Confessing Evangelical

Craig has pointed out that the Schartau sermon I posted on Friday, while wonderful, does perhaps stretch its text a little. It thus transgresses the basic principles of sound expository preaching, in particular the need to interpret biblical texts responsibly and in their context, rather than using them as a mere springboard to whatever the preacher wants to say. As JI Packer puts it, "the Bible is God preaching", and the preacher's job is, first and foremost, to "get out of the way" and ensure that his message is nothing more and nothing less than what the text is actually saying in its context. In a word, God says what the passage says. If you make the passage say something else, then you will not be hearing what God is saying in it.

Now this is a good and important principle, and I am still very committed to the value of true expository preaching that tells us what the passage says, rather than what the preacher happens to want to say that week. Hence the occasional posts to expositions by Dick Lucas (one of the finest Bible expositors I've ever come across), and hence my continuing intention at some point to post more about "biblical theology" and especially Graeme Goldsworthy's work on the subject.

But a strict adherence to this approach has caused me some anguish in the past. The problem comes when you hear a sermon and the preacher (in your view) misinterprets the text. Since God says what the text says, if the preacher is misinterpreting the text, that means you're not going to hear from God that morning. You may hear some edifying material (or not), but you won't be hearing what God has to say in that particular passage. (I'm not defending this sort of attitude, merely describing my own experience as someone with a strong and sinful disposition towards sitting in judgment on Christ's ministers; and also as someone with bruising experiences of having sat under genuinely damaging and unbiblical preaching). Reading Don Carson's classic Exegetical Fallacies only made matters worse (there are some books which laypeople really shouldn't read, and this is perhaps one of them).

However, since we started attending Christ Church, my attitude has softened and modified. This is the product of hearing excellent preaching week by week from our pastor, and finding that minor quibbles over the precise interpretation of particular texts are less important than a clear testimony to Christ and His saving work, and a proper distinction of Law and Gospel.

For example, a few weeks ago, our pastor preached on Psalm 67. IMPO (that's "P" for "proud"), he misinterpreted the word "ways" in the verse, "that your ways may be known on earth". But the sermon overall was a wonderfully Christ-centred message, that demonstrated how the Israelites' prayer of Psalm 67 had been answered in the coming of Jesus (not least the prayer that God would "make his face to shine upon us" - but God doesn't have a face, does He? Or rather He didn't, until...)

Equally, I have heard sermons at other evangelical churches that are a model of sound exposition and biblical theology, with not a word out of place, but which still fail to have any real spiritual power - usually, IMAO (that's "A" for "arrogant"), because they confuse Law and Gospel to some degree.

While accurate exposition is indeed important, what really gives preaching its power is that:

• it presents Jesus Christ to us, and uncovers to us how "Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world, is the heart and center of the Scripture and therefore the key to its true meaning" (Explanation, q.4); and
  


• it correctly and sharply distinguishes between the Law and the Gospel (see Explanation qq.6-8).
  

If a sermon points us to Christ and doesn't confuse Law and Gospel, then interpretational errors or "stretching" of a text can, within reason, be overlooked. The Schartau sermon is an excellent example of this.