Borrowed Light

As the Pendulum Swings: Commentary Preaching

August 19, 2015Mike Leake

The seasoned pastor stood into his pulpit with the audience ready to receive God’s Word. He had about five times the amount of people in his sanctuary as he normally would. Area churches had gathered together to have a sort of moving revival. One night they’d be at one guys church, the next night another. This guy was amped up about the opportunity.

What he said next floored me.

“I’m not really sure what the Bible says about this, but here is what I’d like to tell you this evening…” He went on to give us “a message from the Lord” that had nothing to do with God’s Word. For the sake of your understanding, I need to mention that this was not some sort of charismatic service where this fella was being anointed and then prophesying. This was just an old preacher who had a lot of opinions that he thought we needed to know.

I wish I could say that this guy was alone in his preaching style. But judging from the chorus of “Amen’s”, I fear that this is a bit more common than we’d like to admit. In fact if what I read in history books—and what other dear saints have told me—is correct, this was a pretty prominent way of preaching back in the day. Judging from studies done on the biblical ignorance of many professing Christians, I have to believe that there has indeed been a famish in our land.

But history tends to follow pendulum swings. The church is not immune. As finite and sinful human beings we have a tendency to bounce from one extreme to another—dancing around the truth along the way.

The Over-swing

In recent years I have witnessed a revival of expositional preaching. There are so many books out on how to do expository preaching. Seminaries are training young pastors to preach expositionally. It is being drilled in our heads to only preach what the text says, to make the main point of your sermon the main point of your text.

I praise God for this revival. Not for one moment will I say that I believe we need less expositional preaching.

Having said this, I think we preachers (especially those of us who are more inexperienced) can ride the horse of verse-by-verse expository preaching straight off a cliff. In so many books on expositional preaching I’ve seen whole sections devoted to the dangers of topical preaching. Seldom do I see sections devoted to a style of preaching that I think is about as dangerous; namely, what I like to call commentary preaching.

Commentary preaching is when a well-meaning pastor stands before the congregation and faithfully tells us what the Bible says. He walks through each verse providing a good commentary as he goes along. He then closes the Bible, prays, and expects God to do the work of using His Word in a way that it doesn’t return empty. While I admire this guys faith in God’s ability to use His Word, I don’t know that we can rightly call this preaching.

Bryan Chapell calls this a “pre-sermon” noting that “they dispense information about a text without relevant application from the text that helps listeners understand their obligations to Christ and his ministry to them.” (55) He then rightly notes that “information without applications yields frustration”. (56)

We rightly don’t want to be like one of those guys who just spouts out a verse and then spends the entire time on something he calls “application”. But in our efforts to not be “that guy” we’ve become another “that guy” and we aren’t feeding our sheep.

Think of it this way. If I always only plopped a big juicy rib-eye steak in front of a 3 month old at supper time—she’d die of starvation just as if I hadn’t fed her at all. The better method—if you want your three month old to eat steak—would be to put it in a blender and serve it to her in a way she can digest. And as you go along and she grows a bit, eventually you work towards showing her how to use a knife and start cutting it up herself.

That analogy breaks down at many points so don’t press it any further than you ought. All I’m trying to say is that a verse-by-verse running commentary doesn’t feed the sheep much better than topical preaching. You’re probably just training them how to be Job’s counselors—feeding them full of biblical truth but not helping them learn how to rightly apply it.

Let’s not over-swing and simply starve our sheep by another method.

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Photo source: here

Today in Blogworld 08.19.15

August 19, 2015Mike Leake

Pastor, You Need the Gospel Too

A great reminder for us pastors. We need the gospel too.

To Trade Love for Discernment is Not Love or Discernment

I appreciate what my friend Jared says here.

Is the Sabbath Still Relevant?

Good word here. Is the concept of “weekend” even biblical?

15 Centuries-Old Board Games

The nerd in me wants to try a few of these.

This is incredible. No way I’m still sitting there videotaping this:

Writing With Authority

August 18, 2015Mike Leake

It’d been an ongoing discussion. One of those that isn’t heated but its just a difference of opinion on how to “do church”. The guy I’d been going back and forth with stopped into my office and gave me an article from LifeWay on the very topic that we’d been discussing. The article agreed with him and not me. The article landed on my desk with the thud of authority. “See, I’ve go the dudes at LifeWay on my side in this one. The people who are experts and ‘in the know’ agree with me on this”.

When I saw the name on the article it jolted me. I know—at least online “know”—the guy who wrote the article. And here is the part where I risk sounding quite pretentious. I occasionally write for LifeWay too. I’ve got just as much ministry experience, just as many Twitter followers, just as many blog readers, etc. (By the way, I feel ridiculous even typing this out). But because on this particular occasion his article got published on the topic—he is presented as an authority on the matter.

It was such an unsettling situation for me. Because I wondered if on some occasion one of my articles had been presented as “an authority on the matter”. And that scares me because half the time I don’t really know what I’m talking about. That’s a bit of an overstatement, I realize, but I’m really not much of an expert on anything. Any article that I’ve had published by LifeWay hasn’t been because they sought me out as some sort of expert on the topic. I’ve written a piece, I’ve shared it with one of my connections at LifeWay, he’s got an open slot and so he publishes the thing. Simple as that.

And so here I was left uncertain of how to respond because the guys who are in charge of the SBC (LifeWay, doesn’t everyone know that?) have given their authoritative word on the topic. No matter what arguments I put together they didn’t matter as much anymore because some fella with way more knowledge and authority has already spoken definitively on the topic.

This little encounter has shaped the way I write articles and how I read. I’m still trying to figure out what I’m doing as a writer, but here are a few principles I’m trying to put in place:

1) Don’t write as if I’ve got the authoritative final say. Don’t appeal to my own authority or knowledge on a topic. Instead try to point people to sources. Ultimately, point people to the fountainhead of all truth and authority. Help people rely on the Spirit to shine a light on Christ through the Scriptures.

2) Don’t try to usurp a local pastor who loves Jesus and is doing his best to teach the Bible. Don’t write in such a way to foster discontent in the local body: i.e., “Most pastors don’t…” I don’t know most pastors and I never will. So I probably shouldn’t try to sound like I’ve got more knowledge and experience than I really do.

3) If something is just an untested opinion or theory I should let people know that. Don’t write in such a way that people will believe I’ve been doing something in ministry for the last fifteen years when I’ve never actually tried it on my own congregation. At the end of the day most of my writing shouldn’t be “here’s what worked for me” but more about expositing the Scriptures and pointing to Christ.

4) Don’t read as if people are definitive experts. They are only streams which flow from the fountain, as such they’ve likely got mud in the waters. Don’t check my brain at the door—but truly be a Berean.

Lastly, I simply want to remind you that the nature of the publishing industry has drastically changed in the past 10-15 years. Reading a published article back in the day likely did come from at least a semi-expert in the field. Today, any schmo can get published (I know this from personal experience). We can no longer assume that just because something has gotten published that it has been vetted.

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Photo source: here