“The power that makes preaching pastorally effective does not reside in the preacher, but in God who utilizes him as His instrument in His good pleasure . . . the life of His creatures is finite . . . It is not sufficient to itself. It needs God in an absolute sense and it needs …
To This End I Labor
“Good service is always and fundamentally receiving mercy, not rendering assistance . . . The only right way to serve God is in a way that reserves for Him all the glory. ‘Whoever serves [must do it] as one who serves by the strength that God supplies — in order that in everything God may …
Homiletical Care
“If the quality called ‘pastoral’ be not understood, preaching will not be understood” (Volbeda, The Pastoral Genius of Preaching, p. 30).
But the Storehouses of Grace Never Have an Inventory Crisis
“Good deeds do not pay back grace; they borrow more grace” (Piper, Brothers, We Are Not Professionals, p. 38).
The First Step Is to Eat the Text
“To put it in the symbolic fashion of Revelation 10:8-11, these men first ate the book containing God’s revelation, and then they prophesied . . . It must become a piece and parcel of our spiritual selves, so that, no matter to whom, when, or wheresoever, we preach, the sermon comes, yea verily from the …
And the Grape Juice of Therapeutic Entertainment Does Not
“The strong wine of Jesus Christ explodes the wineskins of professionalism” (Piper, Brothers, We Are Not Professionals, p. 3).
Preaching a Felt Christ
“The preacher worthy of the name, the preacher after God’s heart, then, must proclaim the written Word of God indeed; but he must preach it — and that precisely makes it preaching — as it has come to light in his own heart and mind” (Volbeda, The Pastoral Genius of Preaching, p. 27).
With the Exception of Their Own Religious Convictions, Serenely Above It All
“Once upon a time tolerance was the power that kept lovers of competing faiths from killing each other. It was the principle that put freedom above forced conversion. It was rooted in the truth that coerced conviction is no conviction. That is true tolerance. But now the new professional tolerance denies that there are any …
A Preacher Well Tuned
“Surely, that written Word of God is pastoral through and through in its message, spirit, and purpose. Therefore the spoken proclamation of that pastoral Word calls for an agent who is himself in heart and mind in perfect harmony with the pastoral Scriptures which he must preach . . . Before one can preach in …
A Preacher Well Tuned
“Surely, that written Word of God is pastoral through and through in its message, spirit, and purpose. Therefore the spoken proclamation of that pastoral Word calls for an agent who is himself in heart and mind in perfect harmony with the pastoral Scriptures which he must preach . . . Before one can preach in …