Practical Sermons (excerpt from P.T. Lecture #16)

The Intensely Practical Thrust of Biblical Sermons

0:01 Number four, our sermons will be intensely practical in their overall thrust. Our sermons will be intensely practical in their overall thrust.

0:17 And you see, the purpose for which Scripture was given is clearly stated in such passages as 2 Timothy 3, 16 and 17. The God-breathed Scriptures are given and profitable for teaching. Now, some people, that's where they stop, and they feel when we've taught what the Bible says, we've done our job. But that isn't what the text says.

0:39 For teaching, for reproof, for correction, for child-training in righteousness. That's why they were given. Or 1 Corinthians 10, 11, concerning great blocks of Old Testament narrative and history. These things were written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the ages have come, to the intent that we should not lust after evil things as they lusted and perished and were destroyed by the destroyer.

1:09 Therefore, all preaching that is really biblical must manifest these realities of what the Bible says concerning why the Bible was given.

Truth According to Godliness

1:20 Take Titus 1, 1. Paul speaks of the truth which is according to godliness. It is truth which tends toward and leads toward and is supportive of godliness. And if godliness is not a very practical issue, then I don't know what it is.

1:37 So we must not traffic in truth as the newscaster does in reporting the major events of the day. He's just reporting events. I'm just reporting facts that are in the Bible. No.

1:51 Though any given sermon may, in terms of sermon type, take me nine-tenths of the time to explain, to illustrate, to qualify, to demonstrate, it's all leading to that ultimate assault upon the conscience, the affections, and the will. It's all leading to the authoritative summons to have dealings with God. Whether in the reception of his comfort, whether in the reception of a new dimension of his revealed will, whether in the expansion of my appreciation for his grace, the scriptures were given to lead us to have dealings with God, in the concreteness of the totality of life under the eye of God, and lived in the fear of God.

Distinguishing Practical Preaching from Merely Informational, Emotional, or Rhetorical

2:43 Now, such preaching will be found in direct contrast to that which is merely, and here again I've given you three things it shouldn't be. I find it helpful if I can state, well, this is what I'm aiming at, and if I'm aiming at that, this is what it won't be. So this is why I'm doing this with you. Preaching which is merely informational.

3:01 Here the preacher seems to be concerned with nothing less than the, the injection of facts into the heads of his hearers. And once he's injected the facts, his informational task is done, he's done, they're done, everyone goes his way. On the other hand, there are others whose preaching is exclusively emotional.

3:26 Their end seems to be the mere disruption or agitation of the feelings.

3:32 If I can carry on the imagery, he tries to get an electric probe into the area where the affections are stirred and give them a toad. That's his. And then others, they seem to be merely rhetorical. They want to dazzle the eyes of the mind and tickle the ears with the lovely sounds that come out of their voices.

The End of Preaching: Eliciting Responses and Volition

3:56 But with this practical concern that people will have dealings with God in the full range of what that means, from conviction to comfort to consolation to the response of faith and awe and love, and the full range of all that constitutes wholesome, full-orbed Christian experience, so many men seem to be utterly ignorant that the end of preaching is to see such responses elicited from the people of God. So if the Bible is being preached biblically, it cannot help but be preached practically. If it is preached biblically, it cannot help but be preached practically, for it was given for those practical ends. And here again, Dabney the philosopher, comes forth here. He said, Eloquence is often named, page 30 of Dabney on preaching,

4:55 music, I'm sorry, eloquence is often named as one of the fine arts, but I've already forewarned you there's an essential distinction made by the ends of the tooth. Music and the imitative arts, that's the theater, are designed primarily to gratify the taste. Their immediate aim is at the sentimental affections of the soul. But the immediate end of eloquence is to produce in the hearers, some practical volition.

5:20 Its design is to evoke an act. When this is said, you will not understand me as indicating by the word action, only the movement of the body and its members. I speak of the actions of the soul, of those mature determinations of the will, in which man's rational and responsive activity consummates itself. And I repeat that wherever there is no direct purpose in the speaker to reduce action of the will in his hearers, there is no proper oration.

5:52 He's saying that a sermon is a sacred oration. And in classical rhetoric, the oration always had as its end something more than the mere impartation of information, the mere stirring of emotions, or the display of the rhetorical arts of the orator. There was an end in view that was intensely practical. And brethren, we must never forget that.

The Frustration and Faith of the Preacher

6:19 Now, one of the great liabilities of the ministry is you don't know how close you're coming to your mark. There's no way to measure any given sermon. You may be very conscious at what you're aiming at. Under God, you're aiming that people shall be overwhelmed with a sense of the majesty of God, or the beauty of Christ, or the compassion of Christ, or the horrible depths of human depravity.

6:44 And you have no way of measuring whether or not that effect, that practical response of humiliation, or exultation and praise, is actually being elicited in any one sermon. And that's the frustration of preaching. That you have to be a man of faith who leads to God, that over the long haul you will have undeniable evidences that the word is indeed accomplishing that. But whether you can measure it or not, that's what you must drive after.

7:11 That's what you must pour out your soul in. And it must be evident to even the most cursory listener that that man in the pulpit is, not content for me simply to have a mental injection. He wants me to feel his feeling. He wants me to commit myself to the things he's committed to.

7:33 That they ought to know. And they ought to know that every single time you preach. And every single time I preach.

7:42 And that's why old Professor Murray said, preaching without passion is not preaching. Because you cannot feel the pressure of the practical ends of the truth in which you traffic without feeling passion. It's impossible.