The Bride of Christ doesn't need anymore ear-ticklers, people -pleasers, peddlers of the Word, sentimentizers or editors of the Scriptures. The people of God have long endured them. Such people have infiltrated the pulpit and led people astray. They have confounded, wounded, confused, misled, lied to God's people. They have convinced unbelievers that they are in the family of God. They have preached another Gospel and they shall receive their just due. There are hoards of Satan's messengers ready to step in the place of a faithful preacher. But we don't want them.
So will the faithful preachers please stand up? Will you stand and herald to precious Gospel of Christ Jesus. Will you proclaim Christ the Servant (Matt. 20:28) who is also Christ the Warrior King whose eyes are like a flame of fire with a two-edged sword from His mouth (Rev. 1:14,16)? Will you proclaim the Lamb who was slain for the ransom of God's people (Rev. 5:6-10), the slain Lamb that is risen and ready to judge the unrepentant (Rev. 1:17-20)? Will you tell them of the mercy of Christ? Will you testify to His love? Will you explain such divine love? Will you connect the dots between sin, the cross and Christ? It is Him we proclaim, brothers! Christ the Lord.
There are those whom God has reserved for Himself that have not bowed the knee to Baal. These people are longing to be nourished by the Word of God. They are starving, perhaps even emaciated from a lack of spiritual food. They are hungry for the Word of God to be heralded to them. "Enough of the foolishness!" they cry. They want the Christ of the Bible. They want God the Father, who sends the Son to redeem His people and glorify His name. They want God the Son, who accomplishes the work of redemption that the Father has sent Him into the world for. They Want God the Spirit that applies the Work of Christ and indwells them. They long to grow in Christ. Preacher of Christ will you please stand up?
The poor unbeliever, who has been convinced they are a believer,
needs to hear that they are not saved by their community service, church attendance, saying the "sinners prayer", "being like Jesus", giving to the poor, good works as some messengers of Satan have convinced them they are saved by such things. They need to hear they are wretched sons of Adam, dead in their trespasses and sins and only the merciful, gracious, saving work of Christ can save them from hell (Matt. 10:28, Eph. 2:1-10, Rom. 3:9-26).
Will you stand and preach? Will to tell them they are sinners? Because if you do many will hate you for it. Others will be grateful that through your faithful handling of God's Word, through the power of the Holy Spirit, they will be converted to Christ and enter the fold of God. The former will seem more common than the latter. They will revile, slander, misunderstand, curse you. They will distort your words and ask for your resignation. They will hate you for the sake of Christ's name (Matt. 10:16-25). But will you still stand and preach Christ crucified? Will you endure? Will you do it for the glory of the Triune God?
If so, please stand and preach the whole counsel of God- every whit of it! If you will do this on behalf of Christ your Sovereign King, then:
Here on some words from a faithful preacher (Dr. Al Mohler):
"4 I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: 2 preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. 3 For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, 4 and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. 5 As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry" (2 Ti 4:1–5).
This centrality of preaching is seen in both testaments of Scripture. It was the apostle Paul, for example, who told Timothy in no uncertain terms, “I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom, Preach the Word!” In Nehemiah 8, as we will see in more detail in the next chapter, we find a remarkable portrait of expository preaching, when the people demand that Ezra the scribe bring the book of the law to the assembly. Ezra stands on a raised platform and reads from the book of the law, “translating to give the sense so that they understood the reading” (Nehemiah 8:8 NASB). When he opens the book to read, the assembly rises to its feet in honor of the Word of God, and their response to the reading is to answer, “Amen, Amen!”
This text is a sobering indictment of much contemporary Christianity. According to the text, a demand for biblical preaching erupted within the hearts of the people. They gathered as a congregation and summoned the preacher. This reflects an intense hunger and thirst for the preaching of the Word of God. Where is this desire evident among today’s evangelicals? Moreover, where is the faithfulness of preachers to confront their people with the preached Word of God? There seems to be a sense that people will be more affected by the gospel if it is presented in a slickly produced multimedia production, or even if we dispense with preaching altogether in favor of a purely subjective and emotional worship “experience.” Yet what was it that brought the Israelites to their God-honoring response of “Amen, Amen!”? It was the exposition of the Word. Ezra did not stage an event or orchestrate a spectacle. He simply and carefully proclaimed the Word of God.
In far too many churches, the Bible is nearly silent. The public reading of Scripture has been dropped from many services, and the sermon has been sidelined, reduced to a brief devotional appended to the music. Many preachers accept this as a necessary concession to the age of entertainment, and are thus left with the modest hope of including a brief message of encouragement or exhortation before the conclusion of the service.
Michael Green pointedly put the problem like this: “This is the age of the sermonette, and sermonettes make Christianettes.” The anemia of evangelical worship—all the music and energy aside—is directly attributable to the absence of genuine expository preaching. If we as pastors are truly serious about giving our people a true vision of God, showing them their own sinfulness, proclaiming to them the gospel of Jesus Christ, and encouraging them to obedient service in response to that gospel, then we will devote our lives to preaching the Word. That is our task and our calling—to confront our congregations with nothing less than the living and active Word of God, and to pray that the Holy Spirit will thereby open eyes, convict consciences, and apply that Word to human hearts.*
*Mohler, R. A., Jr. (2008). He is not silent: Preaching in a postmodern world (37–38). Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers.
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