How To Preach Without Results

I was going through old papers and throwing a lot of stuff away today. In the process, I came across this great satirical article by Charles Finney (paraphrased by Keith and Melody Green). I searched for it online and found it here. I love the picture at the top of the page too.

Let your supreme motive be to increase your own popularity – then, of course, your preaching will be suited for that purpose, and not to convert souls to Christ.

Avoid preaching doctrines that are offensive to the carnal mind, lest they should say to you, as they did of Christ, “This is a hard saying, who can hear it?” (John 6:60)

Make no distinct points, and do not disturb the consciences of your hearers, lest they become alarmed about their souls.

Avoid all illustrations, repetitions, and emphatic sentences that may compel your people to remember what you say.

Avoid all heat and earnestness in your delivery, lest you make the impression that you really believe what you say.

Address the emotions, and not the conscience, of your hearers.

Be careful not to testify from your own personal experience of the power of the Gospel, lest you should produce the conviction upon your hearers that you have something which they need.

Do not awaken uncomfortable memories by reminding your hearers of their past sins.

Denounce sin in general, but make no reference to the specific sins of your present audience.

Do not make the impression that God commands your listeners here and now to obey the truth. Do not let them think that you expect them to commit themselves right on the spot to give their hearts to God.

Leave the impression that they are expected to go away in their sins, and to consider the matter at their convenience.

Dwell much upon their inability to obey, and leave the impression that they must wait for God to change their natures. Preach salvation by grace, but ignore the condemned and lost condition of the sinner, lest he should understand what you mean by grace, and feel his need of it.

Preach the Gospel as a remedy, but conceal or ignore the fatal disease of the sinner.

Do not speak of the spirituality of God’s holy law (by which comes the knowledge of sin – Romans 3:20), lest the sinner should see his lost condition and flee from the wrath to come.

Make no appeals to the fears of sinners, but leave the impression that they have no reason to fear.

Preach Christ as an infinitely amiable and good-natured being, but ignore those scathing rebukes of sinners and hypocrites which so often made His hearers tremble.

Encourage lots of church socials, and attend them yourself.

Make it your great aim to be personally popular with all classes of your hearers.

Aim to make your hearers pleased with themselves and pleased with you, and be careful especially not to wound the feelings of anyone.

Especially avoid preaching to those who are present. Preach about sinners, but not to them. Say “they,” and not “you,” lest anyone should take your subject personally, and apply it to their own life, securing the salvation of their soul.

Preaching…

Ryan has a couple of posts that highlight a certain preaching methodology. (Part 1 | Part 2)

It has brought about some really interesting comments. Whatever the case, it has definitely started me thinking.  So is drive by preaching really a demonstration of love?

Looking for love
Just a quick search of the New King James shows me that a few books in the Bible don’t mention the word love. It’s kind of an interesting list, actually.

• Numbers
• Ruth
• 2 Kings
• 1 Chronicles
• Ezra
• Esther
• Lamentations
• Joel
• Obadiah
• Jonah
• Nahum
• Habakkuk
• Haggai
• Malachi
• Acts

The first mention of Love in the Bible is in Genesis 22:2. The last mention is in Revelation 12:11. In light of the conversation, I find it interesting that the word can’t be found in the writings of so many of the prophets (Jonah, Habakkuk, and Malachi most noticeably), or the book of Acts.

In all of the preaching in the book of Acts, with all of the conversions in Nineveh, we don’t read anywhere of anyone telling sinners that “God loves you and have a wonderful plan for your life.”

In fact, the entirety of Jonah’s message was, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” (Jonah 3:4). We read nothing of Jonah building relationships with the sinners in Nineveh. We read nothing of him setting up greed counseling centers. All we see is that one sentence. The result?

So the people of Nineveh believed God, proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest to the least of them. Then word came to the king of Nineveh; and he arose from his thronw and laid aside his robe, covered himself with sackcloth and sat in ashes.

Powerful stuff. How did it come about?
We can pretty much understand from scripture that Jonah was not praying for Nineveh’s conversion. In fact, he was giddy about their impending annihilation! We read in Jonah 4:1, “But [Nineveh's conversion] displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he became angry.”

So how did Nineveh’s conversion happen?
We understand that nobody comes to Christ by their own will. “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him” (John 6:44). We also understand that nobody comes to Christ apart from their own will. “Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord” (Acts 3:19).

There are a combination of factors in play here in the macrocosmic conversion of Nineveh, just as there are a combination of factors in play in the microcosmic conversion of a single soul.

1. Prayer
   I believe the first step to a person’s conversion is genuine heartfelt prayer to God for that person’s soul (cf. John 14:14, James 5:15, 2 Peter 3:9).
2. Preach
3. Hear
4. Believe
   

But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart“, (that is, the word of faith which we preach); that is you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the mouth
confession is made unto salvation. For the Scripture says,”Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.” For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, for the same Lord over all is rich to all who call upon Him. For “whoever calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved.“

How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach unless they are sent? As it is written:

“How Beautiful are the feet of those who peace the gospel of peace,
Who bring glad tidings of good things!”

Romans 10:8-15

The final three steps in the process are all summarized in Romans 10:8-15.

We are all parts of an ongoing chain. We may be the one who prays. We may be the one who preaches — the first time. We may be the person who preaches the gospel and experiences their conversion.

I think that the preacher in the video is being motivated by love. I don’t think that is the way I would approach it, but as Jason is clear to point out in his comments, the gentleman’s stated motivation is clearly loving, and nothing he says is particularly offensive.

It may be one of those situations where the people are complaining so loudly because his words hit close to home. On the other hand, it may also be a situation where they have heard the same thing so many times that their ears are unresponsive. I think this is where the hypocrisy issue comes out clearest. We will never know this side of heaven.

Stewardship

I am scheduled to preach on the subject of stewardship for the next two Wednesday Evening services at Del Rio Christian Fellowship.

Over the next two and a half weeks, I will be posting some blog entries on the subject. Please feel free to give me feedback on what I write!

At this point, the plan is to teach on:

Stewardship Part 1: A Living Sacrifice - 01/09/08
Stewardship Part 2: A Lifestyle Sacrifice - 01/16/08

The way it works is that we have sort of an informal, question and answer kind of deal. Much of my own life experience will come into play and be included in these discussions. These both look to be among the most personal sermons I have prepared to date.

I am really excited about where God is taking me this year, and I really do hope you can join us!