Stott on Having a God-Directed View of Prayer

"It will be seen that the fundamental difference between various kinds of prayer is in the fundamentally different images of God which lie behind them. The tragic mistake of Pharisees and pagans, of hypocrites and heathen, is to be found in their false image of God. Indeed, neither is really thinking of God at all, for the hypocrite thinks only of himself while the heathen thinks of other things. What sort of God is it who might be interested in such selfish and mindless prayers? Is God a commodity that we can use to boost our own status, or a computer that we can feed words into him mechanically."

John Stott
The Message of the Sermon on the Mount

Tim Keller on Prayer

"To fail to pray, then, is not to merely break some religious rule--it is a failure to treat God as God."

Tim Keller
Prayer: Experiencing Awe and Intimacy with God

N.T. Wright on the Problem of Evil

"We are not told—or not in any way that satisfies our puzzled questioning—how and why there is radical evil within God’s wonderful, beautiful, and essentially good creation. One day I think we shall find out, but I believe we are incapable of understanding it at the moment, in the same way that a baby in the womb would lack the categories to think about the outside world. What we are promised, however, is that God will make a world in which all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well, a world in which forgiveness is one of the foundation stones and reconciliation is the cement which holds everything together. And we are given this promise not as a matter of whistling in the dark, not as something to believe even though there is no evidence, but in and through Jesus Christ and his death and resurrection, and in and through the Spirit through whom the achievement of Jesus becomes a reality in our world and in our lives. When we understand forgiveness, flowing from the work of Jesus and the Spirit, as the strange and powerful thing it really is, we begin to realize that God’s forgiveness of us, and our forgiveness of others, is the knife that cuts the rope by which sin, anger, fear, recrimination and death are still attached to us. Evil will have nothing to say at the last, because the victory of the cross will be fully implemented."

N.T. Wright

Evil and the Justice of God

A Word for Preachers...William Still on Preaching the Whole Word of God

"Beyond the deeper truths of the Gospel -- which, alas, so many do not teach and preach for, I fear, reasons obscure to others but known to themselves -- there is the darker blackcloth to the Good News, namely, the penal and corrective judgements of God, upon which the scintillating diamond of the Gospel shines with a thousand facets. The judgements are also the Word of God; and only he who preaches and teaches the whole Bible, dark and light, rightly dividing the Word of truth, fully proclaims the Word of God. After all, we see a rainbow only on the clouds."

William Still
The Work of the Pastor

A Word for Preachers...Mohler on the Need for Urgency in Preaching

"In all too many pulpits, God has become our next-door neighbor, our great cosmic companion, or the divine leader of our small group, rather than the holy God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Perhaps the lack of urgency in so much preaching today comes from a lack of understanding about humanity's awful predicament. The greatest problem we human beings face is not a shortage of self-esteem. It is that we have rebelled against God, and, in His holiness, God will one day hold us to horrible account for our sin.

"The gospel necessarily comes with an urgent warning, because the distinction between those who obey its call and those who disobey is not merely between a better life and a worse life. It is the difference between life and death. It is an eternal distinction, for the cost of disobedience and the coast of not hearing the gospel is eternal death.

"That is why we must preach with urgency of a dying man. It is because human beings are in desperate need of salvation. Time is short, God's wrath is certain, and eternity hangs in the balance. Moreover, there is for each of us only one way out of this predicament, and that is the salvation God Himself has won through the gospel of his Son, Jesus Christ."

Al Mohler
He Is Not Silent: Preaching in a Postmodern World

A Word for Preachers...Wright on the Central Calling of Preachers

The words "Him we proclaim" in Colossians 1:28 "serve, for Christian preachers and teachers, as a constant reminder of their central calling, not (first and foremost) to comment on current affairs or to alleviate human problems, good and necessary as those activities may be, but to announce that Jesus is Lord."

N.T. Wright
The Tyndale New Testament Commentaries:
Colossians & Philemon

A Word for Preachers...Stott on the Pastor's Personal Walk

"We pastors have God-given responsibilities both to the congregation we serve and to the doctrine we teach, for both have been committed to us. Yet our prior responsibility is to ourselves, to guard our personal walk with God and our loyalty to him. Nobody can be a good pastor or teacher of others who is not first a good servant of Jesus Christ. Disciplined habits, of pastoral visitation and counselling on the one hand, and of theological study and sermon preparation on the other, become barren exercises unless they are supported by disciplined habits of personal devotion, especially biblical meditation and prayer. Every pastor knows how exacting his ministry is. We may encounter misunderstanding and even opposition; we shall certainly grow weary in mind and body; we may also have to endure loneliness and discouragement. Even the strongest personalities collapse under the weight of these pressures, unless the power of God is being revealed in our weakness, and the life of Jesus in our mortal bodies, so that 'inwardly we are being renewed day by day. (2 Cor. 4:7-11 and 16)"

John Stott
Between Two Worlds: The Challenge of Preaching Today

Wednesday's Words of Wisdom...Calvin on the Believer's Security

"Christ instructs his followers to remember that, in this world, they may be said to be in the midst of a forest, surrounded by innumerable robbers, and are not only unarmed and exposed as a prey, but are aware that the cause of death is contained in themselves, so that, relying on the guardianship of God alone, they may walk without alarm. In short, our salvation is certain, because it is in the hand of God; for our faith is weak, and we are too prone to waver. But God, who has taken us under his protection, is sufficiently powerful to scatter, with his breath alone, all the forces of our adversaries. It is of great importance for us to turn our eye to this, that the fear of temptations may not dismay us; for Christ even intended to point out the way in which sheep are made to live at ease in the midst of wolves."

John Calvin
Commentary on John 10:28

A Word for Preachers...Alexander on the Key to Applicatory Preaching

"I am told that someone said of Robert Murray McCheyne of Dundee, 'He seemed, as his preaching progressed, to advance upon you until he was standing inside your heart, applying the Word of God to all your life.'

"My own increasing conviction is that this application begins at our own door. I think the secret of applicatory preaching is that we must apply to ourselves the Word of God while we are meditating upon it, while we are studying it. We must do this before we ever begin to think about applying it to other people.

"John Owen wrote, 'A man preacheth that sermon well unto others which preacheth itself in his own soul. If the Word do not dwell with power in us, it will not pass with power from us.' And again, 'He who doth not feed on and digest and thrive by what he preaches and prepares for his people, may give them poison as far as he knows,   for unless he finds the power of it in his own heart, he cannot have any ground of confidence that it will have power in the hearts of others.'"

Eric J. Alexander
What is Biblical Preaching?

Wednesday's Words of Wisdom...DeYoung on the Gospel and Holiness

"(T)he gospel aids our pursuit of holiness by telling us the truth about who we are. Certain sins become more difficult when we understand our new position in Christ. If we are heirs to the whole world, why should we envy? If we are God's treasured possession, why be jealous? If God is our Father, why be afraid? If we are dead to sin, why live in it? If we've been raised with Christ, why continue in our old sinful ways? If we are seated in the heavenly places, why act like the devil of hell? If we are loved with an everlasting love, why are we trying to prove our worth to the world? If Christ is all in all, why am I so preoccupied with myself?"

Kevin DeYoung
The Hole in our Holiness: Filling the Gap between Gospel Passion and the Pursuit of Godliness

A Word for Preachers...Alexander on the Unction of God

"When the unction of God is upon the preacher of his Word, people will go away saying, not 'What a great preacher!' but rather, ' Truly, God is in this place! How great and glorious he is!'"

Eric J. Alexander
What is Biblical Preaching?

Wednesday's Words of Wisdom...Calvin on the Principal Office of Christ

"The principal office of Christ is briefly but clearly stated; that he takes away the sins of the world by the sacrifice of his death, and reconciles men to God. There are other favours, indeed, which Christ bestows upon us, but this is the chief favour, and the rest depend upon it; that, by appeasing the wrath of God, he makes us to be reckoned holy and righteous, that, by not imputing our sins, he receives us into favour."

John Calvin
Commentary on John 1:29

A Word for Preachers...Ferguson on the Preacher's Heart

"There is a widespread need for (preaching that produces inner prostration of the hearts of listeners). We have an equal need as preachers to catch the vision for it in an overly pragmatic and programmatic society that believes it is possible to live the Christian life without either the exposing of our own hearts or the accompanying prostration of ourselves before the majesty of God on high.

"It is just here that one notices a striking contrast between the biblical exposition one finds in the steady preaching of John Calvin in the sixteenth century and preaching in our own day. It is clearly signaled by the words with which he ended virtually every one of his thousands of sermons: 'And now let us bow down before the majesty of our gracious God...' Reformed biblical exposition elevates God and abases man. By contrast, much modern preaching seems to have the goal of making man feel great, even if God Himself has to bow down.

"So a leading characteristic of preaching of to their heart will be the humbling, indeed, prostration of hearts before the majesty of god on high. This is simultaneously the true ecstasy of the Christian, and therein lies the paradox of grace: the way down is always the way up.

"But if, through the preaching of the gospel, we want to see people prostrated with mingled awe and joy before God, the essential prerequisite is that we ourselves be prostrated before him. John Owen's words still ring true even after three and a half centuries: ' a man preacheth that sermon only well unto others which preacheth itself in his own soul....If the word do not dwell with power in  us, it will not pass with power from us.'"

Sinclair Ferguson
Feed My Sheep: A Passionate Plea for Preaching

Wednesday's Words of Wisdom...Keller on Rejoicing and Repentance

“Rejoicing and repentance must go together. Repentance without rejoicing will lead to despair. Rejoicing without repentance is shallow and will only provide passing inspiration instead of deep change. Indeed, it is when we rejoice over Jesus’s sacrificial love for us most fully that, paradoxically, we are most truly convicted of our sin. When we repent out of fear of consequences, we are not really sorry for the sin, but for ourselves. Fear-based repentance (‘I’d better change or God will get me’) is really self-pity. In fear-based repentance, we don’t learn to hate the sin for itself, and it doesn’t lose its attractive power. We learn only to refrain from it for our own sake. But when we rejoice over God’s sacrificial, suffering love for us -- seeing what it cost Him to save us from sin -- we learn to hate the sin for what it is. We see what the sin cost God. What most assures us of God’s unconditional love (Jesus’s costly death) is what most convicts us of the evil of sin. Fear-based repentance makes us hate ourselves. Joy-based repentance makes us hate the sin.”

Tim Keller
Counterfeit Gods: The Empty Promises of Money, Sex, and Power, and the Only Hope That Matters  

A Word for Preachers...William Taylor on Evangelistic Preaching

"To call upon men constantly to come to Christ and to repeat perpetually the words of Paul to the jailer, 'Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ,' without at the same time telling them who Jesus Christ is and what it is to come to Him, is the merest mockery. It is using the name of Christ as though it were some cabalistic charm and reducing the Gospel message to an empty formula. If therefore we would be effective evangelists, we must be ready to give an answer to him who asks us, 'Who is this Jesus that I believe upon him? What is there in His dying that has any relation to me?'"

William M. Taylor, in his book The Ministry of the Word
cited in What is Biblical Preaching? by Eric J. Alexander

A Word for Preachers...Campbell Morgan on Being Crucified with Christ

"It is the crucified man that can preach the cross. Said Thomas 'except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails...I will not believe.' Dr. Parker of London said that what Thomas said of Christ, the world is saying about the church. And the world is also saying to every preacher: Unless I see in your hands the print of the nails, I will not believe. It is true. It is the man...who has died with Christ,...that can preach the cross of Christ."

Campbell Morgan
cited in John Stott's The Cross of Christ

Wednesday's Words of Wisdom...Stanley Gale on Prayer and God's Sovereignty

"Prayer is a means by which God enfolds us int the outworking of his eternal plan. Prayer is God's means for God's ends. God executes his plan and accomplishes his purposes through the mediation of our prayers as his people. Prayer is intended by God to engage us in the accomplishment of his purposes for his own glory and goals.

"We can say that in praying we can expect God to do something he would not have done had we not prayed, not to limit God but to exalt the glory of his unfathomable providence that governs all causes, mediate and immediate. In other words, to suggest God waits on our prayers does not make God smaller. It makes him bigger than we could ever possibly fathom. Who is like God, governing means and ends, including the acts and prayers of his creatures, without violating their free agency and still maintaining their responsibility and culpability?

"We can take it even a step further: God's sovereign plan not only does not invalidate responsible action, it establishes it because that is the way God has designed things. Our prayers are not intruders on God's plan but instruments in that plan."

Stanley D. Gale
Why Do We Pray?

A Word for Preachers...Chapell on Grace-Focused Preaching

"No matter how great your skill or accolades, you are unlikely to lead others closer to God if your heart does not reflect the continuing work of the Savior in your life. A grace-focused ministry recognizes the repentance our prayers must consistently express, confess the divine aid that grants us the strength of our resolutions, obeys God in gratitude for forgiveness Christ supplies, expresses the humility appropriate for a fellow sinner, exudes the joy of salvation by faith alone, and reflects the Love that claims our own souls and accepts our service without any merit of our own. Preaching without a grace focus concentrates on means of earning divine acceptance, proofs of personal righteousness, and contrasts with those less holy than we.

"The necessity of grace in balanced preaching inevitably points both preacher and parishioner to the work of Christ as the only proper center of our sermons. Christ-centered preaching is not merely evangelistic, nor confined to a few gospel accounts. It perceives the whole of Scripture as revelatory of God's redemptive plan and preaches every passage within this context--a pattern that Jesus himself introduced to us (Luke 24:27)...(T)he Bible requires us to construct our messages in such a way as to reveal the grace that is the ultimate focus of every text, the ultimate enablement for ever instruction, and the only source of true holiness."

Bryan Chapell 
Christ-Centered Preaching: Redeeming the Expository Sermon

Wednesday's Words of Wisdom...Ryken on Prayer and God's Sovereignty

"Imagine for a moment that God is not sovereign in grace, but that salvation ultimately depends on the sinner's own choice. How then should we pray? Do we say, 'Dear Lord, I realize that there may not be much that you can do about this, but if there is, please help my friend somehow to become a Christian'? Of course, no one actually prays this way: the very idea is absurd. But what makes it so absurd is that, deep down, every Christian believes in the sovereignty of God's grace. When we pray for sinners to be converted, therefore, we ask God to do something for them that we know they are utterly incapable of doing for themselves. We ask God to invade their minds, change their hearts, and bend their wills so that they will come to him in faith and repentance. In short, in our intercession we depend on God to save them."

Philip Ryken

What is a True Calvinist?

A Word for Preachers...T.H.L. Parker on the Example of Calvin

"There is no threshing himself into a fever of impatience or frustration, no holier-than-thou rebuking of the people, no begging them in terms of hyperbole to give some physical sign that the message has been accepted. It is simply one man, conscious of his sins, aware how little progress he makes and how hard it is to be a doer of the Word, sympathetically passing on to his people (whom he knows to have the same sort of problems as himself) what God has said to them and to him."

T.H.L. Parker (regarding John Calvin)
Calvin's Preaching
as cited in The Expository Genius of John Calvin by Steven J. Lawson