Our Scripture verse on preaching is Exodus 4:10-12 which reads: "And Moses said unto the Lord, O my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore, nor since thou hast spoken unto thy servant: but I am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue. And the Lord said unto him, Who hath made man's mouth? or who maketh the dumb, or deaf, or the seeing, or the blind? have not I the Lord? Now therefore go, and I will be with thy mouth, and teach thee what thou shalt say."
Our quote on preaching today is from Billy Sunday. He said, "Whenever a day comes when I can stand and preach God's Word without an agony of anxiety lest the people will not accept Christ; whenever a day comes when I can see men and women coming down the aisles without joy in my heart, I'll quit preaching."
In this podcast, we are using as our texts, the following three books: "Lectures to My Students" by Charles H. Spurgeon; "The Preacher and his Preaching" by Alfred P. Gibbs; and "Biblical Preaching" by Haddon W. Robinson.
Our first topic is titled "The Minister's Self-Watch, Part 3" from "Lectures to My Students" by Charles H. Spurgeon. He writes:
For the herald of the gospel to be spiritually out of order in his own proper person is, both to himself and to his work, a most serious calamity; and yet, my brethren, how easily is such an evil produced, and with what watchfulness must it be guarded against! As I was traveling one day by train from Perth to Edinburgh, we suddenly came to a dead stop, because a very small screw in one of the engines had been broken, and when we started again we were obliged to crawl along with one piston-rod at work instead of two. Only a small screw was gone, if that had been right, the train would have rushed along its iron road, but the absence of that insignificant piece of iron disarranged the whole. A train is said to have been stopped on one of the United States' railways by flies in the grease-boxes of the carriage wheels. The analogy is perfect; a man in all other respects fitted to be useful, may by some small defect be exceedingly hindered, or even rendered utterly useless. Such a result is all the more grievous, because it is associated with the gospel, which in the highest sense is adapted to effect the grandest results.
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Our second topic is titled "The Qualifications of the Preacher, Part 3" from "The Preacher and his Preaching" by Alfred P. Gibbs.
This section is titled: THE PREACHER MUST BE REGENERATED, Part 2
Christ likened the Jewish leaders of His day to "blind leaders of the blind." We read in Psalm 50:16, "To the wicked, God saith, What hast thou to do to declare My statutes, or that thou shouldest take My covenant in thy mouth?" Peter refers to the false prophets of his day as "wells without water." These appear inviting to the weary and parched traveler, but provide nothing with which to slake his thirst. God declares that, "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned." From conversations with returned Christian soldiers, it appears that saved and evangelistic chaplains were the exception, rather than the rule.
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Our third topic is titled "The Case for Preaching" from "Biblical Preaching" by Haddon W. Robinson. He writes:
Those in the pulpit face the pressing temptation to deliver some message other than that of the Scriptures -- a political system (either right-wing or left-wing), a theory of economics, a new religious philosophy, old religious slogans, or a trend in psychology. Ministers can proclaim anything in a stained-glass voice at 11:30 on Sunday morning following the singing of hymns. Yet when they fail to preach the Scriptures, they abandon their authority. No longer do they confront their hearers with a word from God. That is why most modern preaching evokes little more than a wide yawn. God is not in it.
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