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Piper, John The Supremacy of God in Preaching. Wheaton, Ill.: Baker Books, 2004. 121 pp. $13.99

In The Supremacy of God in Preaching, John Piper provides a unique perspective on the definition and goal of preaching. Piper states, “People are starving for the greatness of God,” and the only cure for that hunger is His greatness and majesty (13). To this end, then, Piper calls for “expository exultation” – that is, “not the opinions of a mere man,” but “the faithful exposition of God’s Word” (11).

With that definition in hand, Piper calls for a renewed understanding for the true goal of preaching. Preachers proclaim with Isaiah, “Your God reigns.” (Isa. 52:7) Piper quotes Cotton Mather, who calls preachers, “to restore the throne and dominion of God in the souls of men” (26). This then is the goal of preaching: “the glory of God reflected in the glad submission of the human heart” (29).

Part One of the book focuses on defending why God should be supreme in preaching, and in Part Two, Piper gives his reader insights regarding how to make it so. Piper leads his reader by the hand and encourages them to exalt and exist as those called to this task. He shares lessons and insights learned during his faithful and fruitful ministry, but more emphatically, shares those he has learned through his diligent, lifelong study of the great Jonathan Edwards.

John Piper’s primary critique with modern preaching is that they seem to have been taught to, “get the drift of a text and then talk in your own words for thirty minutes” (45). One wonders if this is an unintended result of the instruction of men such as Haddon Robinson, who writes, “an expositor communicates a concept,” in direct contradiction to communicating the very words of Scripture. Piper maintains that the effects of such preaching leaves the hearers wondering if the authority of the sermon is in the text or the preacher. The solution, then, is to actually quote the text and, “say the actual words of the text again and again. Show the people where your ideas are coming from” (88).

He also instructs the reader that, “good preaching pleads with people to respond to the Word of God” (96). Those who hold the sovereignty of God is “utterly crucial to everything else… believed about God,” such as Piper and Edwards have been accused, at times, of neglecting to call their hearers to respond to the proclaimed Word (78). While there have been examples of such error throughout church history, one cannot accuse Edwards of such hyper-Calvinistic neglect.

Critique

One would have preferred Piper had made a clearer distinction between Edwards’ teaching on stirring up his hearer’s affections versus affecting their emotions. Piper quotes Edwards as stating, “If true religion lies much in the affections, we may infer, that such a way of preaching the word… as has a tendency deeply to affect the hearts of those who attend… is much to be desired” (84). In saying this, Edwards encourages preachers to target the heart of their hearers. Yet only three pages later, Piper posits that, “Edwards can never be brought forward as one who manipulated emotions” (87). It seems that Piper is attempting to distinguish between affections and emotions, but his distinction simply is not all that clear.

Piper’s book, The Supremacy of God in Preaching, provides a much-needed, theologically-grounded, Christ-exalting way forward for those charged with opening and heralding the Word of God. He excels in areas that other preaching texts fail by staying above the mechanics of sermon development and delivery. Rather than entering into the study with the reader as does Robinson, Chapell , Vines , or Mathewson , Piper enters into the prayer closet with his reader and urging them to ensure that the glory of God is the centerpiece of their proclamation. He challenges them to the urgency of the task, for “Good preaching gives the impression that something very great is at stake” (103). Indeed, the supremacy of God is the very substance of our preaching. For “if God is not supreme in our preaching, where in this world will the people hear about the supremacy of God?” (108).

Buy this book. Be challenged and blessed by it.

John Piper, The Supremacy of God in Preaching

Mathewson, Steven D. The Art of Preaching Old Testament Narrative. Grand Rapids, MI.: Baker Academic, 2002. 279 pp. $26.00

In The Art of Preaching Old Testament Narrative, Steven Mathewson (instructor in preaching and Old Testament at Montana Bible College) strives, “to help preachers excel at preaching Old Testament narrative texts” (14). Heavily dependent upon Haddon Robinson for a methodology of sermon preparation, Mathewson states that the main goal of studying the text is to, “determine the author’s intent and to describe this intent in a single sentence” (34). [1] The task of preaching, then, is to “craft a sermon that exposes the meaning of the text and [apply] that meaning to [the] hearers” (27).

Mathewson is convinced that to preach narrative texts well, the preacher must strive to become a good storyteller. Communication and proclamation, from his vantage, are of little value when preaching a narrative text. Instead, faithfully preaching story demands that, in Mathewson’s view, “the preacher’s primary tactic will be telling the story well” (132).

Critique

Mathewson’s description of various approaches to preaching – inductive, deductive, inductive-deductive, semi-inductive, and first-person narrative – is extremely helpful to the inexperienced preacher who approaches every text in search for three points. However, one might counter that any sermon that strives to allow the text to determine the sermon shape, will naturally develop into any of these categories (other than first-person narrative) without requiring the approach or model to be artificially introduced or thrust upon the text. His reminder that, “the dramatic action that makes your point comes at the end of each section,” rather than the beginning in inductive sermons will free a preacher from the shackles of points followed by sub-points (124). However even these golden nuggets are not worth slogging through his other instructions.

Mathewson’s approach begins with the assumption that the most faithful method of communicating narrative texts is to become a storyteller – or more generously, to become a story re-teller. But is that the preacher’s call? Or, is the responsibility of the preacher to faithfully and accurately communicate the story that the Divine Author has told? If we are to be storytellers, then creativity is to be encouraged. However, if we are proclaimers of the story, we do not dare put ourselves in that role. We do not need to “dream up catchy statements,” like Mathewson describes (105). We do not have the right to impose our words upon God’s Word. Our task is to proclaim and communicate faithfully, articulately, and accurately. Creativity is simply not in our job description.

Mathewson suggests preachers, “think about replacing the physical pulpit with a music stand or a smaller lectern that you can move off to one side when you preach” (155). In doing so, the preacher is granted more room to move around and an easier, more natural connection with the congregation. But he misses the very purpose of the pulpit. The pulpit highlights the Word of God as the centerpiece of Christian worship. The pulpit elevates the Scriptures as the most important, most emphatic thing in the believer’s life. The pulpit figuratively hides the preacher behind the Word because the preacher has no authority that is not stemmed directly from the Word.

Perhaps the most frustrating aspect of Mathewson’s treatment of the text is that he consciously moralizes the texts used as examples. For Mathewson, every text becomes about a general principle about what believers can do or should do, rather than a specific example about what God has done.

Mathewson defends this use of Old Testament narratives by arguing, “Paul recognized the validity of looking at Old Testament narratives for examples of how or how not to live (1 Cor. 10:6,11)” (100). In similar fashion, he argues for the use of props, stating that God instructed such prophets as Ezekiel and Jeremiah to do so (120). However, his argument fails on the account that neither Mathewson nor his students have that mandate. They are not actors in the stories. They are called to faithfully communicate those stories, but are not themselves a part of them. There is a distinct difference in communicating God’s actions or commands and using those same actions or commands to justify our own creative impulses.

Mathewson, in storyteller fashion, wants his hearers to find themselves in the story. He wants them to smell, hear, taste, and experience the story as though the story was really about them. Lost in the discussion is the reality that it simply is not.

Old Testament narratives have the tremendous capability of causing the reader to fall to their knees in the acknowledgment of God’s majesty and glory. They cause worshipers to marvel at the loving-patience of the God who redeems a people, rather than destroy them for their rebellion. They speak of God’s sovereign hand at work behind the scenes, even in the lives of those who refuse to submit themselves to Him. These are not tales of how we are supposed to live. These are tales told to bolster our faith. This is why we must preach Old Testament narratives. But we must do better than to preach them in this way.

Steven D. Mathewson, The Art of Preaching Old Testament Narrative

Akin, Daniel L., David L. Allen, Ned L. Mathews. Text-Driven Preaching: God’s Word at the Heart of Every Sermon. Nashville, Tenn.: B&H Publishing, 2010. 315 pp. $29.99.

Text-Driven Preaching, edited by Akin, Allen, and Mathews, presents a much-needed way forward for those responsible for communicating God’s Word. In it, various contributors demonstrate the need and method of preaching text-driven sermon – that is, “a sermon that develops a text by explaining, illustrating, and applying its meaning” (8). It is more than biblical preaching which strives to communicate a biblical truth. It is more than expository preaching which seeks to reveal (expose) the meaning of the text. Text-driven preaching accomplishes these goals, but does so by being wedded to the text, allowing the very Word and words of God to provide the scope, structure, and meaning of the sermon.

Allen argues that there is a biblical and theological foundation for such exposition: “God has spoken. God is not silent. He has revealed Himself in Jesus, who is the living Word, and in Scripture, which is the written Word. Therefore, the theological foundation for text-driven preaching is the fact that God has spoken!” (3).

Critique

There is much to commend in the book. Allen’s 12-step sermon preparation method serves young and experienced preachers alike – instructing the former and challenging the latter to examine their own practices. Hamilton’s chapter reveals the vast importance of studying Biblical theology for preachers who are called to preach the entire counsel of God, rather than just the gospel accounts, epistles, and a few psalms. Akin expertly provides the reader with the importance of application, and assists the reader by instructing him with its preparation.

However, one may find it peculiar that a book instructing preachers to be faithful to the text by allowing the text to speak for itself begins not with a chapter on the prophetic lineage of preaching found in the text, but rather one that focuses, “on the three famous rhetorical means of persuasion provided by Aristotle in his Art of Rhetoric”: ethos, logos, and pathos (17). One quickly discerns that the goal of preaching, according to many of the book’s contributors, is persuasion, for, “the objective of ancient rhetoric was to persuade” (15). This appears to be Allen’s objective as well, who writes that the text-driven preacher should attempt to affect the mind, the emotions, and the will (115).

Following this conviction – that the goal of the preacher is to affect or persuade the hearer – one discovers that when Bennett writes, “God accomplishes His purposes in the believer’s life by two instruments: the Word and the Spirit,” he means through the unctioned preacher, not necessarily the Holy Spirit’s action through the preached Word (60). This leads the reader to understand that the goal of text-driven preaching is to affect the hearer through the Holy Spirit empowered preacher who preaches a text-driven sermon. Sadly, this does not appear to be the impetus for the book, or even the desired message of the book, but stands as the cumulative instruction therein.

At the center of text-driven preaching should be the text itself, not the preacher or the hearer. They are necessary for the text to be preached, but too many books have been written that fail to acknowledge the prominence of the text in the preaching act. York stands alone as the contributor who provides an alternative goal of preaching: “communicating what God has spoken in the most accurate and compelling way possible” (232). York’s definition places the preacher’s concern on his own faithfulness to the text. Grudem writes, “The Holy Spirit speaks through the gospel message as it is effectively proclaimed to people’s hearts.” [1] The preacher has no power whatsoever over the hearts and actions of his hearers. Akin quotes Rick Warren stating the same even more emphatically, “You [the preacher] do not change people’s minds; the Word of God applied by the Holy Spirit does” (279).

This assurance – that it is not the persuasive power of the preacher, but the Holy Spirit who is at work affecting the hearers through the preaching of his inspired Word – provides the foundation for genuine text-driven preaching. No longer enslaved by Aristotle’s rhetorical triad – no longer shackled by the need for creativity to inspire and motivate – the preacher is freed to be transformed by the renewing of his mind (Rom 12:2) through thorough exegesis and study, to stand before his congregation confident that the Holy Spirit will overcome the failures and faults of such a brittle mouthpiece, and the preacher presses the text for its scope, structure, and meaning, for “faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ” (Rom 10:17). This is text-driven preaching. May God convict us to pursue this task.

Daniel L. Akin, David L. Allen, Ned L. Mathews, Text-Driven Preaching: God’s Word at the Heart of Every Sermon