idiosyncrasies, a disciple-making
church is marked by a committed group of disciples meeting
regularly to hear the word of God, so that from the overflow of their
hearts they might “teach and admonish one another in all wisdom,
singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness
in your hearts to God” (Col. 3:16).
Indeed, disciple-making is not complex. It just takes consistency
and enduring focus on the Christ-centered, gospel-rich message of
WHAT HAS PREACHING TO DO WITH DISCIPLESHIP?
the Bible. For this reason, preaching and hearing the gospel (from
one of the pastors and from one another) is the starting point for
all disciple-making in the local church.
May God fill our hearts with the riches of Christ’s Word, so that
we might be a church of disciples who make disciples.
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12
The centrality of the

Bible in preaching
In a chaotic culture, pastors must rely on
the power of God’s Word alone to break
through the noise.
BY MICHAEL POHLMAN
C
ountry music artist Kenny Chesney sums up the current
cultural milieu facing the Christian preacher in his new
song “Noise,” as he laments the chaotic world of countless
competing “voices” vying for our allegiance:
Twenty-four hour television, gets so loud that no one listens

Sex and money and politicians talk, talk, talk
But there really ain’t no conversation
Ain’t nothing left to the imagination
Trapped in our phones and we can’t make it stop, stop
So, in our noisy world, how is a preacher to be heard? What hope

do we have that our words won’t fall on deaf ears? How can we be
confident that our sermons will cut through the noise?
WHAT THE BIBLE IS

If the preacher is going to be heard in our day, then his words must
be of a qualitatively different nature than all of the other words
offered today. The preacher’s words must be more powerful, more
beautiful, more winsome, and more compelling than the world’s
words. And these we have in the Bible.

Indeed, because of what the Bible is, the preacher must make it
central to his sermon if he would be heard in all this noise.
I love to remind my students that in addition to the doctrine
of God, the doctrine of Scripture is the most important doctrine
for the preacher. What we believe about the Bible authorizes our
sermons and assures us that things of eternal significance are
happening when we expound a given text of Scripture. Take, for
example, one aspect of our doctrine of Scripture: its inspiration.
When we say the Scripture is “inspired,” we mean it is “God-
breathed” — that is, a product of God’s Spirit. This is what the
Apostle Paul teaches when he says, “All Scripture is breathed out
by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction,
and for training in righteousness” (2 Tim 3:16).
The word translated “breathed out by God” is theopneustos. This
word is formed from two words theos (God) and pneo (to blow,
64
breathe on). Therefore, what we have in the Scriptures is “God’s

breath” in written form.
The Apostle Peter likewise identifies the words of Scripture
with God’s words when he explains the supernatural origin of the
Bible: “For no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own
interpretation, for no prophecy was ever produced by the will of
man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the
Holy Spirit” (2 Pet 1:20-21). In these verses Peter captures the
breathtaking reality of God’s activity of breathing the Scriptures
and the human activity of writing. Indeed, “men spoke from God
as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.”
The author of Hebrews, in discussing the divine nature of
Scripture, makes this astonishing claim: “For the Word of God
is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing
to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and
discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart” (Heb 4:12).
The Bible, as God’s Word, is qualitatively different than any
other word in the world.
THE CENTRALITY OF THE BIBLE IN PREACHING
WHAT THE BIBLE DOES

If the preacher is going to be heard in our day, then his words must
have the power to hold and move people Godward.
When the preacher declares what the Bible says, he is proclaiming
the very words of God. And God’s words have power. In the opening
pages of the Bible we read, “And God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and
there was light” (Gen 1:3). When God speaks, things like light come
into being — and oceans and mountains and skies and plants and
animals. God’s Word has a creative power to make something
from nothing.
Even more astounding is what God’s Word does in salvation.
Consider how the Apostle Paul compares God’s power in creation
to his creative power in awakening sinners: “For God, who said,
‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give
the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus
Christ” (2 Cor 4:6). Indeed, a Christian is one who has been “born
65
again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the
living and abiding word of God” (1 Pet 1:23). We must keep the
Bible central in preaching because we know that the Bible alone
has the power to create faith: “Faith comes through hearing and
hearing by the word of Christ” (Rom 10:14).
But we would be woefully shortsighted if we stopped here. For
God not only uses his Word to convert sinners, but to sanctify saints
as well. Jesus made it clear when he gave his Great Commission
that God’s people will grow in discipleship as they are taught the
Scriptures: “And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in
heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make
disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father
and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe
all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always,
to the end of the age’” (Matt 28:18-20).
We will labor to keep the Bible central in preaching because
God’s people are built up in the faith by teaching them the whole
counsel of God (Acts 20:27).
GOD’S WORD ALONE

We must keep the Bible central in our preaching. Every preacher
worthy of the name loves the response of Peter to the question
Jesus asked him as the crowds were leaving in droves: “Do you
want to go as well?” Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom
shall we go? You have the words of eternal life” (John 6:67-68).
Our world is a chaotic concert of noise. The countless siren songs
of the world are powerful and dangerously alluring. The noise
of our day has made millions of people deaf to the truth of God.
Knowing this, preachers are desperate to cut through the noise.
The temptation to part from the Bible and adopt other means of
reaching people is real. But to do so would be a tragic mistake, for
God’s Word alone has the power to overwhelm the world’s noise.
66
Resources
FURTHER READING
On the Preparation and Delivery of Sermons, John A. Broadus
He is Not Silent: Preaching in a Postmodern World, R. Albert Mohler Jr.
Nine Marks of a Healthy Church, Mark Dever
A Guide to Expository Ministry, Dan Dumas, ed.
Preaching With Bold Assurance, Hershael York and Bert Decker
Encountering God Through Expository Preaching, Jim Orrick, Brian

Payne, and Ryan Fullerton
Between Two Worlds: The Challenge of Preaching Today, John Stott
Preaching and Preachers, D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones
The Supremacy of God in Preaching, John Piper
Rediscovering Expository Preaching, John MacArthur
Feed My Sheep: A Passionate Plea for Preaching, Don Kistler, ed.
The Center for Christian Preaching

The Center for Christian Preaching is an international center
that is unapologetically committed to modeling and promoting
expository preaching.
Details at sbts.edu/preaching
DOCTORAL DEGREES IN PREACHING OFFERED BY

THE SOUTHERN BAPTIST THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY
Doctor of Ministry in Expository Preaching

Designed to equip pastors and other church leaders in the skills
of sermon preparation and public exposition of the Scriptures,
the Doctor of Ministry in Expository Preaching is founded upon
the belief that the health of the local church is grounded in the
preaching of the Word of God.
Doctor of Philosophy in Christian Preaching

The Ph.D. in Christian Preaching prepares pastor-theologians to
not only develop and deliver Christ-centered sermons but also
equip the next generation of ministers to do the same. This degree
is offered in a modular format and trains students in the biblical,
historical, theological, and homiletical components of preaching.
68
More details at sbts.edu/degrees.

Contributors
Brian Croft is senior pastor of Auburndale Baptist Church in
Louisville, Kentucky, and is the founder of Practical Shepherding,
Inc. He is also senior fellow for the Mathena Center for Church
Revitalization and an adjunct professor at The Southern Baptist
Theological Seminary. He is the author of several books including
The Pastor’s Ministry and Biblical Church Revitalization. He is the
husband of Cara and father of four children.
Dan Dumas is special assistant to the President at Southern

Seminary. He is a church planter and pastor-teacher at Crossing
Church in Louisville. He is the author of Live Smart, the co-author
of A Guide to Biblical Manhood, and the editor of A Guide to Expository
Ministry. Dan is married to Jane and has two children.
Michael A.G. Haykin serves as professor of church history and

biblical spirituality and as director of The Andrew Fuller Center for
Baptist Studies. Haykin is the author of numerous books including
Rediscovering the Church Fathers: Who They Were and How They
Shaped the Church and Eight Women of Faith. Haykin and his wife,
Alison, have two grown children.
Timothy Paul Jones is C. Edwin Gheens Professor of Christian

Family Ministry, associate vice president for the Global Campus,
and pastor at Sojourn Midtown. Jones has authored or contributed
to more than a dozen books, including PROOF, Conspiracies and
the Cross, Perspectives on Family Ministry, and Christian History
Made Easy. He is married to Rayann and they have three daughters.
Michael Pohlman is assistant professor and department chair

of Christian preaching at Southern Seminary. He is also pastor of
Cedar Creek Baptist Church in Louisville. He is married to Anna
and they have four children.
David E. Prince is assistant professor of preaching at Southern

Seminary and is pastor of Ashland Avenue Baptist Church in
Lexington, Kentucky. He is the author of In the Arena: The Promise
of Sports for Christian Discipleship and The Church with Jesus as the Hero.
He is married to Judi and they have eight children.
R. Albert Mohler Jr. serves as president of The Southern Baptist

Theological Seminary and as Joseph Emerson Brown Professor of
Christian Theology. Mohler hosts two programs: “The Briefing,” a
daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview; and
“Thinking in Public,” conversations with today’s leading thinkers. He
is the author of several books, including He Is Not Silent, The Conviction
to Lead, and We Cannot Be Silent. He is married to Mary, and they have
two grown children.
Tom J. Nettles is senior professor of historical theology at Southern

70
Seminary. Among his books are By His Grace and For His Glory and
Baptists and the Bible, co-authored with Dr. Russ Bush; and Why I
Am a Baptist, co-edited with Russell D. Moore. He is married to
Margaret and they have three grown children.
Jeff Robinson is editor of Southern Equip, pastor of Christ

Fellowship Church in Louisville, senior editor for The Gospel
Coalition, adjunct professor of church history at Southern, and
senior research and teaching associate for the Andrew Fuller
Center. He is co-author with Michael A. G. Haykin of To the Ends
of the Earth: Calvin’s Missional Vision and Legacy and co-editor with
D. A. Carson of Coming Home: Essays on the New Heaven and New
Earth. Jeff and his wife, Lisa, have four children.
David Schrock serves as preaching pastor at Occoquan Bible

Church in Woodbridge, Virginia, and adjunct professor of
systematic theology for Boyce College and Southern Seminary.
David and wife, Wendy, have three sons.
CONTRIBUTORS
Hershael W. York serves as Victor and Louise Lester Professor

of Christian Preaching at Southern Seminary. He is also senior
pastor at Buck Run Baptist Church in Frankfort, Kentucky. He is
the co-author of Preaching with Bold Assurance. He is married to
Tanya and they have two grown sons.
71
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A growing collection of resources for

the growing challenges of ministry
F I N D T H E S E R E S O U R C E S A N D M O R E AT E Q U I P. S B T S . E D U
Preach Staying at the What

holiness for church for the elements
we are not long haul should family
frightened Hershael York
worship
enough include?
Jeff Robinson John Divito
- a publication of -
For Southern’s Admissions office:

call (502) 897-4200 or email
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ESSENTIAL READING ON

R. ALBERT MOHLER JR.

Southern Equip c/o Communications

Southern Equip is a division of The Southern Baptist

Printed in the United States of America.

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English

03 Preaching in a secular age 43 ‘A power to move men:’

31 Preaching for conversions 67 Resources

THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF BELIEF

islands of Europe on American soil. Consider for instance the

Berger predicted that this collapse would result in adherents

tenure at a major American university is to inhabit a world in which

of its population being coastal, urban, and university-educated,

PREACHING: THE CHURCH’S MEANS OF SURVIVAL

there are benefits to specialization in academic disciplines, we

work of instilling our people with a Christian worldview. The

Why some preachers

not remember him. “You had no reason to,” he explained. “I was

written word — on screens, smartphones, blogs, Kindles, and now

5. PAY THE PRICE

gospel-proclaiming, expository preaching has turned into, well,

Scriptures” (Luke 24:27). It’s the kind of preaching commanded in

to spend time studying week-in and week-out, praying through the

Whether you’re in a church with consistently edifying sermons

CHRIST IS THE CENTER AND GOAL OF EVERY

explains his homiletical method as focusing on “the being and

Thus, Brainerd’s normal expositional pathway was:

CHRIST IS THE SUBSTANCE OF EVERY BIBLICAL

If I treated on the being and glorious perfections of God, I was

It is important to note that for Brainerd preaching Christ from

CHRIST IS THE CENTER IN WHICH ALL THE LINES OF

to Cornelius, and “wondered to see him so quickly introduce the

PROMOTE MORALITY BY PREACHING CHRIST

rests on the foundational gospel indicative and is consequential.

Brainerd believed that according to Christ and his apostles,

corruption, while the root of all vice remains still untouched”

THE SOUL-HUMBLING DOCTRINES OF GRACE BRING

This article originally appeared on the blog, Prince on Preaching.

1. PRAY AND READ SCRIPTURE

2. KNOW YOUR LIMITATIONS

4. ASSIGN ACHIEVABLE TASKS

GOSPEL PREACHING AND POPULARITY

the way people are is widely assumed to be the inescapable result

WHAT I LEARNED AT A FUNERAL

recognition of the utter bankruptcy of theological liberalism. The

of Canterbury, William Laud, had set out to suppress the Puritan

A “CLEAR SHINING FROM GOD”

Presbyterian preacher, at St. Mary’s Church, Aldermanbury. On

PREACHING BEFORE PARLIAMENT

IRELAND AND OXFORD

How is it that Jesus Christ is in Ireland only as a lion staining all

work on holiness came out of his preaching during this period.

“THE CHURCH IN A STORM”

number of Cromwell’s fellow Puritan leaders, fearful that Britain

Hebrews appeared between 1668 and 1684. A Discourse Concerning the

‘A power to move men’

article titled “Educating a Preacher,” the editor of the Baptist

The writer then clinched his analysis through anecdote:

A Virginia planter, having heard Broadus preach, rose to make a

educating a preacher makes him talk that way, I want to help.”

Though his talent in public declamation clearly exceeded most of

Ten years later, preaching in the Confederate camps, he remarked

proclaim the truths … so new to every needy heart, of sovereignty