Striving in the Wrong Direction

“As a comedian once said, ‘It’s hard to explain bad taste to people who actually have it.’ It’s even harder to persuade preachers who’ve tried all their lives to be something that they need only to be nothing — and to trust Jesus to do the rest . . . I hope you get thirsty enough, and dried up enough, and withered enough, and shriveled away to nothing enough to come at least within hailing distance of being nobody at all. Because until you’re that, you’ll never amount to anything as a preacher” (Capon, The Foolishness of Preaching, p. 51).