The Conclusion of a Sermon

Introduction: Terminology and Necessity of the Conclusion

0:04 Now, primarily for the benefit of the brethren visiting with us, I've just sketched in, in terrible, terrible printing, but that's about the best I can do, the basic structure of our course and where we are in our present consideration of these things. Our overall theme for the entire pastoral theology course, or I should say for this first section, is the essential elements of effective pastoral preaching. And we've considered those elements in the man himself and are presently wrestling with those elements as they pertain to the message, particularly its content and its form. And having considered seven axioms applicable to all kinds of sermons, we're now in the middle of a series of questions. We're now in the middle of a series of questions. We're now wrestling with the principles that are operative in preaching the differing kinds of sermons. We've looked at the identity and legitimacy of the three basic categories that we're working with, the old traditional category of topical, textual, and consecutive expository sermons.

1:10 We've considered the worth and weaknesses of each kind of sermon and are presently engaged in a study of the constituent elements of each sermon. We've dealt with the introduction, and we did that in one day's lectures, and then we took a day for each of the kinds of sermons developing the principles by which we construct the argument or the main body of a topical sermon, of a textual, and a consecutive expository sermon. Now we come then today to the third constituent element, the introduction, the discussion or argument, and now today we...

1:50 We come to a consideration of the conclusion of a sermon. And by way of introduction, I wish to open up two lines of thought. First of all, something about the terminology with respect to the conclusion, and then a word about the necessity of the conclusion. Now the terminology of the conclusion in classic rhetoric, the introduction is called, as you've been told, the exordium, and the conclusion is generally identified and described as...

2:20 as the peroration. And in classic rhetoric, this is defined as the concluding part of a speech in which there is a summing up and an emphatic recapitulation. And in your standard writers on homiletics, you will find the term peroration used interchangeably with the word conclusion. And that's why I'm giving you this bit of information.

2:46 And not to convey in any way that I'm an expert. I'm an expert on classic rhetoric. All the classic rhetoric I've learned, I've learned by reading the writers on homiletics who themselves were knowledgeable in classic rhetoric. I've never had the privilege of having a course in rhetoric.

3:05 I wish I had had that privilege, but I have not, and I don't want to give a false impression, particularly to our visitors. The men know this. They're fully aware of the pockets of ignorance out of which I speak week by week. But be that.

3:20 As it may, the terminology, then, that we will use is the terminology of the conclusion. But in some of the quotes that I will give you this morning and in your own reading, you will find this other term, peroration, and you ought to understand that we are speaking of one and the same thing. But though we're speaking of the same thing, there is a major distinction to be found between the peroration of a secular rhetoric, in secular rhetoric, and the conclusion of a biblical sermon. And the basic element of difference has to do with the fact that in biblical preaching, the peroration or the conclusion derives all of its weight and all of its thrust from the substance of the discussion. Now, this is not always necessarily true in classic rhetoric. Rhetoric or secular rhetoric. But because we are preaching the word, even the conclusion must be suffused with the pressure of the word itself.

4:33 Now, having given just that brief word about the terminology of the conclusion, secondly, by way of introduction, just a word about the necessity of the conclusion. And this is one of those points where our observations are drawn primarily, though not exclusively, from general revelation. In the summary statements of some of the sermons recorded in the book of Acts, I believe it can be demonstrated that the preachers were conscious of the necessity of a conclusion. But one would be stretching the thing and really resting the scriptures if he were to attempt to build his case primarily upon the scanty evidence of those that are really probably just a synopsis, of the various sermons recorded in the book of Acts. But with respect to this matter of the necessity of a conclusion, Dabney's words at this point are very pointed and wise. He said, or wrote, The reasons for a conclusion correspond to those which required an introduction. As the approach to the main subject without any preparation would be abrupt and unskillful, so to rewet the main subject would be abrupt and unskillful.

5:50 relinquish it without conclusion would be awkward and incomplete. And I go back to my analogy of the airplane ride. You've got to get that critter off the runway and up to cruising altitude, but somehow you've got to get it down from 30,000 on the runway and parked at the gate. And so how to land that critter and get it parked at the gate is no little part of the skill in preaching. In fact, I would say, just as in flying, it may be the most difficult aspect. I have actually flown a plane in flight, and this recent trip to South Africa, I actually took the plane off the runway. But I'll clue you, I ain't landed one yet. And anyone who valued his life would not turn the controls over to me to land it. Flying it

6:41 when it's in flight at altitude is relatively simple. Taking the thing off is relatively simple as well. All you've got to do is look at it and say, well, I'm going to land it. And I'm going to land it. And I'm going to land it. And I'm going to land it. And I'm going to land it. And I'm going to land it. And I'm going to look at the airspeed indicator and know that that particular plane rotates safely at 85 knots, and you just gently pull back on the stick when it's well over 85 knots, and it just takes itself off. But getting the critter down is quite another thing. And as I've reflected on that analogy, which we've used again and again, I have often felt that. I think I can see my way clear how to get the thing off the runway, how to cruise, but how to get the thing down on the deck safely with all passengers in good shape is a difficult aspect of preaching. But there is this necessity, because God has made the human

Goals and Functions of the Conclusion: Riveting Content

7:27 mind in such a way that it feels this necessity of having the truth to which it has been exposed brought to some kind of a neat, wrapped-up state in what we call the conclusion or the peroration. Now then, with those introductory matters behind us, as we address ourselves to the subject, we shall first of all consider the goals or the functions of the conclusion. That's the first of the three main divisions of our lecture today, the goals or functions of the conclusion. Now, unless there is precise thought on this subject of the function of the conclusion, we will probably be found grasping at expedience in the sermon, seeking to wind down a sermon and be done. Or worse yet, we'll be like those described by a French master of the pulpit who said that many preachers were like the poor hunting dog who, when it came time to go to bed, chased his tail around in a circle until he was tired, and then he just flopped where he began. And he went on to say that this was the way many a preacher concluded his sermon. He came to that point where he knew he had to go to bed, and he came to that point where he knew he had to go to bed, and he came to that point where he knew he had to go to bed, and he came to that point where he knew he had to go to bed.

8:49 He had to be done, but for the life of him, he didn't know how to be done, so he just chased his tail, as it were, around in a circle until he was out of mental and spiritual and verbal strength and energy and finished. Or our sermons may be like that famous bridge to nowhere in Lancaster County, nearby where my folks live. It's an engineering bureaucratic boondoggle. There is an exit ramp and a bridge, but it empties into an open field, and they have dubbed it the bridge to nowhere, because it literally goes nowhere. And a sermon that is not marked by an apt conclusion can in a real sense be dubbed a bridge to nowhere. And here you took time and pains to construct a ramp, your introduction, and then the body or discussion of the sermon was the bridge, but then it ends up in some poor farmer's field. It takes you nowhere.

9:48 If we have some finely chiseled concepts of the goals or function of the conclusion, we shall be able to use them both as guides in the construction of our conclusions and as a standard by which to evaluate and self-criticize our conclusions. First of all, then, the goal should be one. It should be a goal of riveting, to the minds of our hearers, the essential content of the sermon. Riveting to the minds of our hearers the essential content of the sermon.

10:33 As we began the sermon with an overall objective, and the various points or stages of development have been opened up, generally speaking, our concentration upon the parts, have weakened the grasp of our hearers upon the whole.

10:58 You follow me?

11:00 We've set an objective in our preaching, and often in the introduction there may be some pre-announcement of that objective. But now in the body of the sermon, of necessity, we have had to take up the various parts essential to the attainment of that objective. The explication of the context, and explanation of the meaning of the text, and articulation, of its abiding principles, and application of its abiding message. Well, you see, in the conclusion, then, one of our goals should be that of riveting to the minds of our hearers the essential content of the sermon.

Goals and Functions of the Conclusion: Moral and Emotional Thrust

11:42 And in so doing, the unity of discourse ought vividly and forcefully to be seen and felt. We must seek, then, in the conclusion, rivet to the minds of the people, not the entire substance of the sermon, and re-preach it at five times the speed we preached it in the actual sermon, but to rivet to the minds of our hearers the essential content. But then there is a second aspect of the goal, or function of the conclusion, and it should be this. That of pressing home to the consciousness of the hearers, the moral, and emotional thrust of the sermon. You see the progression now? Pressing home to the consciousness of the hearers, the moral, and emotional thrust of the sermon.

12:41 Not merely riveting to the minds of our hearers the content of the sermon, we do not view the content, the impartation of knowledge, as an end, in itself, in preaching. We desire that, that men may know to the end that they may feel, and that they may feel to the end that they may do.

13:05 And it's in the conclusion that we make this patent. And it's interesting that men whose commitment to sound biblical preaching and the primacy of truth attacking the mind is unquestionable. Men of the stripe of Dabney and Shedd are unembarrassed to use the word feeling and affections and emotions in describing the function of the conclusion or the peroration.

13:38 Dabney says, and you have to be separating Alexander and Dabney, they're about the same size. Once the truth has found full access to the hearer's soul, the best possible thing to be done is to leave it there performing its own work. Protracting the discourse beyond this point only undoes what has already been effected. There's a word of caution.

14:06 But he says its object is only to place the truth which has been explained or proved in contact with the heart and the conscience. Dabney says we have explained, we've brought the truth in contact with the mind, and he's not saying, he's not setting up false categories as though the affections and the will and the emotions have not been touched in the main body of the sermon. But the great end has been to explain, to enforce, to inform, and to secure the consent of the judgment. However, in the peroration or in the conclusion, our main concern now is to bring all of this home into the theater of the heart and of the conscience.

14:51 If the text or subject, should be productive of encouragement, then exhortation and admonition to be holded in that light and to feel the warmth of that encouragement ought to be the goal in our conclusion. If shame and conviction should be felt in the light of the issues treated, then it should be pressed home in such a way to the consciousness of our hearers that shame and conviction are felt. If new dimensions of appreciation of the love of God, should be evoked, then we ought, in the conclusion, to seek to evoke that appreciation of those new dimensions of the love of God. A sermon is not only intended to make people know, but to feel, not only to receive light, but to feel the heat of truth. It is said of John the Baptist, he was a burning and a shining light. And the best exposition I ever received on that text, was from the lips of old Dr. Merrill Tenney, when I had preached in the graduate school of Wheaton College.

16:00 And this white haired, dignified New Englander came up to me and said in very terse, almost verbal shorthand, thank you young man, and I was young at the time, I think I was about 24, thank you young man for that exposition. He said, I am reminded of a text. He was a burning and a shining light. There was both heat, and there was light.

16:24 Thank you. And then he left. But it made its impression. There was both heat, and there was light.

16:31 Well, he was simply reflecting this very principle, you see in his assessment of the sermon. We are concerned not only to give light, but to impart heat. And often the most heat is concentrated in the application, in the peroration, in the conclusion, where we press, home to the consciousness of the hearers, the moral and emotional thrust of the sermon. And although a man aglow with the reality of truth will convey some of this in the very act of preaching, it is in the conclusion that this becomes a conscious and focused effort.

17:13 Your reading assignment next week will take you into the section in Dabney in which he deals with this very subject, but by way of anticipation, I'm going to read a little bit from Dabney. All writers on eloquence, ancient and modern, seem to have concurred in the opinion that the peroration, the conclusion, should excel in persuasion. You will be hereafter more distinctly instructed in the nature and means of this part of rhetoric, but you doubtless already comprehend what we mean by persuasion as distinguished from argument. Those appeals, which are aimed directly at the heart, in the conclusion, if anywhere, the religious affections should be touched. The power of moral painting must now be invoked. Now remember, here's a man who is a thoroughgoing Calvinist, who believes without any reservation in the biblical teaching on the totality of man's depravity. He's not writing as a new school theologian, who believed that preaching was mere moral suasion.

18:23 No, no. If you have any question, read Dabney's Systematic Theology in the section dealing with the fall of man and with human depravity. Nonetheless, he is saying, the power of moral painting must now be invoked. The preacher's soul should here show itself fired with the force of the truth which has been developed, and glowing both with light and heat.

18:51 The quality of unction should suffuse the end of your discourse and bathe the truth in evangelical emotion. Isn't that a beautiful statement? Bathe the truth, there's the objective reality, in evangelical, that is, emotions derived from the truth of the evangel. Bathe the truth in evangelical emotion.

19:18 But this emotion must be genuine and not assumed. It must be spiritual, the zeal of heavenly love, and not the carnal heat of the mental gymnastic. It must disclose itself spontaneously and unannounced as the gushing of a fountain which will not be suppressed. Who can give this glow except the indwelling of the Holy Ghost?

19:49 You are thus led again to that great ever-recurring deduction that the first qualification of the sacred orator is the grace of Christ. This demand for progressive animation and unction cannot be met by a mechanical and calculated increase of voice and gesticulation. Crank up the volume, stir up more dust with your hands. No, no, he says, can't be done that way.

20:18 When the preacher who is not really penetrated in his own soul by the light and heat of the truth which he wields begins to foreshadow the approaching end by the stale artifice of buffeting the cushion of his pulpit and the ears of his audience, every sensible person is wearied and repelled instead of being impressed. He instinctively sets himself to resist being taken by storm by so deceitful an assault instead of being swept along a willing captive to the preacher's light and love. Profound insight. Let your people have any just grounds to suspect you of saying, oh well, I'm coming near the conclusion and this is supposed to have some heat along with the light so I'm going to kick up the thermostat and they're going to turn you off and rightly so. And just to give you a little sampling of Shedd since many of some of you do not have Shedd, but I hope this will whet your appetite to read him. He says in the conclusion the preacher is duty bound, duty bound brethren, to make the truth which he has established bear with all its weight and penetrate with all its sharpness. The spirit with which he should do this should be Christian.

21:47 Let him not dart the lightnings or roll the thunders except with the utmost solemnity, the utmost fear of God, the utmost love of the human soul and the utmost solicitude lest he be actuated by human pride or human impatience. Were you able to preach the doctrine tenderly said McShane to a friend who had spoken to him of a sermon which he delivered upon endless punishment. Perhaps the imperfection of his own Christian character is never seen more clearly by the preacher than in the manner in which he constructs and delivers the perorations of his solemn discourses. He finds himself running to extremes. Either he is afraid to be plain and pungent in applying the truth and thereby puts a sheath upon the sword of the spirit and muffles those tones which ought to sound startling as a fire bell at midnight. Or he is impatient with his drowsy listeners or is puffed up with self-conceit and thunders and lightnings in his own strength and, what is worse, for his own purposes. Put the lust of self, said Coleridge, in the forked lightning and it becomes a spirit of the god Moloch.

Goals and Functions of the Conclusion: Volitional Demands

23:09 That's pretty penetrating stuff, brethren. But the point, you see, they are making is that in the peroration, in the summary, in the conclusion, we must have as part of our goal a pressing home to the consciousness of our hearers the moral and emotional thrust of the sermon. But then there is a third dimension of the goal or function of the conclusion and it is this. Appealing to the conscience and will of our hearers to obey the volitional demands of the sermon.

23:49 Appealing to the conscience and will of the hearer to obey the volitional demands of the sermon. You see the progression now? From the judgment to the affections to the will. The clear teaching of James 1 ought always to be present in our thinking in working out the conclusions of our sermons.

24:17 We are not content to send away self-deceived forgetful hearers of the word. We are concerned that our people be doers of the word and not hearers only deluding their own selves. Otherwise they will be like the man who beholds his natural face in a mirror. Beholding himself he goes away and straightway forgets what manner of man he was.

24:49 There is not only something to be seen something to be felt but something to be done. And our preaching must indicate that. And generally speaking the major thrust of making that patent to our people waits for the peroration. It waits for the conclusion.

25:12 Appealing to the conscience and the will of our hearers to obey the volitional demands of the sermon. As surely as the Bible teaches that truth understood is the root of Christian obedience it also teaches that the acid test of our professed reception of and love to the truth is our obedience. If ye love me ye will keep my commandments. Not everyone who says unto me Lord, Lord shall enter the kingdom of heaven but he that does the will of my Father.

Illustration of a Masterful Conclusion: James Henley Thornwell

25:56 So let me suggest brethren that these three things comprise the goal or functions of the conclusion. Riveting the essential content to the minds of our hearers pressing home to the consciousness and affections the moral thrust of our sermon and appealing to the conscience and will for appropriate action. Now you want to read an account of a man who had an unusual facility in doing this. I'm reluctant to read this from the standpoint that it may discourage you and yet I'm reluctant not to because this picture sets a standard that I have found a constant challenge.

26:41 It's a description that Palmer makes of Farnwell as a preacher. At the end of this excellent biography and it is a heartwarming you'll laugh you'll weep you'll go down on your knees if you've not read this The Life and Letters of James Henley Farnwell by D.M. Palmer I encourage you to do so.

27:01 You'll find some very humorous things about Farnwell not only the theologian the saint the preacher but the real lover of the South after he made his first trip abroad when he landed back in New York and by carriage was making the final part of his trip when he crossed over into the South he asked the carriage to be stopped and he got out and he kissed the earth.

27:27 And then you'll find some very humorous things with regard to his justification of his addiction to expensive cigars and the rest. Well be that as it may I don't want to digress so much but as a saint and a preacher he stood head and shoulders above men who were giants in the land even that day. And here we have a description of Farnwell the preacher particularly as his preaching was drawing to its peroration or its conclusion. Eschewing all efforts to work upon the superficial emotions or to play upon natural sympathies he addressed himself in earnest to present the whole truth of God and to discuss its fundamental principles before men. His analytic power was fully displayed in the pulpit. The clear statement of a case is often one half of the argument. Stripping his subject of all that was extraneous he laid bare to the eye the single principle upon which it turned so single and so bare that the most untrained were compelled to see precisely what was to be elucidated.

28:39 Then followed a course of argument close, logical, clear, profound bending through it forward to one conclusion towards which the hearer was carried with his will or against it led captive in chains of logic that could nowhere be broken. When the truth had won its way and the mind was brought into a state of complete submission the argument was gathered up in its weighty and practical conclusions and hurled upon the conscience compelling either the confession of guilt on the one hand or a complete stultification of reason upon the other. These appeals to the heart were often fearful in their solemnity all the more because based on the previous assent of the understanding they were not mere exhortation but a judicial finding in the court of the hearer's own conscience. The preacher stood there as an attorney from heaven to indict and prosecute the sinner. The pleading has been heard the argument for his conviction has been concluded and the sinner only hears the sentence of condemnation from its throne of judgment echoing through all the chambers of the soul. It was upon this plan most of the discourses of this matchless preacher were formed.

30:05 It mattered little whether the exposition was of law or of grace there was the same enforcement of eternal and immutable principles the same judicial finding of guilt and shame whether the offense was against the one or the other but though argumentative he was not polemic. Indeed the current of his thought was too rapid and vehement to pause and deal with impugners and their objections. It was like the Nile swollen with its mountain tributaries and bursting through the sedge which impedes its flow. He rightly judged that to build upon truth in its positive form was the better way to remove difficulties which in its light soon appear as mere impertinences. He reasoned always but never coldly. He did not present truth in what Bacon calls the dry light of the understanding clear indeed but without the heat which warms and gives life. Dr. Thornwell wove his arguments

31:12 in fire. His own mind warmed with the friction of its own thoughts and glowed with the rapidity of its own motion and the speaker was borne along in what seemed to others a chariot of flame. However vehement his passion it was justified by the thoughts which engendered it and in the storm of all his eloquence the genius of logic could be seen presiding over it over its elements and guiding its course. Well, I could read on but I hope that's enough both to humble you and to whet your appetite.

Means to Attain Conclusion Goals: Resume, Inference, Delineation, Appeals

31:50 If you ever come out of the pulpit some day thinking you've preached just turn to page 547 of Thornwell's biography and then you'll go hide in a closet and say, Lord have mercy on me. But you see that element of self-consciously taking what had been established on sound exegesis developed by principles of sound, clear, close logic and then driving it all home to the conscience in the conclusion or the peroration. Well, having dealt with the goals of the conclusion now let me attempt to address myself to the second division of our study today the means calculated to attain these goals. Now in your reading of Dabney you will discover that he suggests five ways in which the conclusion can legitimately be handled. Phelps in his mixed work on the theory of preaching he was a New Light theologian he says some things in a section in here that I've scribbled all over the margin at one point I even put rubbish where he really knocks Calvinism is totally unpreachable and if you believe that stuff don't carry it into the pulpit and the only reason God blessed Edwards and other Calvinists is they were better than their theology. He says some terrible things.

33:12 I've more than once almost been tempted to punch the book while it's been open on my desk but I've resisted that and taken out my attitudes with my pencil but be that as it may there's an awful lot of good stuff still in Phelps and Phelps gives more than a hundred pages to the subject of the conclusion more than a hundred pages. Now as with so much you'll learn by observation and experience and have to find your own method and those things most helpful to you but what I want to suggest today is that there are several ways and most of the authors refer to these and I think your own experience as limited as it may be will bear this out. There are several means by which to attain this or these goals of the conclusion and let me give them to you. I'm going to suggest four this morning. Number one by resume or recapitulation if we are aiming at drawing all the beams of light together and focusing them in the conclusion then a judicious recapitulation is in order much of the time and one of the French homileticians prefers the word resume rather than recapitulation because it perhaps

34:39 will guard us from the idea that we have to go back and re-preach the sermon in all of its points just do it a little faster. A resume is a distillation not a summary merely going over the same ground in the same way. Now Phelps suggests that there are six elements in an effective recapitulation I'm going to give you just four. What is an effective and helpful resume or recapitulation?

35:07 What characteristics will mark such a resume? Well I give you four words or four descriptive elements. Number one brevity brevity parole octave respond reason range content word now they don't take the tape of the whole hour of the previous week stripped of its commercials and then run it by five times the speed you know how they do that when they speed things up now that's what some people do in a sermon in the conclusion they take what they've established over 40 minutes and try to squeeze it into 5 minutes by just pushing the high speed button now that's not what we're talking about there ought to be a brevity which reflects a careful analysis of what has been given that knows the difference between the mountain peak of a thought or a principle established and the valleys or the lesser peaks

36:35 and the foothills of the sermon so brevity should mark the resume or recapitulation and then secondly restriction to the foregoing materials your conclusion if it takes the form of resume or recapitulation is not a place to throw in miscellaneous items that you've been longing to get off your chest and everyone would think you a fool if you put them in the body of the sermon because it obviously doesn't fit well a few people got enough sense to think you a fool if you try to sneak it in to your resume as well so brevity should mark the resume secondly restriction to the foregoing materials and thirdly clarity or perspicuity it must be evident that your resume is what it's supposed to be not breaking new ground not taking things already established and beating them thin at the edges to fill up the time now I find a good check on whether or not there's been perspicuity in the overall form and structure of the sermon is whether or not I can readily see perspicuity in my resume if what I've been establishing ain't clear when I go back to the sermon to prove and summarize what I've established it's going to be evident that it's not clear so you'll find this a good check

38:04 on your own organization of the sermon and then it should also be marked by climactic order let the force of the thought that's been developed in the sermon be felt in the resume the connection the transition that perhaps may have been lost in some of the force of it lost in the sheer necessity of establishing things as you move along now that you're cutting out all of those things assuming the people know the connectives assuming that when you assert that the text means thus and thus they have now the proof in their minds a proof that may have taken you 10-15 minutes to establish now something of the climactic order and the cumulative impress of the overall content of the sermon ought to mark the resume or the recapitulation and Dabney addressing himself to this says on page 169 very helpful words each several head of discussion may be likened to one strand it is the conclusion which twines them all together combining their strength and drawing the convinced hearer irresistibly to his duty the separate branches of argument are the parallel rays of the sun of truth the conclusion is the lens

39:33 which refracts them into one burning focus once more these several parts of the argument must be presented by the speaker and considered by the hearers singly in detail for to mingle the discussion of them together could result only in confusion and obscurity the preacher must lay aside the first in order to take up the second head he dismisses the second in order to introduce the third he must in a certain degree call his hearers away from the previous point to attend to the one at hand he must require them temporarily to exclude it in order to give full attention to the next if then there were no conclusion the branch of argument treated last would occupy an undue place before the mind of the hearer and the force of the previous ones partly lost hence the necessity of going back either by a formal or virtual recapitulation to suggest again all the heads of discussion which had been temporarily dismissed to deliver their cumulative weight upon the souls of the people in a word it is by means of the conclusion that the unity of the discourse becomes evident now brethren in re-reading this stuff on Dabney I came to the conclusion that few of you at your present state of development

40:59 mentally, spiritually and practically can be able to begin to appreciate what's there in Dabney probably only appreciate about one-tenth of it I'm beginning to appreciate probably about three-tenths but each time I read through and I spent some time reading through large sections of Dabney again yesterday I actually had to check to see if I had read that before it came with such freshness to me and there were my underlinings and I said well they look like mine it must be my pencil and there are my comments and then when I went over my notes of this lecture and saw that I had quotes from those sections but just the experience of three years since I last gave these lectures and read through some of this material on Dabney has so influenced my own thinking that I see things in Dabney that I couldn't see before and appreciate things that I couldn't appreciate before so I trust that you will not just take these reading assignments in Dabney complete them now and let him collect dust you will find through the years more and more the wisdom the solid sound wisdom and sound biblical psychology that is reflected in Dabney's observations alright the first means then by which to attain the goal of the peroration of the conclusion is resume or recapitulation but then secondly by use of inference and you'll find the various writers discussing the subject of inference

42:26 and inference is a logical deduction or an evident observation based upon that which has been established in the body of the sermon if I may take last Sunday evening's observations or inferences for an example having opened up the meaning of Romans 13 14 I then tried to articulate the things that were quite evident in the text and those would come under the category of inference which formed either you could say the tail end of the body of the sermon or the nose end of the conclusion and application of the sermon and these inferences can take the form of logical progression natural but they must be warranted by the text itself and inference can become an integral part of the framework within which we accomplish the goal of the conclusion then thirdly by specific delineations of the demands of the truth considered by specific delineations of the demands of the truth considered for instance if you are giving a series of sermons topical sermons

43:54 on the offices of Christ having established that Christ is a prophet having opened up the pivotal texts having defined the nature of his prophetic office your work is not done until you bring home to the hearts of your people either the kind of appreciation they ought to have for the prophetic office of Christ the basis they have to love him as their great prophet or the implications and the demands of his prophetic office upon them in terms of their response to preaching their relationship to the word of God in their private devotional reading it is not enough that they understand that Christ is a prophet but they must also understand that Christ is a prophet and the exegetical basis upon which that assumption or that truth rests we must start there but we must then at times by specific delineation of the demands of the given truth bring it home to the conscience and to the affections and then fourthly we may accomplish the goals of the conclusion by direct appeals to the conscience and the will by direct appeals to the conscience and to the will scripture itself is full of this aspect I beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of God to present your bodies

45:23 a living sacrifice Ephesians 4.1 walk worthily of the calling wherewith ye were called direct appeals to the conscience and the will in the light of the truth already established again listen to Dabney as he would instruct us the object of the application is to bring the truth which has been established in the discussion to bear immediately upon the conscience and will since every rhetorical discourse aims at a practical determination of the hearer's will it is obvious that this species of conclusion is in the strictest accordance with the design of eloquence and when he uses eloquence he doesn't mean highfalutin preaching but he means efficient and proper enunciation of God's truth the application may either be general or special the former is one which urges a principle of duty concerning all classes of hearers alike thus the truth that we know neither the day nor the hour when the son of man comes results in the application watch therefore the application an injunction suitable alike to believer and unbeliever the special application is that which separates the hearers into classes and directs the truth to their several consciences

46:51 in the particular phase appropriate to each and then he goes on to develop that thought but we may accomplish the goals of the conclusion by direct appeals to the conscience and to the will and of course here Spurgeon is an excellent model of how that can be done read the last paragraphs of Spurgeon's sermons and almost invariably you will find him bringing home the truth to the conscience and the will in a very direct manner now I'm sure you have noticed in the opening up of these things that there is overlapping in our treatment of the conclusion and the previous lectures on applicatory preaching and the necessity of application to the truth that was one of the seven axioms for all sermons that there must be the application of biblical truth to the consciences of our hearers but much of that application is often found in the conclusion or in the peroration now having set before you the goals of the conclusion the means to attain those goals let me attempt to give you some practical directives concerning the construction of the conclusion of the conclusion and the best way I know to organize the practical directives is to give you

Practical Directives: The 'Do's' of Conclusion Construction

48:20 three do's and then three don'ts alright three positives positive directives number one construct a conclusion that really concludes the sermon construct a conclusion that really concludes brings the sermon to a definite terminal point doesn't leave the airplane out on the runway doesn't leave it flying around a field until it runs out of fuel and then just plops down in a field somewhere but construct a conclusion that really concludes positive directive number two construct the conclusion under the restraint of the discipline of exclusion construct your conclusion under the restraint of the discipline of exclusion under the restraint of the discipline of exclusion since all of God's truth is interrelated you will see many corollaries and inferences if your mind is active at all as you attempt to bring the truth home to its proper influence upon the affections the consciences the wills of your hearers and it's at this point more in actual preaching than in preparation that you must put a rein upon yourself

49:44 because if God has been with you in your life and your preaching you will find that as your own mind has felt the friction of that truth and as your own spirit has felt the friction of that truth upon your people and you have felt the friction of your own quickened minds and hearts upon each other in the actual act of preaching it's then that you can mistake all of that friction and the heat that comes from it from a mandate to just take off and go bellowing and hollering about everything under the sun that comes into your mind because the people are really in a sense then eating out of your hand and they're receptive and open and you feel well you know this is too good to just quit and go home and then preachers often then preach themselves right out of a spiritual frame and preach their people right out of the impress of that given exposition and we must beware of that we must exercise this discipline of conclusion both in the construction and the actual delivery of the conclusion and Shedd understood this principle well he said let unity run clear through the sermon and clear out clear through and clear out if there be other lessons to be taught from the text teach them in another sermon if there be other applications make them in another discourse it's not as if the preacher

51:13 had no other opportunity as if he must say everything in one sermon and apply everything in a single discourse he has the unity and the years before him in which to make full proof of his ministry in which to exhibit the truth upon all sides and apply it to all classes of men let him therefore make each sermon a round and simple unit and trust to the whole series of his sermons to impart a full and comprehensive knowledge of the Christian system and to make a complete application of it to all grades and varieties of character so for a positive direction number two labor to construct a conclusion under the restraint of the discipline of exclusion and then thirdly choose a method of conclusion which assumes a heightened state of emotion and passion choose a method of conclusion which assumes a state of heightened emotion and passion and passion now what do I mean by that well what I mean by that is this when you're at your desk working on the conclusion you may experience there in the period of preparation something of that heat from the truth

52:41 that you trust will be your portion in preaching and there are times when you will be brought I trust to a shouting state to a weeping state to the borders of a glory fit in preparation but generally speaking there is something about the actual dynamics or there are things pertaining to the actual dynamics of preaching I've already hinted at them that which actually happens when you're articulating the truth of God with the present aid of the spirit and there's an expansion of your own heart your own emotions your own mind and you are not only conscious of that expansion in yourself bringing you to a heightened state of emotion and passion by means of the truth it's not something you're working yourself into the truth is pressing you to that heightened state now it's doing that with your people as well now trusting that God is going to bring you to that not forcing yourself to it but trusting he will bring you to it you ought to construct a conclusion which assumes not presumes upon God but assumes that in answer to people's prayer and in anticipation of the Lord's presence in preaching you and your people will be brought to that heightened level of emotion and passion and therefore construct a conclusion that fits that state

54:10 both for yourself and for your people now that's at the level of preparation now what do you do if in preaching you don't ignite and your people don't ignite well then you just got to do some thinking on your feet and reconstruct the conclusion on your feet the same way there has to be some sensitivity to God granting levels of heightened emotion and passion and directions for that emotion and passion perfectly consistent with the truth you've unfolded but the connection between the two was not discovered in your preparation but lo and behold it becomes clearest daylight in the actual act of preaching and you see channels of legitimate application from your text in the act of preaching that never came to you in your preparation well you see you've got to allow room for that as well and that's part of the mystery of preaching you never know what's going to happen but if we're to be responsible and not tempt God we've got to make some anticipation of what the normal framework is and that's all I'm pleading for that under the positive directives of constructing your conclusion assume that there will be that heightened state of emotion and passion and construct a conclusion that is consistent with it now again I quote from Shedd on this matter

55:40 because his approach to homiletics at times seems rather top heavy with his knowledge of and dependence upon the insights of classic rhetoric but here in these sections he shows himself to be the true saint and the man who understood some of these mystical but blessed elements of preaching let's see where I want to pick up the reading here yeah listen to the language he uses the peroration of the conclusion should be distinguished by vehemence by the utmost intensity energy vividness and motion when therefore it consists of inferences these should be of such a nature and so arranged as to press with more and more weight to kindle with hotter and hotter heat to enlighten with stronger and stronger light to enliven with intenser and intenser life and to move with a more and more irresistible force now that's dry dusty Calvinism brethren stronger and stronger light intenser and intenser life more and more heat but he is trying to articulate the very principle that I'm also attempting

57:08 poorly to articulate as well now Broadus recognized that in the act of preaching some of these adjustments might have to be made and because most of you don't have Broadus especially this Dargan edition which is as far as I'm concerned the best and yet hard to generally not available he said whatever the subject might require let a man not speak let a man not speak in an emotional manner unless he really feels it an effort to work oneself up into feeling because it's desirable at this point will usually fail and if it succeeds as to the preacher himself will be apt to make anything else that a good impression I'm sorry and if it succeeds as the preacher himself will be apt to make anything else than a good impression on the hearers few things are so painful or so injurious as the reaction produced by passion at words which are not felt by the hearers nor even by the speaker do not preach the corpse of an appeal do not preach the corpse of an appeal let it never be forgotten we must not aim to excite emotion merely for its own sake as if that were the end in view but to make it a means of determining the will and stimulating the corresponding action even love to God will not subsist as a mere

Practical Directives: The 'Don'ts' of Conclusion Construction

58:37 feeling and then he goes on to say the length of the conclusion like that of the introduction must be determined by circumstances in the act of preaching and then he amplifies this whole matter of adjusting to the actual preaching situation when it comes to what we do with what has already been prepared well so much for the positive injunctions let me very quickly go over the negatives alright because then I want to give you a a good example of some of these principles I've recorded some of about 13 minutes of Tozer and I want you to hear that this morning now what are the don'ts under the practical suggestions well the don'ts the negatives are and this one overarches all the others do not skimp on the labor connected with a well prepared conclusion do not skimp on the labor connected with a well prepared conclusion do not skimp on the labor connected with a well prepared conclusion stale bread with good meat makes a bad sandwich you got my analogy stale bread with good meat makes a bad sandwich and in order of importance nothing is more vital than the body the discussion the argument of the sermon granted

60:06 next in importance is not the introduction but the conclusion you may start poorly but if you give them something worth while you'll gain their attention but then you can lose much of it by an injudicious conclusion so the most forgivable thing is a poor introduction that's the most forgivable thing but that doesn't mean we should skimp on labor connected with the introduction or with the conclusion and Dabney recognized that preachers had this tendency and so he warns on page 175 with respect to this very dangerous very dangerous very dangerous I would urge that the conclusion be always the subject of careful preparation it is no less important than our last that our last impression be a good one than our first nothing can be more faulty than to leave the conclusion to the accidental suggestions of the moment the speaker's then exhausted he's expended his store of thoughts he feels that while he's not willing to sit down he virtually has nothing more to say and he's he beats the air with empty declamation he wears away the impression of the truths already unfolded by their bald repetition he endeavors to cover his retreat by noise picture the guy running from the battle but he wants to make the appearance

61:36 of being brave so he's banging on his drum or his mess kit all the way but he's retreating so as a man involved in warfare he apparently saw this and that imagery I thought was so graphic let not this critical part of discourse be left to the inspiration of chance brother and I am embarrassed at this point I look at some of my poor efforts and one of the things that embarrasses me is that when the moment of truth has come and I've just expended all my time on the body of the sermon and the introduction all I've seen on my notes is summary and conclude hoping that somehow something will happen that I'll be able to tie it all together and the longer I live and the more I preach the more I realize in a sense that's tempting God now God has wonderfully come in times when the lack of time for that has not been culpable and the Lord has come and helped but I see more and more the necessity of thinking through this matter of the conclusion and not skimping on labor essential to the construction of a good conclusion alright second negative warning don't be too long in your conclusion I've already hinted at this with regard to the resume or recapitulation but even impressing

63:05 truth upon the conscience and appealing to the conscience and the will Shed and Dabney both underscore this principle that heightened emotions cannot be sustained for a lengthy period of time and that's what I'm going to do and I'm going to and you know that to be true and therefore if you are seeking in the conclusion to take both the moral impact of the truth the response that it ought to elicit at the realm of the emotions and the will and bearing down upon the consciences of your people don't be too long in such a conclusion far better to stop three paragraphs too early than to go three paragraphs three paragraphs too long at this point don't be too long in your conclusion thirdly don't be bound by one method or pattern in your conclusion it's a standing joke is it not that some preachers you can always tell when they're coming to the conclusion because they're going to have an illustration in a poem and that's the sign that you're taxiing up to the gate and the plane is landed well don't let it ever be said by your people oh well we know the sermon is coming to an end now because here's the signpost and here's the signpost and we've been down this road many times before

64:33 always keeping the goals before you remember there's more than one way to reach those goals and you need not have all of those elements of a conclusion equally present or equally distributed or distributed in the same way in all of your sermons vary the placement of the elements of your conclusion you may have some pointed application and inference after each point of the sermon and then gather them all together in a brief statement at the end you may vary the focal point of the conclusion in one conclusion on the Lord's Day morning it may be that the primary focal point of that conclusion is appealing to your people with respect to the kind of response the truth ought to create in them at the level of their appreciation of the grace and goodness of God it may be in the evening that you're seeking to stir them up to some specific action so vary the focal point of the conclusion and then seek to vary the emotional pattern of the conclusion don't feel that if a conclusion is what it ought to be it must end in wind and fire and thunder God may be present in the still small voice as well as in the wind and the fire and the thunder all right

Illustrations and Further Discussion: Tozer and Nichols

66:02 those are my suggestions of the do's and the don'ts now what I want us to do is well this will be like a break I'm going to play Tozer for you and then we'll have a little discussion after that all right are you weary of sitting or should we take a little break take a little break now and then we'll come back and we'll hear 13 minutes of Tozer that I hope will be a blessing from many standpoints not the least of which is uh to say the least an unusual conclusion to a sermon all right so let's take five it's 1230 now let's reconvene at 25 till okay what you're going to hear is an excerpt of Tozer now I'll give you an example of resume and recapitulation this sermon was preached at the NAE convention two weeks before Tozer went to be with the Lord and he was asked to preach on the subject of forward with Christ in total commitment and his first two points were forward with Christ in total commitment means commitment theologically and he opened up the whole fact you can't commit yourself to a Christ whom you do not know theologically and then he quoted from some of the creeds rich stuff but then he said it's commitment to Christ volitionally and then he preached about the fact that uh some of the teachers of the deeper life talk as though our will gets obliterated and he goes after that and says no our will becomes captured by Christ

67:30 and we choose to follow him now it's at this point that he's taking up his third point so he dealt with commitment to Christ theologically volitionally and I think the next point is irrevocably but he'll tell you what his point is but I want you to get something of the flavor of this man and then the very unusual way he concluded his sermon alright it helps if you push the play button exclusive attachment and what do I mean by that exclusive I mean that in our attachment to the person of Christ must exclude all that is contrary to Christ you see there is a polarity in the Christian life and this polarization begins at the very threshold these are the days when we're trying to be positive 100% positive but the scripture says of Jesus that thou hast loved righteousness and hated iniquity and that was said of the very holy Christ himself higher than the holy in the highest heavens and separate from sinners and if he had to hate in order to love so do you and I tell us that we ought to be positive people write to me and say you're negative why don't you go positive well to be positive 100% would be as fatal as you can do that

68:57 messiate the devil and I don't think that he can love or would leave us yet in order to own the things you got repudiated I from my part of the conclusion I can't get along with everybody he's at least

69:58 solution to that

70:46 I'm an identify accept his friends as my friends you know that that's how that goes down this road with a Jesus only button as big as a dinner plate here you know and his hair not it was a good brother he was a Pentecostal brother he's given out tracts he was making a bit of a nuisance of himself I admit there in the middle of the street car people getting on and off but you know my heart warm to him and on my way to church I took his hand and took the track and I said brother I'm on your side I'm one of them too and I shook his hand and we had nice little time there and I hustled off the car before it got away from my block so I like to own all of them you know the old bishop said that the the lord has his treasure in earthen vessels and some vessels are a bit cracked of the lord whoever they are his friend talked a little about that but I think we ought to have the courage to have this that everybody's

72:15 talking about now you know and as a I can't go for it at all I don't like it I want to the enemies of the lord is my enemies of the lord is my ways and the cross of Christ is my cross that's crucifixion what is a good definition for a Christian the definition for a Christian is it is backed from the editor any of you editors listening to me you would have thrown that out and shot that back in the first mail going in the direction of the fellow that wrote it

73:37 that's a contradiction that a Christian is static union forever to be reversed static union with him and when he died on a cross we died on a cross and when he rose from the dead we rose from the dead and when he went to the right hand of God we went to the right hand of God if then he'd be risen with Christ seeing that we sit in the heavenly place which means a great bible teacher Dr. Tucker he talked about being under the circumstances he said some lady said well I'm feeling as good as I could be under the circumstances he said no never should be under circumstances you should be on top of them Jesus Christ and live again and that he's like

75:04 if you look and if you look and if you look up you'll understand but if you look down and then you will indeed be victorious you'll be on top of it all a time called try to read the book I wouldn't be caught dead reading it try to eat in the cockpit and dive on the deck and if we go out we go out sink or swim live or die in the uniform in the world war one of them was a dive bomber in the navy engagements out in the pacific as a dive bomber out on the point under admiral mitchner true but when he came home he told me about it

76:33 desperately tried to get stop him but he got through our flak and hit the deck and bounced and came to a stop and the bomb was a dud and so we got to see a live suicide bomber and he said we opened the cockpit and found a 15 year old Japanese boy chained in the cockpit in the field they said goodbye to the deck along the point fortunately for my boy and all the boys it didn't go off but they took a Japanese kid 15 out of there and you know they committed that it's final this week looking back over your shoulder to see if there isn't something better who taught the deeper life and the crucified life and said and the old man thought a moment and said well to be crucified means that's the direction of God

78:02 the revelation the direction of world evangelization and the direction the edifying of the church the direction of sanctification and the direction of the spirit from direction going back doesn't say to his wife oh goodbye honey I'll be in shortly after five he isn't coming back when you go out to die on a cross you did goodbye to your friends you kissed your friends goodbye you had it going back life's so easy where it's contemptible living new this world he's not going to go back he takes a cross he has no further plans a further plan somebody else made his plans for him and when they

79:26 disappeared next Saturday noon about three I'll be by and we'll go fishing up by the lake he wasn't going fishing up by the lake he was finished he was going out to die no plans at all you were Christians some of them even though they're done in the name of the Lord and Evangelical Christianity the Lord will give you your plans twenty minutes more than you can learn out of books and teach you more in churches and the Lord will give you your plans of the churches but only learn time debating there it sits tawny cut on the wall and in the boardroom just I tell you you can cut

80:50 you can cut down you can cut down your time in this and teach and give you his plan I think that's about all I want gently join but we're to be very cool and inclusively attached taking in everything that he surrounds himself with and irrevocably attached that the Lord was with us

81:48 that's it that's it he got the plan from thirty thousand down to the deck and to the gate in thirteen seconds

81:57 well I thought that would be refreshing to you brethren I've listened to that so many times I can almost I think quote rings of that some of those quotes but you see the in terms of just analyzing the thing he just went back over those main heads drew them together in one brief capitulation that made as it were relive the various points and then in the exigencies of a close schedule just gave a very what we would say non-classical conclusion but for the situation it was perfect and he just went away from it and I still have the feeling I gotta go back to my hotel room and chew over what I've heard and then it also shows us a number of things about preaching that we don't set up false standards if you were to listen to Dr. Tozer expecting close careful exegesis you never would have found it and his great gift was not that of an exegete and to have pushed him into the Professor Murray mold would be to expect something that God never intended from the man so I was just excited to see what we would do about it and a couple of things that I'd like to look at that I'll put down on here but the first part of it

83:26 is the the the from that breadth of experience and perspective, the kind of stuff you heard today. And yet God marvelously and wonderfully used that ministry. And so when I keep emphasizing in these lectures, there's more than one way to do it. It's because I would be ready to defend to the death, I trust, the legitimacy of a tozer's ministry.

84:00 Now, that doesn't mean we try to be tozers or say that he could not have improved on certain aspects of his ministry, but the fact is that he didn't fit any mold. And yet there were underlining principles. I could not use the amount of humor that tozer used with a good conscience. But when you sat under his ministry, you never felt that, in fact, you could tell by the glint in his eye that he was holding back about three quarters of the humor and only letting out as much as he could with a good conscience.

84:30 And I, sometimes whenever he preached and I was there, the few occasions I was able... I tried to get as close as possible and I could just see from the glint in his eye, having had the privilege of some personal interaction with him, to interpret that, to know that he was thinking of all kinds of humorous things.

84:50 And humor is the ability to see the grotesque in something and you get a little flavor of that. But I hope you found that a blessing in content as well as an exposure to a different model and how things can be done sometimes that on the surface seem to break, break the rules, but really don't. One of the, I think, a classic illustration of how a conclusion can be constructed, and Pastor Nichols reminded me of that in our little break, is often by a telling illustration that brings home the truth with tremendous power and drives it home. There's a sermon he preached, not from a text of the Bible, but from a quote from an old mystic who prayed that God would give him three wounds.

85:35 The wound of contrition, the wound of compassion, and the wound of yearning after God. I'll never forget the sermon. I've literally listened to it stretched out on my face in my study. I was so absolutely overhauled by the sermon.

85:50 And in the unfolding of what those three wounds were, he then introduced, of course, biblical themes and having opened up the concept of the wound of yearning after God and that hunger for God is one of the essential marks of true biblical Christianity and compassion. He gave the illustration of a young miner that he knew in a church that he pastored out in western Pennsylvania in mining territory years ago who, because his church was having special meetings, took a day off from work, gave up a day's pay to spend the day in prayer and fasting that God would send his spirit upon the special effort to reach the lost. And how after that day of prayer and fasting he went into the mine the next day and the tipple, jumped the tracks and splintered and a large splinter caught him in the main artery in his thigh and by the time they got to him he had bled to death. And then he closed the sermon by saying this. He said, Brethren, do you know what Christianity is? That's Christianity.

86:53 He said, Lying all day before God with a wound of compassion and yearning after God and the next morning to wake up and look upon the face of Jesus. That's Christianity. This let's-go-play business, that's heresy.

87:15 And the effect is electric. I can still hear the words ringing in my ears. This let's-go-play business, that's heresy. Masterful, classical peroration and conclusion.

87:29 And yet it wasn't bound, you see, to the one method. But often a telling illustration, if you have at your disposal a hymn, often that can judiciously, judiciously drive an issue home. What were some of the other things you mentioned, Pastor Nichols? I felt that they were good, but I didn't write them down.

87:48 You made notes there.

87:52 Yeah.

87:56 Something, while I was wondering about the matter of the gospel appeal at the end of the sermon, about the matter of preaching and closing prayers, and about the matter of the distinction between writing out a conclusion versus thinking it through. Yes. Or the use of it. Or the use of the quotation, like Paul used in Acts 13, or do you despise your description of the scripture?

88:23 Those are some of the other things. Yes. Maybe I can just address myself briefly to a couple of them, because we're coming down near the time when some of you have to leave. Some of the brethren have to leave promptly at one because of work commitments, but we usually stay on to about quarter past or twenty after for discussion.

88:41 I certainly did not want to give the impression that I was encouraging writing out in detail the conclusion as I have encouraged you to do with your introduction, but certainly thinking through the broad structures of your conclusion and perhaps taking brief skeletal notes of how you hope to do it, but leaving to the moment the actual fleshing out of those broad outlines of thought as far as the specific language, leaving that to the actual act of preaching. And one of the things, that I personally am convinced is a good way to, as it were, bend over the nail of the sermon and the conclusion is in your final prayer to pray in such a way that you don't re-preach the sermon, but you ask God to work into your people the thrust of that sermon so that if the dominant appeal has been one of exhortation to the unconverted, to plead with God that he would make that effectual is certainly appropriate and right, or if the primary focus of application and in the conclusion has been a call to action, crying to God that by the Spirit he would enable his people to respond to that which he has said in his word. But we certainly want to avoid using prayer as an occasion to do what should have been done in the sermon. And few things are more distasteful

90:09 to thinking and sensitive people than prayer that is turned into preaching or to exhortation Now, Lord, you know that there are lots of people here tonight who are not saved and, Lord, you know that. Well, the Lord knows all that, so don't tell him. You know, often when people, when a prayer takes that form and, Lord, you know that, someone is using prayer as an occasion to preach or to exhort. And generally speaking, that's very distasteful and is really a profaning of the very nature and privilege of prayer.

90:43 Well, are there other questions or areas with respect to prayer? With respect to the whole matter of the conclusion that you'd like to open up by way of questions or contributions? Yes, Jonathan?