He is Not Silent: Preaching in a Postmodern World

by R. Albert Mohler Jr.

Any honest and faithful theology of preaching must acknowledge that charges of foolishness are not incidental to the homiletical task. They are central, and every Christian preacher should be prepared for them. Most of the world will be frustrated with what we preach, for the cross abolishes human self-sufficiency and worldly wisdom. Christian preachers will always labor under the temptation to preach a message that will be acclaimed by the world as learned, wise, and erudite. To aim for that kind of worldly applause, however, is to empty the cross of its power (see 1 Corinthians 1:17).

The neglect of the work of the Holy Spirit is a symptom of the decline of biblical Trinitarianism that marks our age.

the absence of a conscious dependence upon the Holy Spirit is a sign that the preacher does not understand his task and calling.

Martyn Lloyd-Jones was aware that preachers often forget this promise: Seek Him always. But go beyond seeking Him; expect Him. Do you expect anything to happen when you get up to preach in a pulpit? Or do you just say to yourself, “Well, I have prepared my address, I am going to give them this address; some of them will appreciate it and some will not"? Are you expecting it to be the turning point in someone’s life … ? That is what preaching is meant to do….Seek this power, expect this power, yearn for this power; and when the power comes, yield to Him.9

J. I. Packer once defined preaching as “the event of God bringing to an audience a Bible-based, Christ-related, life-impacting message of instruction and direction from Himself through the words of a spokesperson.”

Ultimately, a theology of preaching is essentially doxology. The ultimate purpose of the sermon is to glorify God and to reveal a glimpse of His glory to His creation. That God would choose such a means to express His own glory is beyond our understanding; it is rooted in the mystery of the will and wisdom of God.

When the pulpit ministry lacks substance, the church is severed from the Word of God, and its health and faithfulness are immediately diminished.

According to the Bible, exposition is preaching. And preaching is exposition.

Moreover, the therapeutic concerns of the culture too often set the agenda for evangelical preaching. Issues of the self predominate, and the congregation expects to hear simple answers to complex problems.

One of the first steps to a recovery of authentic Christian preaching is to stop saying, “I prefer expository preaching.” Rather, we should define exactly what we mean when we say “preach.” What we mean is, very simply, reading the text and explaining it—reproving, rebuking, exhorting, and patiently teaching directly from the text of Scripture. If you are not doing that, then you are not preaching.

The heart and soul of expository preaching—of any true Christian preaching—is reading the Word of God and then explaining it to the people so that they understand it.

the entire theology of Deuteronomy comes down to the fact that God has spoken. Thus hearing and obeying is life, but refusing to hear and disobeying is death.

three things that we learn from Deuteronomy 4, three points that can help us to develop both a theology of and a passion for expository preaching.

First, the only true and living God is the God who speaks.

Instead of recognizing God’s speaking to us in Scripture as a miracle of grace, we treat it as of little account. Instead of preaching the Word of God, we preach pop psychology and culture, or we tell compelling stories.

The God who needs nothing, sovereign in His majesty and infinite in His perfections, decided to reveal Himself to us so we might know Him. If that is true, then wouldn’t you think that a people who are the recipients of such a gift would live by it, hunger for it, and cling to it?

if you call yourself a preacher of God’s Word, and you think that all of God’s speaking was in the past, then resign.

Second, God’s true people are those who hear God speaking to them.

Third, God’s people depend for their very lives on hearing His Word.

As Christians, we live by the Word of God just as completely as Israel did. We know who God is only through the Scriptures, and we know who we are in Christ only through the Scriptures.

The question that faces us as preachers is not how we’re going to grow our churches or inspire our people. It is not even how we can lead them to live more faithfully than they did before. The question that faces us is: Are these people going to live or are they going to die?

It all finally comes down to the question of who has the right to speak. Does the preacher have the right to speak, or does that right belong to God? That is the difference between life and death for our people. Do we think that God’s elect will be called out by our own stories, gimmicks, and eloquence? Such thinking is arrogance. Can God’s redeemed people live on our words alone? Will they be just fine if we don’t read and explain God’s Word to them? Obviously not. For life is found only in the Word of God. In the end, our calling as preachers is really very simple. We study, we stand before our people, we read the text, and we explain it. We reprove, rebuke, exhort, encourage, and teach—and then we do it all again and again and again.

Genuine exposition takes place when the preacher sets forth the meaning and message of the biblical text and makes clear how the Word of God establishes the identity and worldview of the church as the people of God.

Expository preaching is therefore inescapably bound to the serious work of exegesis. If the preacher is to explain the text, he must first study the text and devote the hours of study and research necessary to understand it. The pastor must invest the largest portion of his energy and intellectual engagement (not to mention his time) to this task of “accurately handling the word of truth” (2 Timothy 2:15 NASB).

The expositor is not an explorer who returns to tell tales of the journey but a guide who leads the people into the text, teaching the arts of Bible study and interpretation even as he demonstrates the same.

Another motive for our preaching is the edification of our people and their encouragement in the faith. All this takes place, however, only as we present and explain the biblical text itself. If a preacher leaves the pulpit without accomplishing that primary task, then no matter how much the congregation enjoyed the sermon or felt moved by it, his people will die.

application must follow the diligent and disciplined task of explaining the text itself.

T. H. L. Parker, commenting on Calvin’s homiletic method, describes preaching like this: “Expository preaching consists in the explanation and application of a passage of Scripture. Without explanation it is not expository; without application it is not preaching.”

Certainly no preacher should ever believe that he can or should manipulate the human heart. But the faithful preacher understands the difference between the external application of the text to life and the Spirit’s internal application of the Word to the heart.

The Bible tells us who we are, locates us under the lordship of Jesus Christ, and establishes a worldview framed by the glory and sovereignty of God. Put simply, the Bible determines reality for the church and stipulates a God-centered worldview for the redeemed. Thus, the church is always mounting a counterrevolution to the spirit of the age, and preaching is the God-ordained means whereby the saints are armed and equipped for this battle and confrontation.

The preached Word, applied to the heart by the Holy Spirit, is the essential instrumentality through which God shapes His people.

When it is done rightly and faithfully, authentic expository preaching will be marked by three distinct characteristics: authority, reverence, and centrality.

First, expository preaching is characterized by authority.

In the postmodern culture of the West, authority is under attack in every form, and a sense of personal autonomy is basic to contemporary ideals of human rights and freedom. We will have no king to rule over us; no parent to discipline us; no teacher to instruct us; and no truth to bind us.

In all true expository preaching, there is the note of authority. That is because the preacher dares to speak on behalf of God. He stands in the pulpit as a steward “of the mysteries of God” (1 Corinthians 4:1), declaring the truth of God’s Word, proclaiming the power of that Word, and applying that Word to life. This is an admittedly audacious act. No one should even contemplate such an endeavor without absolute confidence in a divine call to preach and in the unblemished authority of the Scriptures.

Furthermore, the call to preach is not merely an existential experience or perception embraced by an individual, but a call that must be recognized and affirmed by the church. The teaching office is one of God’s gifts to His people, not a career path for a “helping profession.”

The absence of authority in much contemporary preaching is directly attributable to the absence of confidence in the authority of the Bible. Once biblical authority is undermined and eroded, preaching becomes a pretense.

Second, authentic expository preaching creates a sense of reverence among God’s people.

Christians leave worship services asking each other, “Did you get anything out of that?” Churches produce surveys to measure expectations for worship. Would you like more music? What kind? How about drama? Is our preacher sufficiently creative? Expository preaching demands a very different set of questions. Will I obey the Word of God? How must my thinking be realigned by Scripture? How must I change my behavior to be fully obedient to the Word? These questions reveal submission to the authority of God and reverence for the Bible as His Word.

Third, expository preaching must be at the center of Christian worship.

Worship is not something we do before we settle down for the Word of God; it is the act through which the people of God direct all their attentiveness to hearing the one true and living God speak to His people and receive their praises. God is most beautifully praised when His people hear His Word, love His Word, and obey His Word.

Paul is explaining why he so willingly submits to suffering—and indeed even rejoices in it! To anyone else, to speak of rejoicing in suffering would be ridiculous. But it makes perfect sense to Paul. He rejoices in suffering because his sufferings have earned him the opportunity to preach the gospel.

Far too many pastors operate under the assumption that the authority they enjoy is their own, that they somehow earned it or achieved it, rather than merely receiving it from the hand of God. Similarly, the people in our churches are often fooled into trusting in the wrong kind of authority, an authority that originates in man and man’s abilities rather than in the call of God.

The task of preaching and teaching the Word of God is not a profession to be represented by degrees and credentials and initials after one’s name. It is a calling, given by the hand of God in grace, to men who do not and cannot deserve it.

Another critical point for the preacher to understand is that God has given him this calling not for his own benefit but for the benefit of the church.

The aim of the pastor, of the one who preaches the Word of God, is that at the end of his ministry he might be able to present the Christians under his care complete and mature in their Savior.

To that end, we preach Christ in three ways. As Paul says in Colossians 1:28, we proclaim Christ, we warn people, and we teach people—all to the end of bringing Christians to maturity in Christ Jesus.

First, Paul says that his aim as a preacher is to...

Christianity does proclaim a mystery, but this is not a mystery of esoteric knowledge, or a Gnosticism consisting of some secret knowledge available only to elite intellectuals. No, Christianity’s mystery is one that has been publicly revealed by God in the incarnation, death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Our task is to show how Christ, the mystery of the ages, is revealed throughout the whole of Scripture, in both the Old Testament and the New. In other words, we have to paint the entire canvas with the truth of the mystery of Jesus Christ.