Arrogance is the New Humility

The context for the below video is set in the current controversy over Rob Bell, his heretical universalism, and "evangelicalism's" utter disbelief that anyone would ever call him out on it. That's not what this blog post is about. Rather, in answering this question, Doug Wilson makes some phenomenal points about the nature of Christian ministry that I was hoping to echo in this series, and particularly in this post.

I absolutely love what he says about being a herald. Pay close attention to that around 3:00.

Rob Bell and the nature of Arrogance from Canon Wired on Vimeo.

This must characterize our ministry. We are not to preach ourselves. We are not orators who have the luxury of altering our message or our method in order to win the favor of our audience. We are heralds -- men under assignment who must preach the message with which they've been commissioned and let the chips fall where they may.

Jesus Came Not to be Useful, but to be Precious

"No amount of working will make Me precious to you."

Amen.

Be benefited by this.

How to Be An Effective Preacher: Be Passionately Thrilled by the Bible

I think everyone who is currently in a regular preaching ministry and everyone who aspires to serve God's people by preaching His Word should listen to this clip repeatedly. A transcript of a relevant portion (1:54 to 3:03) is below.

"I think the way I became a preacher was by being passionately thrilled by what I was seeing in the Bible in seminary. Passionately thrilled! When Philippians began to open to me, Galatians opened to me, Romans opened to me, the Sermon on the Mount opened to me in classes on exegesis -- not homiletics but exegesis -- everything in me was feeling, 'I want to say this to somebody! I want to find a way to say this! Because this is awesome! This is incredible!'

"So preachers today that go everywhere but the Bible to find something interesting or something scintillating and passionate -- I don't get it! I don't get that at all! Because I have to work hard to leave the Bible and go somewhere to find an illustration because everything here is just blowing me away. And it's that sense of being blown away by what's here -- by the God that's here and the Christ's that's here and the Gospel that's here and the Spirit that's here and the life that's here -- being blown away by this, you just kinda say, 'That's gotta get out. That's gotta get out.' ...

"I don't think there's much you can do to become a preacher except: (1) know your Bible and (2) be unbelievably excited about what's there, and (3) love people a lot."


As I listen to this, everything in me says, "YES!!! YES!!!" This is how a preacher that honors God is made, because God is honored when He is beheld and marveled at! And marveled at to such a degree that His glory compels praise.

I will not be an effective preacher -- one that plumbs and mines the depths of God's Word to feed the people on the meaty delicacies of the voice of their Shepherd -- if I am not blown away by the vision of an all-glorious, all-satisfying, high and lofty and exalted and lifted up God as is revealed in His Word. I must be affected -- thrilled! -- by God's own magnificent presentation of Himself, and worship over that in my study so that I can worship over that as I'm preaching. Because it is only as the preacher worships over the Word as he proclaims it that the people will worship over the Word as they hear it proclaimed.

This is just so huge! I love what Piper says about being thrilled in his exegesis classes and not his homiletics classes. You know what that shouts out to me? You can't fabricate a preacher. Preachers are not man-made. You can't study really hard to become a preacher. No matter how good a communicator you are, how clever you can turn a phrase, how good your outline is, or how white your teeth are, God and God alone makes preachers. When Christ ascended on high, He led captive a host of captives and He gave gifts to men. And He gave some as pastors and teachers (Eph 4:8, 11). Pastors and teachers are Christ's divinely-made gifts to His Church. They are not men who thought they could turn a phrase well and didn't mind the idea of talking for a living and so decided to take up preaching.

And the implications of that are wildly significant! It means that the Church must depend on Christ for the provision of these men. Do you want to be a preacher? I do. But all I can do is prayerfully, with fear and trembling, get on my face before the Lord Jesus and beg Him to open my eyes to behold wondrous things from the truth of His Word, and to affect me rightly with them, that I might be able to properly proclaim the excellencies of Him that called me out of darkness into His marvelous light (1Pet 2:9). You see? I am at His mercy to make me a preacher. And if He doesn't, I am not called to the ministry -- no matter how much I really think I am called, no matter how much I really want to preach and teach and shepherd and counsel and lead, and no matter how much passion I can muster up for those tasks.

"Preacher" is not merely a title. It is an identity. A God-given identity.

And if God hasn't granted that identity to you -- if He hasn't given you the vision to be blown away, to be passionately thrilled by what He's revealed of Himself in the Bible (and not the television, the newspaper, and the depraved human culture!) -- then for Christ's sake stay out of the pulpit! Don't torture the people of God by trying to give to them out of your own resources that which only Christ can give out of His.

Know your Bible, be unbelievably excited about what's there, and love people a lot. And trust Christ to provide all three by grace.

The Glory of God and Preaching

One of my many privileges as a student at The Master's Seminary is sitting under excellent preaching on a fairly regular basis. Last week I was -- get this -- required to attend the Shepherds' Conference. (Those are the kinds of requirements I can deal with!) At the conference, Al Mohler preached a message on John chapter 9, where the man born blind is healed by Jesus. And he taught us that the entire chapter hinges upon Jesus' response to the disciples' question about why the man was born blind, namely: It was so that the works of God might be displayed in him. Dr. Mohler went on to emphasize that that is the very reason that everything is the way it is. When people say, "Everything happens for a reason," this is that reason. The answer to the question, "Why?" is in John 9:3. And then he specifically related that to pastoral ministry. I pray you'll be as benefited as I was.

Everything is as it is on purpose. And that purpose is that the works of God might be displayed. Our God is about putting Himself on display!

There are no little texts because everything exists to display the glory of God. God does everything to His own glory, and therefore God says everything to His own glory. This ought to shape how you read your Bible and how you preach to your congregation! (Or, if you're not a preacher, it should shape how you handle Scripture in general, how you speak truth to your neighbor [Eph 4:25], how you counsel people, how you encourage people, how you evangelize.)

"The reason the cosmos exists -- everything that exists -- all the billions of stars, all the infinitude of expanding space, all that we can measure and all that is immeasurable -- it all exists for one purpose alone!" And that is that God determined to magnify His work and His worth by saving a people through the blood of His Son!

What explains all that is and ever has been? The answer is that the works of God might be displayed. That God might display Himself.

If you don't know that everything exists to display the glory of God, including every text of the Bible, then you cannot have any grasp of authorial intent, which is the cornerstone of our exegesis. In every passage of Scripture, God's authorial intent is to display the glory of His majesty, the beauty of His manifold perfections. If you don't know that, if you don't believe that, if you don't love that, well then like Dr. Mohler says: don't preach.

This knowledge of God's ultimate purpose in all that He does in all of history is what drives our ministry. "Because we know," he says, "we preach." Because it has been given to us to know that the most glorious Being in the universe has so acted as to display the beauty of that glory most fully in everything that happens -- and supremely in the sacrifice of His own Son for sinners -- we can't help but open our mouths and tell people about it! We believe, therefore we speak (2Cor 4:13)!

He goes on to give the implications of this truth for pastoral ministry. He says:

• We are to stake our lives on this truth
  
• We are to establish our ministries on this truth
  
• Believing this truth demands that we will have a high view of God
• Believing this truth will ensure that we preach a God-centered Gospel
• This truth will drive our conviction
• This truth will fuel our passion
• This truth is as life unto us
• And that will affect our preaching!
  

For the love of God, brothers, preach, speak, teach, live, act, counsel, minister like you know that God's purpose in everything that He does is to display His glory! Look at every single person that you minister to in your church, look at every single circumstance of your life, and recognize that they are there so that the works of God might be displayed in Jesus Christ to His glory in all things!

Do we believe this or not?

Dear Jesus, open our eyes.

More on the Minister as Waiter

As I spent some more time meditating on what it means to minister the Word of God, I considered some more of the parallels between the minister and the waiter.

When you go to a restaurant, you don’t want the waiter to bring you food he made at home and brought to work in his pocket, you want what the gourmet chef prepared – what you ordered. Similarly, a Biblical minister of the Word will not bring you the fruit of his special recipes, concoctions, and culinary experiments. He is not to present to the people of God his own opinions, ideas, or interpretations. He is to proclaim the Word of God. Scripture interpreted by Scripture and applied with Scripture. As Al Martin has said, "Give me Scripture, sixteen ounces to the pound!"

And you don’t want a lazy and negligent waiter, who delays to bring you what you ask, whom you’ve got to importune to get a refill of your water. You want a waiter who is prompt and attentive to your needs. Accordingly, a Biblical minister is diligent in his labor over the souls the Chief Shepherd has entrusted into his care. He makes time for his people. He is attentive to the state of their souls and cares for their needs. He is available and comes when is called. And, like an especially good waiter who sees your water running low and refills it without you asking, an especially tender shepherd will minister in a preventive way if at all possible. The sheep will not only see him when there is a problem.

Neither do you want an impure waiter, one who goes in the back and handles all kinds of gross and unsanitary things and then touches your food without cleansing himself. In the same way, a Biblical minister must flee immorality. He must be diligent to keep clean hands and a pure heart before God, for only then can he ascend to His holy mountain. The Biblical minister keeps short accounts with his God, often confessing sin and ever clinging to the shed blood of Christ as his only plea for forgiveness and only hope to stand before the Throne of God. He also does not dabble in the corrosive decay of false doctrine, but seeks to guard the treasure of the pure, unadulterated Gospel entrusted to him.

You don’t want a harsh waiter who gives you a hard time all the time, but one who is understanding and who seeks to meet your needs. Similarly, a Biblical minister is not heavy-handed, but tenderly cares for his sheep. He is aware that he too is beset with weakness, and so can deal gently with the ignorant and misguided (Heb 5:2).

Nor do you want an overbearing waiter who is always hanging around your table and bugging you about how everything is going, or who takes the food and shoves it down your throat; you want someone who prepares you to eat, but lets you yourself actually do the eating. Similarly, a Biblical minister does not ram doctrines down the throats of his people, but leads them and teaches them to understand and interpret Scripture for themselves. Among his greatest desires is for the faith of the people of God to rest on God's Word and not at all on him. He never creates an atmosphere of, "Well, just take my word for it," but always strives to make clear God's Word on the subject and exhorts the people to take His Word for it.

And there are more connections, I'm sure. (Feel free to share some, if you can think of any.)

Again, I pray for grace to be such a waiter. May God get what He is worthy of in His people.

But the one who is the greatest among you
must become like the youngest,
and the leader like the servant.
For who is greater,
the one who reclines at the table or the one who serves?
Is it not the one who reclines at the table?
But I am among you as the one who serves.
- Luke 22:26-27 -

To Him be the glory in the church
and in Christ Jesus
to all generations
forever and ever.
Amen.
- Ephesians 3:21 -

The Ministry of the Word

I mentioned a couple weeks ago that in my Pastoral Counseling class, we answered the questions in the exam for the National Association of Nouthetic Counselors as a class assignment. The following is an adapted answer from that assignment, which asked us what it meant to "minister the Word" (cf. Ac 6:4) in counseling. I think the answer has beneficial implications for all of pastoral ministry.

The Greek word translated “minister” in the New Testament is diakonéō, and essentially means to serve. In Acts 6, the famous passage in which the Apostles designate the priorities of the Christian ministry, the twelve make it known to the congregation that they will devote themselves “to prayer and to the ministry (diakonía) of the word” (Ac 6:4). Interestingly, the same word is used in Acts 6:1, where we are told of the problem that prompted the Apostles’ response: the widows of the Hellenistic Jews “were being overlooked in the daily serving (diakonía) of food.” The word takes on this connotation frequently throughout Scripture. Peter’s mother-in-law began ministering (diakonéō) to Jesus after He healed her. What was her ministry? The NASB says, “…she got up and waited on Him” (Mt 8:15). Similarly, Martha complains to Jesus about Mary leaving her “to do all the serving (diakonéō) alone” (Lk 10:40). Here again, ministry takes on this connotation of waiter- or waitress-like service (see also Luke 12:37; 17:8).

This, then, must be the attitude that the Biblical counselor (or Biblical preacher, or Biblical missionary) adopts as he seeks to minister the Scriptures in the various contexts of Christian ministry. He is to be a servant, a waiter who supplies the food of the Word of God appropriately according to the various hunger pangs that the people of God experience as a result of their personal sin. “As a calling he must be a pastor/teacher who faithfully leads God’s flock in the paths of righteousness and feeds them upon ‘every word that proceeds from the mouth of God’” (Adams, The Christian Counselor's Manual, p. 11). He is not the chef; that is, he does not seek to advance his own ideas and theories as sufficient to meet the needs of his counselees. Rather, he recognizes that the Word of God alone is the true food that will satisfy the people of God.

May God be gracious and make me into a faithful waiter to serve His people the delicacies of His Word.

Piper on What Preaching Is

As I've been thinking about the themes of Friday's post on what it means to do practice Biblical ministry, I was reminded of the following video clip. John Piper takes a few moments at the beginning of a sermon to tell those new to his church what he believes preaching is and thus what they can expect as they come week to week. As he explains that preaching is expository exultation, he is effectively commenting on the "proclaim," from "Him we proclaim" (Col 1:28) from Friday's post. I believe he really captures the solemnity of Paul's charge to Timothy to preach the Word (2Tim 4:2), and thus presents the foundation for a Biblical philosophy of ministry.

Do you mean that by 'preaching'? Is that what you, dear pastor, commit yourself to do each week for your flock? Is that what you, dear Christian, commit yourself to sitting under and diligently listening to each week? Is that what you do when you seek to minister the Gospel to your friends, co-workers, and neighbors? Do you preach the Gospel? Do you proclaim the Word of God?

Preach the Word. This is the foundation of our entire ministry.

Him we proclaim.

And He ordered us to preach to the people,
and solemnly to testify
that this is the One who has been appointed by God
as Judge of the living and the dead.
- Acts 10:42 -

And we preach to you the good news of the promise made to the fathers.
- Acts 13:32 -

We ... preach the gospel to you
that you should turn from these vain things to a living God.
- Acts 14:15 -

Woe is me if I do not preach the gospel.
- 1 Corinthians 9:16 -

Him We Proclaim

Over at Christ is Deeper Still, Ray Ortlund offered some really helpful, succinct comments on Colossians 1:28: "We proclaim Him, admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom, so that we may present every man complete in Christ." "We proclaim Him" stands at the heart of a verse that explains how Paul believed the Church was to achieve the maturity of individual believers. According to Paul, the heart of the discipleship and Christian ministry is: "We proclaim Him." Ortlund looked at each of those three words one at a time (in the order they appear in the ESV: "Him we proclaim").

Him. Paul summarized his ministry in one word: “Him.” Not “Christ + _________” but Christ as the only focus. All other topics of interest had to fit in around Him and promote Him and make Him clearer. If they didn’t serve that purpose, Paul got bored quickly.

We. Whatever others may do, this is what we do. Whatever message others may shout out, we’ll shout louder about Jesus Christ. We are responsible to Him and will give an account to Him only and finally.

Proclaim. Not beg, as if He were poor. Not suggest, as if He were doubtful. Not propose, as if He were the premise of something larger. But proclaim as the only life that is truly life, accessible to everyone on terms of grace, received with the empty hands of faith, giving all, demanding all.

I just think that is so sound.

We will not dishonor the sufficiency of Christ by, in our actions, presenting something more than Him to the world and to each other. We will not present Christ and programs, or Christ and gimmicks, or Christ and coffee houses, or Christ and funny skits and videos, or Christ and rock concerts.

Neither will we dishonor the sufficiency of Christ by parroting the world as we seek to minister the Gospel. We will not market Jesus. We will not market His Church. We will not conform to the pattern of this world as we seek to build each other up in faith and to evangelize the lost. We will not seek to win the world by becoming like the world. And we will not be controlled by the world's felt needs or their opinion of us. We will recognize that we are called out of the world and so will be an aroma of Christ from life to life to His sheep whom He will call according to His sovereign decree. And we will do this by being utterly different than the world around us, just as Jesus was. (The Greek word for 'church' is ekklesia. It comes from two words: (1) ek, meaning 'out of' and (2) kaleo, meaning 'to call.' The Church is made up of the called-out ones.)

Finally, we will not dishonor the sufficiency of Christ by doing anything less than proclaiming Him. I liked Ortlund's examples. We won't beg, and thus make Jesus look poor and needy. We won't merely suggest, and thus make Him look optional. We will not merely invite, or offer, or (the favorite) share. We will proclaim.

The proclaiming, the heralding, the preaching of Jesus Christ and Him crucified is the God-ordained means of accomplishing the ministry He has given to us, both to other believers and to the unbelieving world. The most solemn, severe charge in all of Scripture came from Paul to young Pastor Timothy regarding what his ministry was to be:

I solemnly charge you
in the presence of God
and of Christ Jesus,
who is to judge the living and the dead,
and by His appearing
and His kingdom:

preach the word!

Oh, may we never become more clever than the Word of God!

And may God grant swift repentance to the many thousands throughout evangelical churches today who already have.

See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception,
according to the tradition of men,
according to the elementary principles of the world,
rather than according to Christ.
For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form,
and in Him you have been made complete,
and He is the head over all rule and authority.
- Colossians 2:8-10 -

For I am not ashamed of the Gospel,
for it is the power of God for salvation
to everyone who believes.
- Romans 1:16 -

Putting Expositional Listening into Practice

As I've been thinking about becoming a more diligent recipient of the Word of God preached -- or, as Thabiti Anyabwile puts it, an expositional listener -- I've been struck by the thought that I don't want this to just be something I talk about. I want to take advantage of the opportunity God has given me to consistently listen to the preaching of His Word, a privilege that many don't enjoy enough.

To that end, I tried to summarize both Tim's and Thabiti's posts into a sort of practical application format for me. Hopefully it will be helpful to you, and will encourage you to put these things into practice as well.

During the Week Before the Sermon

• Pray for your pastor (or pastors), that God would work in his heart, illumine the Word to him, grow him in his faith, and protect him from the accusations and temptations of Satan.
• Encourage your pastor by telling him that you are praying for him and are preparing to listen to the sermon.
• Resolve any conflicts with brothers and sisters, as following Matthew 5:23-24.
• In your devotional time with the Lord, study and meditate on the passage to be preached.
• As part of your study, outline the text. Use good commentaries to supplement your study if necessary.
• Be sure to get a good night's sleep on Saturday night. Commit the late Saturday night hours to the Lord as part of your preparation to meet with Him in His Word the next morning.
  

Sunday Morning

• Be sure to sanctify time with the Lord on Sunday morning. Take that time to confess any unrepentant sin.
  
• Pray according to Psalm 119:18, that in the coming hours God would prepare you to listen to His Word, and that He would illumine it to you that you might behold wonderful things.
• Come to church expecting and excited to hear Divine words that will change you. Expect to meet with God through the proclamation of His Word.
• Immediately before and during the sermon, pray for focused attention and against distractions which abound.
  

After the Sermon

• Do pursue fellowship with friends and family immediately after the service, but don't talk about trivial and non-spiritual things at such a pivotal time.
• Talk and pray about the sermon in conversation with friends. Discuss the point of the passage. Ask such questions as, "How were you affected by the Word of God today?"
• Share what you learned from the sermon and what you thought was significant.
• Ask trusted others if they know of an obvious application of the sermon for your life (this will reveal areas of sinfulness in you). Receive that well (Psalm 141:5; Prov 9:8b; 19:25; 25:12; Ecc 7:5).
• Pray with fellow believers that you and the rest of the congregation would be properly affected, not become dull of hearing, and would be doers of the Word and not hearers only.
• During your personal quiet time Sunday afternoon or evening, pray for Spirit-led application and obedience.
• Seek to make applications of the passage preached to your own life.
  

The Following Week

• Listen to the sermon again mid-week. Pick applications to focus on and put into practice throughout the week.
  
• Study the passage preached, using the sermon as the chief aid, in small groups, one-on-one discipleship groups, or in family devotions.
• Study further to find answers to questions that you had about the text during the sermon.
  

Thabiti concludes, "Church members are healthy when they give themselves to hearing this message as a regular discipline. Expositional listening promotes such health for individual members and entire churches."

Love the Word of God. Love the Church of God.

Do not quench the Spirit; do not despise prophetic utterances.
But examine everything carefully;
hold fast to that which is good;
abstain from every form of evil.
Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely;
and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete,
without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Faithful is He who calls you,
and He also will bring it to pass.
- 1 Thessalonians 5:20-24 -

More on Expositional Listening

As we celebrate the beginning of a new year, and consider all of the things that we didn't do in 2009 that we want to do in 2010, I think at the top of the list should be to strive to become better hearers -- and thus, doers -- of the Word of God. Becoming an expositional listener, I believe, will do just that.

And as I re-posted Tim Challies' gem on how to prepare for listening to sermons, I was reminded of the first chapter of Thabiti Anyabwile's book, What is a Healthy Church Member? The first chapter of that book that treats such an important topic is "Expositional Listening." With permission (and thanks to Thabiti!), I'm reproducing a large portion of that first chapter here.

A Healthy Church Member is an Expositional Listener

What is “expositional listening”?

Before answering that question, we need to define “expositional preaching.” The first and most important mark of a healthy church is expositional preaching. “Expositional preaching is not simply producing a verbal commentary on some passage of Scripture. Rather, expositional preaching is that preaching which takes for the main point of a sermon the point of a particular passage of Scripture.” If churches are to be healthy, then pastors and teachers must be committed to discovering the meaning of Scripture and allowing that meaning to drive the agenda with their congregations.

There is an important corollary for every member of a local church. Just as the pastor’s preaching agenda should be determined by the meaning of Scripture, so too should the Christian’s listening agenda be driven by the meaning of Scripture. When we listen to the preaching of the Word, we should not listen primarily for “practical how-to advice,” though Scripture teaches us much about everyday matters. Nor should we listen for messages that bolster our self-esteem or that rouse us to political and social causes. Rather, as members of Christian churches we should listen primarily for the voice and message of God as revealed in his Word. We should listen to hear what he has written, in his omniscient love, for his glory and for our blessing.

So what exactly do I mean by “expositional listening”? Expositional listening is listening for the meaning of a passage of Scripture and accepting that meaning as the main idea to be grasped for our personal and corporate lives as Christians.

Then, he lists 5 benefits of expositional listening; that is, reasons why we should strive to be expositional listeners.

1. It cultivates a hunger for God's Word, because as we listen for God's intentions in a particular passage, we become accustomed to His voice, and we want more of it.
   
2. It helps us to focus on God's will and to follow Him, because His agenda -- not ours, and not the preacher's -- becomes primary.
   
3. It protects the Gospel and our lives from corruption, because it guards members from having "itching ears" (2Tim 4:3-4), and hearing only what they want to hear.
   
4. It encourages faithful pastors. "Faithful men flourish at the fertile reception of the preached Word."
   
5. It benefits the gathered congregation by unifying them around the voice of God in His Word.
   

He continues to the heart of the chapter:

How Can Church Members Cultivate the Habit of Expositional Listening?

Well, if expositional listening is so vital to the health of individual church members and the church as a whole, how does a person form such a habit? At least six practical ideas can foster more attentive listening to God’s word.

1) MEDITATE ON THE SERMON PASSAGE DURING YOUR QUIET TIME

Several days before the sermon is preached, ask the pastor what passage of Scripture he plans to preach the following Sunday. Encourage him by letting him know that you’ll be praying for his preparation and preparing to listen to the sermon. Outline the text in your own daily devotions and use it to inform your prayer life. Learning to outline Scripture is a wonderful way of digging out and exposing the meaning of a passage. You can then use your outline as a listening aid; compare it to the preacher’s outline for new insights you missed in your own study.

2) INVEST IN A GOOD SET OF COMMENTARIES

Add to your quiet times some of the greatest minds in Christian history. Study the Bible with John Calvin or Martin Lloyd-Jones by purchasing commentaries on books of the Bible as you read and study through them. If your pastor is preaching through John’s Gospel, pick up D. A. Carson’s or James Montgomery Boice’s commentary on John. Let these scholars and pastors help you hear God’s Word with a clear ear and discover its rich meaning. The Bible Speaks Today commentary series is an excellent starting place for those wanting to build a library of good commentaries. Also, you might want to purchase an Old Testament and New Testament commentary survey to help you sort through the range of commentary options available. Tremper Longman’s Old Testament Commentary Survey and D. A. Carson’s New Testament Commentary Survey are excellent resources.

3) TALK AND PRAY WITH FRIENDS ABOUT THE SERMON AFTER CHURCH

Instead of rushing off after the service is over, or talking about the latest news, develop the habit of talking about the sermon with people after church. Start spiritual conversations by asking, “How did the Scripture challenge or speak to you today?” Or, “What about God’s character most surprised or encouraged you?” Encourage others by sharing things you learned about God and his Word during the sermon. Make particular note of how your thinking has changed because of the meaning of Scripture itself. And pray with others that God would keep the congregation from becoming “dull of hearing” and that he would bless the congregation with an increasingly strong desire for the “solid food” of his Word (Isa. 6:9–10; Heb. 5:11–14).

4) LISTEN TO AND ACT ON THE SERMON THROUGHOUT THE WEEK

We can cultivate the habit of expositional listening by listening to the sermon throughout the week and then acting upon it. Don’t let the Sunday sermon become a one-time event that fades from memory as soon as it is over (James 1:22–25). Choose one or two particular applications from the Scripture and prayerfully put them into practice over the coming week. If your church has an audio ministry or a website that posts recent summaries, take advantage of these opportunities to feed your soul with the click of a mouse. With your pastor’s support, establish small groups that review and apply the sermons. Or, use the sermons and your notes as a resource in one-on-one discipleship relationships. I know of several families that have
a regular sermon-review time as their Sunday evening family devotional. There are a hundred ways to keep the sermon alive in your spiritual life by reviewing God’s Word throughout the week. Be creative. It’s well worth the planning.

5) DEVELOP THE HABIT OF ADDRESSING ANY QUESTIONS ABOUT THE TEXT ITSELF

Jonathan Edwards resolved that he would never let a day end before he had answered any questions that troubled him or sprang to mind while he was studying the Scripture. How healthy would our churches be if members dedicated themselves to studying the Scripture with that kind of intentional effort and resolve? One way to begin is to follow up with your pastor, elders, or other teachers in the church about questions triggered by the text. Moreover, don’t be passive in your private study; seek answers by searching the Scripture yourself and by talking with accountability partners or small groups. But don’t forget that the pastor has likely spent more time than most in thinking about that passage and is there to feed you God’s Word. Follow up the sermon with questions and comments that would be an encouragement to your pastor and a blessing to your soul.

6) CULTIVATE HUMILITY

As you dig into God’s Word, listening for his voice, you will no doubt begin to grow and discover many wonderful treasures. But as you grow, do not become a “professional sermon listener” who is always hearing but never learning. Beware of false knowledge that “puffs up” (1 Cor. 1:8; Col. 2:18) and tends to cause strife and dissension. Mortify any tendencies toward pride, the condemnation of others, and critical nit-picking. Instead, seek to meet Jesus each time you come to the Scripture; gather from the Word fuel for all-of-life worship. Instead of exalting ourselves, let us remember the apostle Peter’s words: “Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time” (1 Pet. 5:6).

Conclusion

It is hearing the message and the Word of God that leads to saving faith (Rom.10:17). Church members are healthy when they give themselves to hearing this message as a regular discipline. Expositional listening promotes such health for individual members and entire churches.

Thanks, Thabiti, for those words. May God give the grace to make it be so in our lives.

But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was. But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man will be blessed in what he does.
- James 1:22-25 -

Expositional Listening

A lot of conservative churchgoers like myself often sound the trumpet in demand for thoroughly expositional preaching. And we should. Preaching that is not expository -- that is not explaining and applying a text of Scripture -- is not preaching.

But we can be so vehement in our pursuit of expository preaching, that we can place the responsibility for sanctification-via-sermon solely on the preacher. The truth is, as much as we want our pastors to be expositional preachers, we in the congregation need to be expositional listeners.

Tim Challies wrote a phenomenal post a few weeks ago that I want to reproduce here. Consider these things as you prepare to be affected by the sermons you will listen to in 2010.

Being a Diligent Listener

We set high expectations for our pastors, and rightly so, I think. Ministers of the Word have a high calling before God to be his mouthpiece, to bring his Word to his people. We expect that every Sunday we will sit under the pastor’s teaching and learn sacred truths from his mouth. We expect that he will spend his week studying Scripture and digging deeply into God’s Word so that he can teach us something on Sunday that will change our lives. We expect him to be true to Scripture, to make a good presentation of it and to keep us engaged all the while. It is a difficult and often thankless task.

What we consider less often, I think, is that while a pastor bears great responsibility in preparing for and delivering the Word of God each Sunday, the listener shares in the responsibility. The church has no place for an audience. We are all to be involved in the preaching, even as listeners. We may drive home on Sunday muttering about the pastor’s lack of preparation after a less-than-engaging sermon, but how often do we drive away reflecting on our own lack of preparation? How often should we trace our lack of learning or our lack of engagement right back to our own lack of preparation?

Weekly Preparation
Preparation for the worship service needs to begin before walking into church on Sunday morning. The Bible exhorts us in many places to pray for our pastors. In Romans 15:30-32 Paul begged for the prayers of believers. “I appeal to you, brothers, by our Lord Jesus Christ and by the love of the Spirit, to strive together with me in your prayers to God on my behalf, … that my service for Jerusalem may be acceptable to the saints…” To the Thessalonians 3:1 he writes “Finally, brothers, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may speed ahead and be honored.” We should be in regular prayer for the pastor, asking that God will continue to work in his heart and illumine the Word to him so he can in turn teach us. The congregation cannot grow beyond the pastor, so it is crucial that he continue to learn and grow in his faith. At the same time we should pray that the pastor would not fall to the attacks of Satan who is always opposed to any fruitful ministry and who will work diligently to disrupt it.

Physical Preparation
When I was a teenager, I usually tried to sit in the back rows of the sanctuary along with my other friends. We took pride in being able to be the first person to fall asleep during the service. Often we had been up well into the wee hours on the morning the night before and were now looking forward to an opportunity to catch up on our sleep. And what better opportunity is there than when the pastor is speaking for thirty or forty five minutes?

One of the most important things congregation members can do is be prepared for the service. This means that we need to be well-rested and attentive rather than tired and glassy-eyed. Our minds need to be alert and both ready and able to hear the Word of God. As a child I was told that preparing for Sunday begins on Saturday night, the implication being that a good night’s sleep is an important prerequisite to attending a worship service. And I have come to see that this is the truth. Little wonder that Christians have often written prayers and hymns meant to be prayed and sung on Saturday night as a means of preparation. Little wonder that the Jewish Sabbath began at sundown rather than sunup! Going to bed at a reasonable hour on Saturday evening is one of the best ways you can prepare for a meaningful Sunday.

Personal Preparation
When we attend church we should do so with the eager expectation of hearing words that will challenge, convict and change us. We come expecting to hear Divine words. We should approach the service with these goals in mind. We should seek to allow the words of God, as summarized and explained by the pastor, to convict us of sin and shortcomings, to challenge our presuppositions and comfort zones and to begin the process of change in our lives. George Whitefield says, “Come to hear them [pastors], not out of curiosity, but from a sincere desire to know and do your duty. To enter His house merely to have our ears entertained, and not our hearts reformed, must certainly be highly displeasing to the Most High God, as well as unprofitable to ourselves.” Come eagerly, come expectantly, come excited.

Spiritual Preparation
Knowing that we hope to be challenged, changed and convicted during the preaching of the Word, we should be certain that we are spiritually prepared. Our hearts must not be filled with unrepentant and unconfessed sin. Prior to hearing the proclamation of the Word, we should take opportunity to repent of sin and to make sure we come before God with clean hands and pure hearts. This can be done before even leaving for church or during times of quiet preparation in the service. We should seek the Spirit’s illumination for the words we will hear. Psalm 119 models this as David prays “Deal bountifully with your servant, that I may live and keep your word. Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law.” (verses 17 and 18) David asks the Lord to open his eyes that he might be able to truly understand and apply the words of Scripture to his heart. In the same way we should ask the Spirit to work in us so we can understand. Matthew 5:24 warns against coming to worship while harboring anger or bitterness against a brother. Again, that kind of disunity be reconciled and resolved, as far as is possible, before we come before the Lord in worship.

Pay Attention
This seems almost too obvious, but we should make sure that we are paying attention during the service. It is easy to look around, to chat with the person next to you or to count heads. It is even easy enough to get involved in a “righteous” pursuit such as reading the Bible. But we have just one hour or two hours a week to listen to our pastor so we should be sure that we are making the most of the time. It is not just a good idea, but is our responsibility. Listen, learn and grow. Take a pen, take your Bible and make a dedicated effort. This is a very good thing to pray for throughout the week and on Sunday morning, that God would give us both the desire and the ability to heed the Word as it is preached.

After the Service
Traditionally a portion of Sunday afternoons was dedicated to gathering as a family and speaking about the sermon and perhaps looking over notes taking during it. Many families would sit down together and re-read the passage of Scripture that had been preached on that very morning and would share what they had learned. It was an opportunity for the father to ask his children for their understanding and to help them make application. This is a custom that has largely been lost, but we would benefit, I’m sure, by its recovery.

Pray For Application
After the service, perhaps during some quiet time on Sunday afternoon, we would again do well to pray that the Lord would help work in us what we heard in the morning. We should ask that He would allow the words to continue to convict and change us and that they would not simply fall out of our minds and be lost. In Revelation Jesus said “He who has ears, let him hear.” Hearing goes beyond the ears, but into the mind, the heart and the life. Hearing involves application and application usually requires dedicated though, reflection, meditation. Who knows what application of truth God will draw out of us if we spend time reflecting on what we have heard.

Be Bereans
Our final responsibility is to imitate the Bereans of old who “received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so.” (Acts 17:11). We need to be sure that we do not blindly accept what the pastor teaches us, but that we diligently compare his words to the Scripture to ensure that “these things are so.” If your pastor is a godly man, he should be willing and eager to answer questions you may have, and be humble enough to accept correction when he has erred. I do not know of a pastor who would claim he has never made mistakes from the pulpit. When we do detect (or think we detect) error, we should approach the pastor humbly and prayerfully, going to him with our questions and not first to others.

Conclusion
While the responsibility of the preacher cannot be underestimated, the listener is also responsible before God. We, as those who sit under the preaching of the Word, are to prepare ourselves even during the week. And on the Lord’s Day we are to listen attentively, to search the Scriptures and to apply what we have learned to our lives. I fear that far too often we expect the pastor to do the work while we coast along as the beneficiaries of his hard labor. It is time for us to take seriously our role in the preaching of the Word of God. I post this article on a Tuesday. Perhaps it is worth asking: what are you doing today to gain the greatest benefit from the sermon you heard just two days ago? And what are you doing today to prepare yourself for the sermon you will hear just five short days from now?