“People don’t like listening to talking windmills” (Motyer, Preaching?, p. 116).
Mind Rinse Sermons
“Our spontaneous overflow is not necessarily to be trusted or valued — as my first senior would put it: ‘trying to glorify God with the rinsings of our minds'” (Motyer, Preaching? p. 105).
What Dries More Quickly Than a Tear?
“Surely that is not good preaching . . . which excites a mere transient and unproductive emotion. It is matter of universal observation that a speaker who would excite deep feeling must feel deeply himself” (Broadus, Preparation and Delivery, p. 236).
A Laugh Can Make It Stick
“A chuckle can go a long way in making the truth memorable and acceptable” (Motyer, Preaching? p. 104).
Straight Up
“Of about ninety-seven verbs used in the New Testament for communicating God’s truth — preaching in the broadest sense of the word — at least fifty-six are declarative . . . Our primary task is to make truth plain” (Motyer, Preaching?, p. 103).
Don’t Overpreach
“Who was it who said ‘we are called to give people to drink of the well of the water of life, but we are not called to make them drink from the bucket or chew the rope’?” (Motyer, Preaching? p. 99).
Which Means Preachers Must Plead
“The chief part of what we commonly call application is persuasion” (Broadus, Preparation and Delivery, p. 232).
Assembly Required
“The art of preaching is presentation . . . We would never put the ingredients of the cake on the table for our guests, but I have heard sermons like that” (Motyer, Preaching?, p. 89).
Application, Not Aiming At
“It is never judicious to make an application to any particular individual, and very rarely to a small and well-defined class. What is popularly called ‘hitting at’ some person or few persons will almost always do more harm than good” (Broadus, Preparation and Delivery, p. 231).
On Not Preaching Switchbacks and Hairpins
[On “rightly dividing” in 2 Tim. 2:15] “Orthotomeo is a compound of ‘straightness’ and ‘cutting’. It only occurs elsewhere in the Bible in the Greek translation of Proverbs 3:6 and 11:5, in both places associated with the word hodos/”road”: to cut a straight road, like the Romans did, and like our motorways attempt! But however …