Lectures Preaching A condeltsntion of n series of three lectures by Dr. Faris D. Whitesell of Xortltern B t is t St-mi~rarv, Clricago, gil-en at Cmcardiu Theolo~~cal Sem- inan., ~prmgfre%, Decerrrbsr 2-3, 1959, us rhc Fred Rutz Fnrrnd~tiort Lccrrrrcl. Dr. \ V ) l l t c ~ ~ f ! i~ the author of VARIETV I X YOVR PAEACWISG. 1. PREACHING THE BIBLE TODAY W E. ARE using the theme, "Preaching the Bible Today." IYe understand what that means: The writtcn Word of God, Scripture given b ~ - divine revelation. Thc Bible may not all be n-ritten to us, but it is all written for us, and is profitable for doe- trine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness I beliere with !.uu that tIie I3ible is trerballv inspired and is irrfallible in all its parts when rightly interpreted and understood. I wish ta discuss three factors involved: First, the handicaps; secand, the encourngcrncnts; and third, the methds of pscaching the Bible today. The first hai-tdicap to ht. encountered in preaching the RibIe is ignorance of the Bible. Peoplc today are generally BiblicallF illiterate. They lack firm hold of the unfolding Itistory of the Bible; they do not know the messages of the books nf the Bible; they can- no[ locate the grcat personalities of the Bible correctly as to time and to contributions the!? hare made; they fail to grasp the ruling lines of doctrinal truth in thp Scriptures; and many would be hard put to Jacate evcn a dozen of the great verses in the Bible. We must patient!! and careft11ly explain what we are trying to preach, when 11-e preach the Bible. The s~rvnd hai~dicap that we face is that of perverted ~~utions about the Bible. Thc Bib!e i s the n~ost accessibIe of all l m k s , yet people seem content much of the t ime to reccii e their ideas about it fro111 second-hand sources-popular n~agarines and articles, re- ligious movies, radio broadcasts of the cults and isms, or some relipj. ons fanatic. These erroneous notions l~rcjudice people against the real truth of the Scrlpturcs. Yet truth is stronger than error, and thc Bible i s the anl!- relrlcd:. \Ye must keep on preaching ilt. T h e Prophet jcremi~h said that the Word of God burned like fire in hs banes so tbat lie could nut withhold it. So it ought to be with us when it conlrs to preaching the Dible. I Lectures on Preaching 5 Shallow thinking on the part of the people is another handi- cap to preaching the Bible today. People seem to have no time for meditation, no time to talk, to argue, to listen to debates and to weigh the merits of issues, to think below the surface. So we must keep the material pitched to the popular level. \\'e must explain carefully and illustrate adequately or our people will fail to follow our thought. They will lose interest and n~iss the benefits of the sermon. Still another handicap is the increasing dullness to spiritual realities. There is a lowering sensitivity to sin. People read the daily news accounts of immorality, lust, lawlessness, crime, bestial- ity, murder, robbery, and they say that they are not guilty of sins like these. The!, consider themselves to be relatively upright, good, honest, and respectable. The Lord ought to be proud of them! They overlook the divinely condemned sins of selfishness, pride, covetousness, lustful thoughts, and sins of omission. The only rem- edy for this is preaching the Bible. It condemns sin in all its forms. It exposes and rel-eals sin like a searchlight turned into dark places, revealing all that is there. Another handicap is the easy tolerance of all religious views. People have been conditioned to believe that all religions are of equal value; that it does not make much difference what one be- lieves or what he practices religiously, so Iong as he is sincere and satisfied with his own beliefs. So our problem today is not only to get people to accept the Bible as the IVord of God, holy and unique among books, but to accept it as worth investigating, believing, practicing, living by, and dying for. Still another handicap is materialism. People become so sated with material possessions that they lose their sense of spiritual values; lose the power to discern between good and evil. They lack the moral and spiritual integrity to choose the good against all odds. The Kingdom of God seems so remote and unrealistic that it is diffi- cult to induce people to take the Bible seriously, to believe that it is relevant for our time. Still another handicap is conformism. IVe wish to do what other people are doing, have what they have, live as they live, pat- tern our lives after the trends of our fellow-citizens. Certainly this is aot all to be condemned, but when it lowers our morals, deadens our conscience, takes our eyes off Christ and His claims it is wrong. The final handicap I would mention is scientism, the idea thal science is God, that science supplies all we need. For many peo ple the Bible is out-dated, unscientific, full of faults, myths anl miracles which could not happen in a universe of law and orda such as science presents. Since religion cannot be put into a test tube and analyzed, its value is questioned. E~tcouragenzents to Preach the Bible S o w the aother side of the picture-the encouragements tc preach the Bible today. The first one I suggest is the hunger fol realits. Our age is becoming tired of sham and tinsel. Peoplt realize that they need something more than this world affords Many persons recognize a deep longing in their hearts to be relievec of frustration and dread, but they bury it beneath other concerns Howeyer, once the subject of vital religion is discussed and lner know that the!- are not to be propagandized or victimired, they wil open up and talk freely and eagerly. It seems to me that me car capitalized on this hunger for reality, for the Bible presents reality Its message strikes deep chords of responsiveness. Another encouragement for the preaching of the Bible is th~ sense of insecuri5 n-hich we encounter. I n spite of all the scientih advancement, the new drugs, the elimination of disease, the length ened life span, the fear of death is still lvith us. IVar is still , possibilit>.. Tragedy lurks in our streets. Lawlessness, crime an1 delinquency appear to be getting out of hand. A hidden super government of gangsters and racketeers has imposed itself upon th government of our cities. IVe are neither safe in body nor in pos sessions when me leave our homes and walk our streets. Any o us could be attacked any time, anyhe re . There is reason back o this sense of insecurity that prevails today. But the one who believes the Bible and accepts it knows tha in spite of shattered faith in people of our time we can still trus the God of the Bible. hIen in high places in business may go wrong television idoIs may fall; disc jockeys may be bribed; and govern ment officials may link themselves with crime; our educators becom prophets of doom; and even some ministers compromise moral stand ards. But there is One whom we can trust, the God of the Biblc His words and His promises need to be proclaimed in this day in which we live. As our scientists seek to explore outer space in our day, the minds of people have been lifted somewhat off this world, to think of what might be "out there" on those other planets. Surely this gives us opportunity to say that our God is an omnipresent, omni- potent, transcendent God who created all of this and who guides all of this for His own honor and glory. It gives us opportunity to say that the Christ of the Bible is the first and only true "space man." He came down from heaven and He has returned to heaven, where He is seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty. He is in control of all these planets and all people and all time in this universe and any other universes that might be. There is also the menace of Communism. Practically one- third of the population of the earth is in countries under Com- munist control. I t is reaching out its tentacles to enlarge its do- minion. \\:e have an incentive to preach the Bible today as never before since the sweep of Islam across the world. \\'e have an encouragement in the new translations of the Bible that are appearing today. '4s people read the Bible in the more recent versions, they see that the Bible can speak to us today, that it does have relevance. \I1e are also living in an age of new discoveries about the Bible. The Bible has come alive under the impact of new archeological discoveries. It is being recognized as a book that has solid histori- cal foundations, a book of unquestioned reliability in its picture of the life, times, and people of its age . . . The final encouragement I ~vould mention is the reappear- ance of the Near East in the headlines. Today we read about Israel, Syria, Egypt, Jordan, Cypress, the Dead Sea, Lebanon, about I Jerusalem and Galilee, and all these familiar biblical places. Peo- ple are having to learn the geography of the Bible today if they are I to u~lderstarld what is going on in the news. Surely this is an en- couragement to preach the Bible. I 0 1 1 1 . Aiethod of Preaching the Bible I say first that we should preach it generously. By that I mean that we ought to preach i t in large portions, whole messages on a book of the Bible, or a series of messages from books of the Bible. \\'e ought to preach it by chapters, by great events and movements, on the great personalities, by great thematic units, by great doc- trines. And I believe also in preaching it by the Christian year plan as many of your ministers do. In the second place, we ought to preach the Bible intelligent- ly; put all of the scholarship back of it that Ire can command; explain its customs, places, thought-forms and thc connections of every passage. \\'e ought to preach it from a careful study of the original languages, so we will be fresh and original in our preaching. \\'e ought also to preach the Bible spiritually. i\'e ought to I disclose the deepest spiritual ineaning in each passage me expound. This does not mean allegorical, esoterical, symbolical, fanciful mean- ings. No, we should stay with the literal, primary, grammatical, historical, contextual meaning for every passage we discuss. Then, we ought to preach the Bible respectfully. That is, me should respect the personalities, the minds, and the rights of our hearers. \\'e one it to people to give them the right explanation of the Scriptures as far as we can ascertain it. But when it is de- batable, we owe it to them to gile them the option of choosing be- tween two or inore views that may seen] to be equally valid. \\'e need also to preach the Bible popularly. \\'e iilust simplify it, illuminate it, translate it, clarify it, if we wish to reach the popular mind. Again, Ire need to preach the Bible honestly. \\'e do not nant to remove the ancient landmarks that our fathers have set. Cer- tainly we must hare respect for the men who have gone before us and left the bright fruits of their meditation and study. On the other hand, we need Iibert! enough to face ever! Bible passage with the honest purpose to find its true meaning and with full commit- ment to accept that meaning as our interpretation for that sermon. A proper use of modern facilities and of language study icould cer- tainly help us to do this. Then, finall!,, we need to preach the Bible relevantly. This is one of the prime concerns in preaching literature and homiletic fields today. It is amazing hocv relevant the Bible is when once we understand it. It fits ancient times, tivo thousand years ago, But in another sense it is timeless. It cannot be dated to one par- Lecttrres or! Prenclziitg - 9 ----- titular point in history. In our study of the Bible for sermonic purposes, we have to dig below the surface and get underneath local and temporaq meanings and find those timeless and universal truths which stand against life today as they stood against life in that day. So, let us preach the Bible today as never before. 11. IRIAGINATION IN PREACHING Imagination plays an iinportant role in modern life, especially in those pursuits requiring creativity. The poet, the fiction writer and most all writers, the architect, the sculptor, the artist, the painter, the advertiser, the educator-all must lean heavily upon imagination if their work is to be well received. It is not surprising that all holniletical authorities mention that imagination has an iinportant role in preaching. The truth is that neither artist nor poet need so ready a use of imagination as the public speaker. In the pulpit, everyone who has excelled as a biblical preacher has done so largely through his appeal to the imagination. Doubtless also, everyone who has failed as a popular preacher has been lacking this. Imagination is the image-making factor of the mind. It puts abstract ideas into pictures. It deals with reality and is under the control of facts. Thus it is to be distinguished from fancy, for fancy soars into areas completely beyond the realm of human ex- perience and out of touch with reality. But imagination never does. Stories of planet people who invade our world in strange modes of transportation are purely in the realm of fancy. But imagination stays within the hard concrete facts of human existence. It fights shy of all daydreams and all losing of contact with reality. Types of Imagination Imagination is one faculty of the mind, but for purposes of how it functions we might think of it as types. I suggest the most common is historical imagination. It is an imaginative revival in ' a preacher's mind of historical events and narratives of the Bible. 1 it makes them live by putting them in living pictures, filling in the 1 blank spaces in the Biblical account, entering into the life of the past by hearing the conversations, seeing the people in action, suf- : fering and rejoicing with them. Historical imagination needs to be based upon careful study of the history, customs, geography, social, political, and religious conditions of the time. With all the wealth of background material available, there is little excuse for perverting the material by fancy rather than re-creating by , sound imagination. A second type is sympathetic imagination-the use of imagina- tion to enter into the experiences of others and see life through their eyes. To put ourselves in the place of others will give their needs a new importance and urgency, compelling us to speak not of some pet interests of our own, but of living issues that touch upon our hearers, thereby holding attention. A third type of imagination-and perhaps the highest type-is called creative. This type takes hold of all materials and puts them in new relationships so as to create an entirely new approach and appreciation. It map be used to create illustration where no actual ones are ready at hand. Preaching on an abstract truth and lacking a good illustration, the preacher imagines one. Such, it seems to me, were the parables of Jesus. ,A fourth type of imagination I would call prospective or fu- turistic imagination. This deals with things of the future but pre- dicted in the Bible as certain to occur. Most preachers like to preach about heaven. But Scripture gives few details, so we may rightly use our imagination to fill in and add to the details of what the Scripture says, as long as me do not contradict any of the state- ments in the Scriptures. The same applies to the final judgment and the return of Christ. In order to present such truths imagina- tively, we ~vill use figures of speech, similes, metaphors, compari- sons, contrasts, personifications, apostrophes, dramati~ation, imag- inary conversation to concretize our ideas. Inzagilzation Needs to be Cultivated Every person of normal capacity has imagination, but our educational system usually does not develop the imagination as it does the logical faculties. Theological students receive training in analysis and s!mthesis, but little in creative imagination. As a result, their sermons are often factual, abstract, and drab. We can, how- ever, cultivate the imagination. The first and best way of cultivating the imagination is by mastering the Bible. The Bible is full of imagery, colorful events, Lectzcres o,r Preacfring 11 and dramatic scenes. The student learns to see the pictures in the original languages of the Bible and his imagination is bound to be stimulated. Hebrew is a language of pictures, strong on nouns. The Greek is a language of pictures, strong on verbs, action and movement. The Bible is a great stimulant to imagination. Then, by ministering to others we can cultivate our imagina- tion. As we counsel with people, visit with them in their homes, help them in their troubles, our minds are stimulated, our sym- pathies are stirred, and we begin to imagine how we may help these people, how they may do better for themselves and live more vic- torious lives. We cultivate our imagination also by reading poetry, fiction, and especially biography for information, for stimulation, for illus- tration; by studying the works of art; by listening to good music, letting it carry us away into the realms of harmony and meditation; by listening to sermons and lectures, letting our imagination fill in between what is said; by vocabulary development; by writing with the purpose of using our imagination, and, of course, by careful observation. Benefits of Using the Inzaginatw~z The right use of imagination clearly makes preaching more interesting; gives it more vitality, color, vividness and movement. Imagination helps the hearer to remember what he has heard in the sermon. Imagination gives the preacher enthusiasm for his sermon. If he takes time to put imagination into it, he puts his heart into the message. It takes hold of him and he preaches more vigorously and earnestly. It makes sermonizing easier. It is in that creative realm that gets away from the "grinding" side of it. If we use imagination, I think me are more likely to rely on prayer and on the Holy Spirit in our sermon preparation. There is something about imagination that is llke the divine creativity, and we need the power and anointing of the Holy Spirit to do our best work in biblical preaching. The Bible will also become more attractive to the audience if they can hear sermons that bring it back to life and see the scenes somewhat as they were in that day. I trust that all of us under- stand tlle power of imagination and will give it a larger place in our preaching. 111. \'ITALIZING EXPOSITORY PREACHING The preachers n h o h a ~ e made the most lasting contribution to the ages hare been expository preachers. \tle think of such names as Origen, Chrysostom, Savanarola, Luther, Calvin, Knox, Zwingli, Bunyan, John Owen, blatthew Henry, E. \il. Krumacher, Andrew guller, F. \\-. Roberts, 11'. A l . T q l o r , Joseph Parker, John A. Broadus, Alcsander aIcLaren, F. B. hle)er, John Henry Jowett, and Campbell alorgan. Homiletical authorities quite generally rate expository preach- ing as best for the pastoral situation and that for a number of rea- sons: It gives the people more of God's \170rd; it builds them up in the faith; it makes the preacher a more Biblically infornled man of God; it creates an appetite for the \170rd of God in the people; it lays morc solid foundations for Christian character; it enables a preacher to handle minor subjects which he might pass by alto- gether, unlcss they are treated in a passage of Scripture with others; it provides all the variety of cmphasis that is needed in a preaching program; it helps the preacher to know what is corning up Sundays ahead, particularly when he is preaching through a book of the Bible; and it does give the preacher an opportu~lity to make some permanent contribution, if he can get his sermons into book or i tract fonn. . . . In spite of the ideal, not as man) preachers follow the exposi- tory method of preaching as we mould like. Perhaps they have not been taught the ideal and techniques of expository preaching in their seminary days. I am glad that this is not true of you. I trust that 1-ou young ministers will determine to become ef- fective expository preachers. No ideal, it seems to me, can be more challenging and rewarding. In order to do this you xvill need not only the necessary training in the seminary, but also the necessary tools for proper textual study, especially the great exegetical books which go down into the exegesis and interpretation of the Li'ord of God. \Ve ought to avoid homiletical commentaries that provide readymade, pre-digested sermons and outlines. For expository peaching is an honest and faithful effort to unfold the basic, pri- Lectures on Preaching 1 3 mary, grammatical, historical, contextual meaning of a passage of Scripture, and to make that meaning relevant to life today by the best possible use of all homiletical skills. But how shall we vitalize expository preaching? What can we do to put life and color and flavor into it so people will like it and want more? I have five suggestions: First, vitalize your organization, your outline, your structure. Get an underlying, timeless, eternal truth as your theme. Let i t branch out through a bright refrain, thesis, or proposition which summarizes the whole sermon in one sentence into a structure that is coherent and logical, harmonious, and meaningful. The main points in the sermon should give thrust to the sermon. They need to be words that have vitality and life in them, verbs or nouns or both, stirring sentences or questions, so that every point makes an impact. That rules out an outline that is simply a jotting down of the main ideas of a passage of Scripture in the order in which you find them. Points should be linked together meaningfully. Every point should hare significance and permit proper develop- ment. Then vitalize your explanation. People want explanation, but nothing dead and dry and dusty. Unfold the meaning of your passage as vividly as you can. Use the word pictures you get from your study of the original languages. Bring in material from geo- graphical, historical, and archeological sources that help you set this meaning in a life-like situation. Be on fire with the greatness of your message. Let your imagination soar. Let your style con- cretize and dramatize your ideas. This is explanation indeed! Vitalize the application. Application means putting the truth to use. This is most important. First explain, then apply. Then gather i t up in the conclusion into a final burning focus and appeal for vital response. Vitalize also by appropriate illustrations. People are picture- minded. We must use illustrations if we are to arouse interest and move our hearers. Use enough illustration to let in the light, but do not overload the message with stories. One illustration for a point is sufficient, but let it be rightly adjusted to the sermon. Finally, vitalize expository preaching by doing it in the power of the HoIy Spirit. \fJe should seek to be filled with the Spirit as a continuing daily experience, walking in the light of God's Word. IPe should seek to prepare the sermon in the power of the Spirit. Then we can certainly count on that same Spirit to help us, both in preparation and delirev. For this we must live in the Book for our own spiritual guidance and nourishment and preach it to God's peo- pIe to bless them and establish them in the faith.