March 19, 2010
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“What do you want to hear?”
The following questions were posed in Revelife’s “What Do You Want to Hear?”
(By Sam at Creating Culture)
What’s the one message you would love to hear preached?A message on a certain perplexing scripture, social issue or theological position?* * *Though we can’t and we shouldn’t totally discount or disregard the people to whom we’re speaking and their particular needs…
Shouldn’t we be asking God what message He would love to hear preached?
II Timothy 4:1 I 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: 2 preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. 3 For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, 4 and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. 5 As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.
An appalling and horrible thing
has happened in the land:
the prophets prophesy falsely,
and the priests rule at their direction;
my people love to have it so,
but what will you do when the end comes?
Jeremiah 5:30-31
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge…
Hosea 4:6O Timothy, guard the deposit entrusted to you.
Avoid the irreverent babble and contradictions of what is falsely called “knowledge,”
for by professing it some have swerved from the faith.
Grace be with you.
I Timothy 6:20-21Like Timothy, may we guard the deposit entrusted to us
and may God’s grace be with us
and may the knowledge of the Lord fill the earth!
For the earth will be filled
with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD
as the waters cover the sea.
Habakkuk 2:14May God keep us faithfully preaching His Word regardless of what others might say or may ask for.* * *
What would you say are the main threats and hindrances to the word of the Lord being preached rightly?
What hinders you from preaching God’s word rightly?Can you share a time when you heard a message you didn’t initially want to hear,
but then you realized it was just what you needed to hear?
Please feel free to add related Scriptures, songs, your thoughts, your prayers, etc., however the Lord leads you,
so we might encourage one another to preach the word and be ready in season and out of season…
as well as receive His word into our own hearts…
Comments (8)
Idk, I think that’s the question that goes through the pastor’s head every week…and he does give the message that everyone likes: prosperity and health, not the true gospel.
An appalling and horrible thing
has happened in the land:
the prophets prophesy falsely,
and the priests rule at their direction;
my people love to have it so,
but what will you do when the end comes?
Jeremiah 5:30-31
I love that verse…It shall be my facebook status.
@llamalima - …he does give the message that everyone likes: prosperity and health, not the true gospel… Yes, that happens w/ many, many pastors. *sigh* We need to continue to pray God would raise up laborers.
As I read your comment, I began to consider that in addition to many pastors asking their people “What do you want to hear?” they are also in a battle between the flesh and the Spirit and are asking themselves “What do *I* want to hear? Do I want to hear my people tell me ‘Well done,’ or do I want to hear my Lord tell me ‘Well done’? Whose approval am I seeking?” (Galatians 1:10)
I love the book of Jeremiah. I’ve not read it through in quite a long time but have found myself there on many occasions lately. If I ever get through Nehemiah, I may end up there eventually…
@deerlife - I hear a great many sermons on radio as I travel to the hospital and back every day. Even messages that hold some promise by the announced title or the name of the speaker are often disappointing to me. Even messages on sin and righteousness or messages on God and salvation and holiness seem to start and end with man, not God. Everything we do in our own power – even so-called “good” works – are not “good.” Unless the Lord does the building, the labor is in vain. Everything we do should be to the glory of God, and by His power.not that of man. I want to hear the truth of God’s supremacy in all things, His sovereignty, His Kingdom, His Son Jesus, His Holy Spirit. Less than those things is weak, powerless, disappointing garbage. Be glorified, O Lord in all the heavens and in the earth, and in our hearts!
@quest4god@revelife - Yeah, as far as I’m concerned you can probably just scrap about 99% of all preachers and listen to Piper, unfortunately he doesn’t broadcast on radio (he used to in some places). (You could burn his messages onto CDs.) That’s exactly what Piper preaches, but I know you already know that. I think it’d probably be better to put on some good worship music rather than listen to a bad sermon, other than it might help to sharpen you doctrinally. I think it helps to hear bad preaching at times, as well as read bad blogs at times, b/c then we’re forced to ask ourselves things like:
What’s missing here?
Why is this bothering me?
Why does it seem empty?
What is the Biblical teaching?
What Bible passages address this issue?
and so on…
(As much as I find X/R frustrating, that’s one thing I’ve found beneficial about it.) Bad preaching also helps us to see the “ruins” even more out there and leads us to pray more. It may also provide blogging fodder. We can’t live on bad sermons. I know I can’t. There are plenty of churches around here, but I’d say maybe 3 of them have good preaching (we visited quite a few), and we are blessed to be at one of them.
That whole thing about starting and ending w/ man…I’ve already been thinking about that & hope to post more here about that here in the near future. But for now I’ll just say Rawwwr! Make War on man-centered preaching!
Be glorified, O Lord in all the heavens and in the earth, and in our hearts! …And in preaching! Amen.
I’ll have to ask Shane if I have the equipment to burn CD’s or can afford to get it. I so love Piper’s preaching - what little I’ve been privileged to hear.
I see you get what I’m complaining about. To think that that is the majority of the preaching I’ve heard (except for at CrossWay – there it was much rarer) I am so glad for the Holy Spirit’s coaching…☺ He usually reminds me that what I have just heard is not profitable when I hear that man-centered preaching. Some people just eat it up and say, “man, that’s good preaching” (pun intended).
@quest4god@revelife - If your laptop can play CDs then you probably can burn them. All you need are blank CDs which are not all that expensive. Piper is good. Of course, ML-J is as well. Those are the only 2 preachers I listen to regularly other than our own pastor.
I despise man-centered preaching. Absolutely despise it. It drives me crazy! It’s scary b/c not only do some people eat it up, I would say most people eat it up. Consider the many churches you and I have both visited and how so few of them have good preaching…People are not discerning. Some who hear these things are not actually not saved (and many of those don’t realize it). But others are saved and yet have not ever really sat under good preaching or read the Word for themselves and allowed the Holy Spirit to teach them.
(FYI: I actually broke the discussion on bad preaching & bad blogs out into a new blog entry.)
@deerlife - I wonder how many will understand what you (we) are saying. Apart from reprinting whole sermons – say, from Piper and M L-J, can we critique some sermons of others? Not just to be critical, but to use them as springboards into what the message might have/should have been? I am interested in seeing if there are an encouraging number who will know the difference and be spurred to action…(like talking to their pastor or looking up good sermons to listen to?) I find that good sermons always drive me to the scriptures hungry and thirsty for more of the same. I guess bad sermons can serve the same purpose – driving us to the scriptures, but for the reason of finding where the preacher went wrong…
@quest4god@revelife - I’ve been thinking about this…and just now I “happened to” stumble onto a Piper video somewhat related to this that I’ll be posting soon…so if it’s all right w/ you, let’s save further discussion until then. I Cor. 16:13-14.