A Passion For Preaching

A passion for preaching

By Adrian Warnock

Subtitle ‘Why I am obsessed with preaching’

INTRO

The Japanese eat a low fat diet and have less heart attacks than the British and Americans.

The French eat a high fat diet and have less heart attacks than the British and Americans.

The Japanese drink very little wine and have less heart attacks than the British and Americans.

The Italians drink lots of wine and have less heart attacks than the British and Americans.

The moral?

Eat and drink as much as you like, it is speaking English that will kill you!

‘sticks and stones may break my bones but words could never hurt me—RUBBISH

We live in an age that devalues words, All about image…..and esp preaching.

‘Its just words’

‘Youre all talk’

Words alone are powerful actually.

Words with the holy spirit are lifechanging.

‘when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you believers.’ 1 Thes 2:13

You may remember sermons, which changed your life.

You may have forgotten sermons, which none the less changed your life.

In true preaching more is done than said

May this sermon be one of those that do something….. PRAY.

Nehemiah 8 and 9

Neh 8:1-8

The setting for preaching

All the people ‘gathered as one man’. Many today don’t go to church. I believe in God they say, but you can keep your church. Bloggers I know who say the church is in a mess- they are right. But we must work to reform the church, and to do that we need to gather….

‘Men and women and all who could understand what they heard’ v2

‘God has decided he will manifest his glory through the church= gathering of people ‘as one man’ to hear the same, to think the same, to act the same (not as clones, but according to the same principles. Eg Colin and Tope- very different people, very different styles, very different leadership styles but ‘as one man’- hard to get a piece of paper between them

It is this gathering of God’s people under the word of God who He has chosen to reveal his glory through.

NO PLAN B Not through the internet, through blogs, through books, worship CDs, Christian TV, even dare I say the Passion.

All those things SERVE the church, but it is the church that is Gods passion

Watching the Passion without a preacher to explain it to you will help no one.

EPH 3:7 Of this gospel I was made a minister according to the gift of God’s grace, which was given me by the working of his power. 8 To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, 9 and to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things, 10 so that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. 11 This was according to the eternal purpose that he has realized in Christ Jesus our Lord,

Why did they gather? To hear God’s word preached. There had been a famine of Gods word- just like today.

IT was always this way in Israel – Judges ‘there arose another generation after them who did not know the LORD or the work that he had done for Israel.’ They hadn’t heard preaching!

When we gather we want to hear God’s word.

In the new testament preaching also has a broader definition- not just what

happens when a large group gather together-

Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word. (Acts 8:4)

And every day, in the temple and from house to house, they did not cease teaching and preaching Jesus as the Christ. (Acts 5:42)

You yourselves know how I lived among you the whole time from the first day that I set foot in Asia, 19 serving the Lord with all humility and with tears and with trials that happened to me through the plots of the Jews; 20 how I did not shrink from declaring to you anything that was profitable, and teaching you in public and from house to house, 21 testifying both to Jews and to Greeks of repentance toward God and of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. (Acts 20:18-21)

Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. 29 For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me. (Col 1:28-29)