Blog – Page 224 – Christ the Truth

A theology of preaching – part 4

GlenJune 18, 2009Leave a comment

Go to theology network for the full paper on preaching. I'll post it here in chunks. Be great to talk about it if you want to comment.

We've made the claim that preaching is God's word when Christ is proclaimed biblically. Now we will tease out some implications of this central conviction:

Christ must be proclaimed biblically.

We proclaim Him (Colossians 1:28). The point of the sermon is not to inspire certain feelings, to convey certain doctrines, to enjoin certain ethics, to dissect certain passages. The point of the proclaimed word is precisely the point of the written word – to witness the eternal Word (See John 5:36-47). We don’t preach Luke or Ecclesiastes. We preach Christ from Luke or Ecclesiastes.

Perhaps the Lord’s Supper provides a helpful analogy (it too is proclamation – 1 Cor 11:26). Just as the point of communion is the receiving of Christ by faith, so the point of the sermon is the same. He is as vital for sinners as bread to the famished. He is as available to sinners as the bread on the table. And in preaching, as in the sacraments, He is handed over to sinners for their nourishment. Where Christ is received by faith, proclamation has done its work. Where Christ is not graciously held out to the congregation the preacher has spoken in vain and the people go hungry.

What does this mean for the ‘application’ of the sermon

Often ‘application’ is taken to mean distilling the text into timeless doctrinal propositions to be turned into contemporary moral injunctions.

preaching 1

Application on this understanding is a discrete portion of the sermon. Once the preacher is done explaining, then come exhortations about our practical response. Usually the application is something along the lines of ‘read your bible, pray, evangelize.’ Occasionally it’s ‘Give money, cut out the porn, volunteer more.’

Now besides being a suspect view of sanctification, this betrays a deficient view of revelation. Here the bible is ‘God’s instruction manual for life.’ The preacher is the expert coach. And Christ? Where is Christ on this understanding?

On the analogy with communion, such preaching is like the minister pressing into our hands not bread but a ‘To do’ list. We leave the communion rail (or rise from the sermon) not so much savouring Christ as resolving to improve. Not glorying in His work but plotting our own.

But what if we took to heart the theology of revelation outlined here? In that case application would be by the pointed driving home of the gospel.

On this model, application is not what we must do on account of the word. Rather, application is what the word itself is doing to us and in us. The Word is being applied to our hearts in lively, surprising, evocative, nourishing ways to the end that He might be trusted. We hear in order to believe (Rom 10:14). This is the work of God – faith (John 6:29). The work of God for which the preacher aims is not so much what the congregation will do on Monday morning having been inspired by the word. The work of God is what God Himself does to the congregation right there in the Sunday sermon.

Application then is the Spirit’s work in driving home the Christ whom we proclaim. It is a work which we cannot perform as preachers but to which we are called nonetheless. In prayerful dependence we follow the way of witness in the Scriptures as they point to Christ. And we point, too. With excitement, with passion, with entreaty. And we say as Moses did regarding the bronze serpent: Look and live!

A theology of preaching – part 3

GlenJune 18, 2009Leave a comment

Go to theology network for the full paper on preaching. I'll post it here in chunks. Be great to talk about it if you want to comment.

The Word of God

In saying that preaching is itself the word of God, it should be made clear that the bible has a vital role. The law and the prophets proclaim the gospel of the Son in advance – a gospel which was ‘according to the Scriptures’. The apostles attest its finished truth and significance for the global church. Both Old and New Testaments are the Spirit's perfect and authoritative testimony to the Son. This completed canon stands above the church as its infallible rule and the test for all its proclamation. It is enduringly and entirely the word of God written.

Yet, to be true to these same Scriptures, we must confess that the title "God's word" does not simply apply to the bible. Already we have seen how the Son is originally and definitively ‘the Word of God’. But we can also identify a third sense in which it is right to use the phrase ‘word of God.’ The witness of the church – a Scriptural, Spirit-empowered, Christ-focused witness – can also be called ‘the word of God’.

Consider how the book of Acts describes the growth of the word.

Acts 6:7: And the word of God continued to increase

Acts 12:24: But the word of God increased and multiplied.

Acts 13:49: The word of the Lord spread through the whole region

Acts 19:20: In this way the word of the Lord spread widely and grew in power.

Where there is Scripture-consonant, Spirit-empowered witness to Christ, not only does the church grow - the word grows. And it is God's word, His presence and power attending and enlivening it.

Consider also these verses from the epistles:

“…when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you believers.” (1 Thessalonians 2:13)

“You have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God; ²⁴ for "All flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls, ²⁵ but the word of the Lord remains forever." And this is the word that was evangelized to you.” (1 Pet 1:23-25)

“Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God.” (Hebrews 13:7)

So we see that the reformers did not overstate their claims. The preacher’s lips are speaking God’s living and active word! What does this mean?

Recently I sat in a friend’s living room on a Tuesday afternoon. There were about ten teenagers present and we had John chapter 20 open on our laps. I looked them in the eye and told them that the risen Christ had entered this living room and was confronting each one of us in a way more blessed than Thomas’s own encounter (this is the clear implication of verses 29-31). I called on them all to confess Christ as their own Lord and God to receive the life that was on offer. Now, here’s the question. If they refused to do so, had they merely disobeyed me? Had they merely disobeyed Glen Scrivener the preacher? No, to refuse my words in this context is to refuse Christ Himself.

When are the preacher’s words God’s?

Here is a vital question. What is the context in which such feeble and faltering human words carry divine authority? I rarely expect teenagers to notice my words let alone submit to them as divinely authoritative. In what context are my words to be heeded as God’s?

The first thing to say is that the initiative lies entirely in the hands of the Speaking God. No human technique conjures Christ into the upper room. Equally no locked doors can keep Him out! Revelation is always grace. So then, perhaps we should rephrase our question. Not, How can we bring God’s word down? But, How is it that God chooses to speak through our human words of witness?

Here is my central conviction:

At God’s initiative, preaching is God’s own word when Christ is proclaimed according to the Scriptures.

This draws together the three senses in which we have spoken of the ‘word of God’: Christ, Scripture and proclamation.

This is the key context. And we must be wise to perceive when this context holds. We still listen as Bereans to discern its biblical character (Acts 17:11). We still ‘test the spirits’ to discern its Christ-focus (1 John 4:1-3). If proclamation fails these tests it fails to be proclamation. Yet where Christ is proclaimed biblically there we can (and we must!) prayerfully expect divine encounter.

Before we go on, you will notice that this context is not an institutional or situational context. It is not God’s word because it is Sunday, this is a pulpit, and the preacher is ordained. The context I am putting forward could apply to any number of situations – a bible study, a drink with friends, a greeting card, even a text message. We can speak words of immeasurable comfort to one another in a thousand different situations. Yet the focus of this paper will be on preaching to the congregation gathered around word and sacrament by those the Second Helvetic Confession referred to as ‘lawfully called’. It is not that genuine proclamation only occurs in the Sunday sermon or only from the lips of the ordained. Not at all. But there especially we are to prayerfully expect the voice of the living Christ.

How to put on a pre-evangelistic event

GlenJune 17, 2009Leave a comment

Follow my simple scheme:

STEP 1: Ask yourself this question. What is more attractive than Jesus? Let's call this thing X.

STEP 2: Lift X high. Be loud. Be proud.

STEP 3: Celebrate a job well done when unbelievers agree that X really is better than Jesus.

Presto!

Evangelistic talk for youth

GlenJune 17, 2009Leave a comment

stefliston Stef Liston preaching to youth in an evangelistic meeting last month. It was part of Bible by the Beach 2009.

It was an absolute pleasure to be there. I'm glad I stumbled on the blog link this week given I'm blogging on preaching. This is a great example of holding out the word of life.

It's called "One kind of God, three kinds of people." (No it's not on the trinity.) He begins by demolishing all other gods than the Christian God.

There is no other message than the Christian message.

Every other 'message' is not a message at all. Ultimately, if you get beneath the jargon into the content, every religion says this: Try harder... Do better. Come on. If you just... If you just... If you just... then maybe. If you just, then who knows. If you just, then you could be in it.

Christianity is completely different. It's a declaration of what's been done.

The good news is 'It is finished'. It has been done. Now you just come into what has been done for you.

Then he gives the gospel as the vicarious life, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus. (And yes he used the word vicarious, repeatedly. Unashamedly. Glorious!)

Then he goes on to talk about Luke 15 - the lost sons. He talks about three kinds of people.

First there's the naughty sinner. Second there's the nice sinner. Different temperaments, both as lost, both as far from God.

If your Christianity consists of reading your bible, praying and not swearing that is as foreign to Christianity as Islam.

You need to be a category three person: You must be born again.

What is the stance of the person who is born again? It's not kneeling. It's standing in the Father's embrace.

Throw yourself into His arms.

Listen here.

A theology of preaching – part 2

GlenJune 16, 2009Leave a comment

Go to theology network for the full paper on preaching. I'll post it here in chunks. Be great to talk about it if you want to comment.

The Speaking God

Let’s begin at the beginning. Our God is the Speaking God. The eternal life of Father, Son and Spirit has ever been an out-going, communicative life. Because our God simply is Trinity there has never been such a thing as a God who then comes to speech. Arius was wrong. There is not a God who then has a Word. God’s existence does not precede His expression. Rather God’s expression, His Word, is eternally constitutive of His life. God is always and eternally the Speaking God. To encounter His Word is not to be obstructed or distanced from a divine reality behind His disclosure. Rather to receive His Word is to be drawn into the depths of His eternal reality as the Speaking God. Revelation, as the unfolding of God's own life in Word and Spirit, is not simply what He does. It is who He is.

From the overflow of this communicative life came creation. Again, by His Word and through the Spirit, God brought all things into being (Genesis 1; Psalm 33:6; John 1:1-4). The universe exists in correspondence to God's Word. "God said... and it was." This means that to be is to be an obedient hearer of the Word. The universe is His congregation and, derivatively, His herald (Psalm 19:1-6). Humanity, as the pinnacle of creation, is supremely called to appropriate God’s revelation. Our vocation, not simply as Christians but as creatures, is to receive the Word. And in receiving the Word we participate in the life of the Speaking God.

What is more, He comes to participate in our life. In incarnation, the Word comes not simply to man or even just in man, but as man. God’s revelation could not be louder or clearer. The Word, Jesus Christ, reveals His Father through His words and actions (e.g. John 14:5-11). Both these words and actions were committed to Him by the Father (e.g. John 5:19ff; 8:26,38; 10:37f; 15:15; 17:6,14). These words were entrusted to the disciples and these actions were witnessed and remembered by them, all through the power of the Spirit (e.g John 16:12-15). In the power of that same Spirit, these disciples proclaimed them to the world (e.g. John 20:21-23; Acts 1:8). The world’s response to this witness is their response to Christ, and their response to Christ is their response to the Father (e.g. John 14:22-26).

To put it another way, the Father Himself confronts us in the Person of His Son and the Son Himself confronts us in the Spirit-empowered words of His messengers (e.g. Matthew 10:40). From Father to Son, from Son to His bride and so out into the world the Spirit carries divine revelation.

Contemporary proclamation is not simply the remembrance of past events or the recitation of ancient words. To proclaim this Word in the power of this Spirit is to stand in a stream of revelation which both preceded and produced the universe. Our words witnessing the Word have their source and authority in the Speaking God who graciously includes us in His ongoing life of self-disclosure.

A theology of preaching – part 1

GlenJune 15, 2009Leave a comment

Go to theology network for my paper on preaching in full. Here I'll post it in chunks. Be good to talk about it if you want to comment...

Introduction

It is often said that the real issue in preaching is not ‘How to?’ but ‘How can?’ How can a preacher stand before a congregation and dare to speak ‘In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit’? The ‘How can?’ is by far the more pressing question. And yet, in the textbooks, at the conferences and in preaching groups it seems the ‘How to?’ is the perennial concern. Notes or full script? Powerpoint or no? Topical sermons or lectio continua? These questions abound. Even issues like ‘how to address the heart?’ or ‘how to preach wisdom literature?’ threaten to drown out proper theological reflection. All the while the ‘How can?’ question stands above our practice demanding an answer.

Our silence on this issue could simply reflect the pragmatic spirit of our age. We want to know what ‘works’ so we can copy it. But I suggest there is a deeper problem. Fundamentally we have an impoverished theology of revelation which fails to appreciate what evangelicals from another age held dear – namely that God Himself addresses us in preaching.

Consider this classic statement of reformed faith from the Second Helvetic Confession:

“The Preaching of the Word of God is the Word of God. Wherefore when this Word of God is now preached in the church by preachers lawfully called, we believe that the very Word of God is proclaimed and received by the faithful.”

Luther would agree:

“Tis a right excellent thing, that every honest pastor’s and preacher’s mouth is Christ’s mouth, and his word and forgiveness is Christ’s word and forgiveness… For the office is not the pastor’s or preacher’s but God’s; and the Word which he preacheth is likewise not the pastor’s and preacher’s but God’s.”

Or consider this from John Calvin:

“When a man has climbed up into the pulpit… it is [so] that God may speak to us by the mouth of a man.”

The reformers viewed preaching as God’s own word proclaimed in His name, by His power and with His authority. More to the point this is the bible’s own teaching, as we’ll see. Proclamation of the word of Christ is not simply an explanation and application of the bible. It is itself a divine encounter in which the Spirit again confronts the hearers with the omnipotent force of God’s own Word.

In the face of such an audacious claim, the ‘How to?’ must be put on hold. This paper seeks a theology of revelation that is able to address the question ‘How can a preacher dare to speak the word of the LORD?’ What is the nature of divine revelation such that this is even possible? Once we have we addressed this we will find that the ‘How to?’ has been decisively and much more faithfully shaped.

Thick skin, open heart

GlenJune 13, 2009Leave a comment

In his commentary on 1 Corinthians, David Prior speaks of prophets as having thick skin and open hearts. I think that's a good definition. And quite apt given our recent discussions on personality etc.

Think of Jesus, the Servant:

⁴ The Sovereign LORD has given me an instructed tongue,
       to know the word that sustains the weary.
       He wakens me morning by morning,
       wakens my ear to listen like one being taught.

⁵ The Sovereign LORD has opened my ears,
and I have not been rebellious;
I have not drawn back.

⁶ I offered my back to those who beat me,
       my cheeks to those who pulled out my beard;
       I did not hide my face
       from mocking and spitting.

⁷ Because the Sovereign LORD helps me,
       I will not be disgraced.
       Therefore have I set my face like flint,
       and I know I will not be put to shame.

⁸ He who vindicates me is near.
       Who then will bring charges against me?
       Let us face each other!
       Who is my accuser?
       Let him confront me!

⁹ It is the Sovereign LORD who helps me.
       Who is he that will condemn me?
       They will all wear out like a garment;
       the moths will eat them up.

The Father gives Him words of comfort for the sheep and He is sensitive both to the Father's help and the people's need. But He is also 'like flint' for the opposition that will come.

Often we simply have thin skin and mistake that for kindness. Or we have a hard heart and mistake that for bold defence of the truth. But no, Jesus shows the way - Thick skin, open heart.

Friday Fun

GlenJune 12, 2009January 30, 2014Leave a comment

Growing up, Friday used to mean John Clarke and Bryan Dawe doing their 3 minute spoof interviews at the end of current affairs programme The 730 Report.

Good example of Australian humour. Hope you enjoy them.

Front Fell Off

Iraq

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-fssfdTXdU&feature=related

Does the gospel create homogenous personalities? 11

GlenJune 10, 200911 Comments

Here's a question Rich Owen asked me. I've included my answer, but I thought it would be great to get your opinions too. This is the question:

To what extent does the gospel require a homogenisation of personality?

I'm thinking about bearing with one another, rebuking one another, kindness... the hard edge of graciousness and integrity... but gentleness etc. So as a simplistic example...

Person A is really very nice. Wouldn't say boo to a goose, tends to fall in line even if reservations are bubbling in the background - thinking very positively about others, perhaps naively, so is always looking for smooth and non confrontaional paths in dealing with people. It is not always obvious what they think about things because everything is tempered with caveats because they are gentle people in every way not seeking to offend.

Person B is also very nice but is very gritty, calls a spade a spade etc. Doesn't fall in line without having to be persuaded. Thinks very highly of others and so in love calls things pretty black and white - calls sin sin, points right at pride and invites others to be just as direct with them. They think positively about others, but analyse and challenge - likewise not seeking to offend - but knowing how pride works want to expose it directly.

These personality types are partly "considered" in that is what they want to be and think is best, but they also reflect how someone naturally is - some people are more gritty than others etc.

Anyway - that is my already unhelpfully stereotyped situation.

under those maxims of bearing with one another, etc should person B attempt to be more like person A so that person A hears them better? should person A be a bit more bullish so that there is more clarity and person B knows exactly where they are going?

does the gospel require these people to deny self in the sense that they are naturally fluffy or gritty, and as they move towards the other, modify personality to be more like each other... a homogenisation?

Here's my answer:

I wrote a series of posts on personality, idols, repentance, gifts, service, maturity etc here, here, here and here.

Basically I think there are four elements to consider:

1) God-given temperament. The triune God loves diversity. When humans make ice we make ice cubes, when the Father makes ice He makes snowflakes and all that,

2) Idolatry which takes hold of our natural differences and creates idols that we serve and imitate (this is an all-pervasive part of 'personality'). For instance, the world, flesh and devil take hold of a person with an above average IQ to make them worship and serve their brain, or intelligence in general, or being right or knowledgeable or whatever.

3) In Christ there is repentance for this idolatry which will mean acting against type. 2) means that a naturally sweet disposition will in some large part arise from flesh-dynamics that simply want to justify self, protect from relational pain, pursue some idol of 'niceness'. Such a sweet person's repentance will involve assertiveness, standing up for truth etc while the bruque person's repentance will involve the reverse.

but also,

4) In Christ there is spiritual gifting which will very often redeem those God-given temperaments from 1). The same Spirit through Whom I was made is the Spirit who gifts me in Christ. He gifts me and gives me to the body of Christ in my distinctness to be a member of this diverse church.

1) and 4) are the pre-redemption and post-redemption celebrations of diversity. I think the last thing God wants is homogeneity. The devil through the idolatry of 2) shoves us into some very bland temperamental boxes. In this sense homogenisation is satanic. Dan Allender talks about how a woman's flesh-dynamics lead her really only to three basic categories: good girl, party girl and tough girl. There's a billion ways of being a woman if we live out our identity in Christ, there's only a few very narrow ones if we don't.

So yes broadly speaking I think repentance will look different for different people. (e.g. party girl should take responsibility, good girl should let go, tough girl should sweeten up.) But that's not because there's some 'average girl' in the middle that Christ is shepherding womankind towards! Following Christ will mean expressing our God-given, Spirit-redeemed diversity not squishing us into some homogenous mould.

Some follow-up questions to consider:

If the gospel doesn't create homogenous personalities then why do our churches, not to mention our ministry training bodies, churn them out??
Why is 'being nice' the bland medium that defines so much of our Christianity??
Is there space for confrontation in our homogenized churches??

“Because we’re supposed to”

glenscrivJune 9, 2009Leave a comment

I just finished a preaching group where a fine preacher gave a fine talk on Judges 14. At the end he included a sentence about 'another Saviour who came to deliver His people eternally'. That sort of thing. He didn't make anything of the point and he didn't mention the name 'Jesus', but he included the sentence.

During the feedback session I asked him in as non-leading a way as possible, "Why did you include that sentence about Jesus?"

Quick as a flash another student answered "Because we're supposed to."

Let me ask:

Do we preach Christ from the OT "because we're supposed to" or because the Hebrew Scriptures are already and inherently a witness to Christ?

Is the 'Jesus bit' a token effort to fulfil some preaching requirement? Or is Jesus actually witnessed in and through the passage?

Is Jesus as incidental to the proclamation of this passage as those terrible jokes that are also tacked on?

Is it the preacher's job to 'bridge to Christ'? Or has God's word already done a good job of that?

Is Jesus forced into our sermons? Or is He present as the Ground, Grammar and Goal of the whole Scripture?

Congregations can really tell the difference between the former and the latter.

Churches where the former is the common practice often produce Christians who know that Jesus is very important. But they're not so sure why.

Preachers that follow this model can start to think that Jesus is a homiletical necessity, but not so much a spiritual one. So when they speak of God's sovereignty, the importance of holiness, the necessity of prayer, they give powerful illustrations and pointed applications. For these 'main points' of their sermon it's aged wine and the best of meats. But then at the end they give their people Jesus as though He's cod liver oil. Out of the blue, unappetising, supposedly good for you but we're not quite sure why.

Know what I mean?