Preaching in Relationship to God

Driving home: the person who's uncomfortable amidst the white light of mystery that surrounds all of God's truth is really doomed to dwell in the dark mists and the shadowy, murky depths of error.

A woman who refused to be comfortable with mystery became a blatant heretic, denying the Trinity and indwelling sin, illustrating the danger of an arrogant, rationalistic approach to scripture.

that the person who's uncomfortable amidst the white light of mystery that surrounds all of God's truth is really doomed to dwell in the dark mists and the shadowy, murky depths of error. We had a woman come to this church some years ago, never manifested a teachable spirit, would sit there and literally shake her head no while you were preaching, had a Bible marked up from Genesis to Revelation, but her whole perspective was me and God and the Holy Ghost and nothing more. I wasn't surprised at all to get some material from her yesterday in which she mocks the doctrine of the Trinity using the...

0:18 - 1:03 Read in full sermon

The point: Cultivate the awareness of preaching as in the very sight of the God of heaven and earth.

Paul's use of 'peddling' or 'hawking' the word of God is compared to a street vendor selling imitation Rolex watches, illustrating the dishonesty of those who merchandise God's word for personal gain.

a very clear negation at the first part of verse 17. We are not like the many. Apparently in his day, there had already arisen many who use the word of God as a hawker of cheap goods, tries to sell his imitation Rolex watch on the streets of New York. That's the word that's used.

22:54 - 23:16 Read in full sermon

Driving home: For if anything will cure a man of dishonesty, artificiality, flippancy, coarseness, calculated attempts to tickle people's fancy or draw attention to himself, it's the awareness, I the creature, I the sinner, I the hell…

Martin quotes William Cowper's poem, 'The Task,' to powerfully condemn affectation, dishonesty, and self-display in preaching, arguing that such behavior is impossible for one truly speaking in God's presence.

as in the sight. And so if we are to preach effectively, there must be that cultivated consciousness in the act of preaching, that we are preaching as in His sight. I may have read portions of these words from Cowper in another setting, but they bear repetition in this context. And this is Cowper.

29:06 - 29:36 Read in full sermon

Driving home: I'm a hell-deserving sinner. But saved by grace and called by God, his appointed ambassador to carry his message. A herald to proclaim his message and the gift of Christ to his church. And that's not arrogance, brethren.

The saying that people kill living prophets but build tombs for dead ones illustrates how people resist the present, convicting message of a living prophet but honor the past words of a dead one.

Someone has said they kill the living prophets in their own generation and they build tombs to the dead prophets in the subsequent generation. And the reason is that the dead prophet tells us what we should do, but the living prophet tells us what we are.

45:59 - 46:15 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Preaching is God's uniquely chosen and unchangeably relevant instrument for dismantling darkness and establishing His kingdom. Martin cites 1 Corinthians 1:18, 1:21, and Romans…

The preacher's mouth is described as the 'vocal apparatus' of the Great Shepherd, illustrating how Christ uses human preaching to call His sheep and build them up.

and they shall become one flock with one shepherd. When I stand to preach the consciousness that preaching is the uniquely chosen and timelessly, unchangeably relevant instrument of God, who knows, but what's sitting there before me this morning are sheep who are going to hear the great shepherd's voice as I preach. That the great shepherd chooses, to use as his vocal apparatus, this sinner's,

55:48 - 56:19 Read in full sermon