Continuing a look at theology, Charlie and Adam now turn to the question: What is a biblical definition of Preaching?
This is Pastor to Pastor, a podcast of NOBTS and Leavell College. Pastor to Pastor is here to help you lay a biblical foundation for your ministry.
Adam: Well, hello and welcome again to our Pastor to Pastor podcast. Hope you're doing well and having a great day. As always, I'm Adam Hughes. And I am here with my colleague and friend, Dr. Charlie Ray. Charlie, how are you doing today? You doing all right?
Charlie: Yeah, doing great. Thanks, Adam. Glad to be here.
Adam: Well, good deal. Well, just to reset for our listeners; where we are, where we've been, what we're dealing with during this section of podcast, we've been talking about looking at from biblical exegesis to even theology, biblical theology, what is preaching/teaching? That's what we've been discussing. And so we've looked at several passages of scripture, done the exegesis of several passages of scripture, and pulled out principles that you and I believe relate specifically to the practice of what the pastor does in the pulpit on Sundays in his local church.
And we then moved and we've talked about what do we see holistically of teaching in the Old Testament? And then last week we specifically looked at Jesus as the teacher and what we can learn from that. And Charlie, what's been interesting about this, and maybe even a little bit frustrating for our listeners, is we've talked about some terms out there. We've bounced back and forth between teaching and preaching and pastoral preaching. And we've even hit on the importance of evangelism versus what we're talking about with teaching and preaching. And so what we think we should do today, perhaps to ease their frustration, is to try to hone in on exactly what we mean, to give a definition of exactly what do we mean. What is it that we're talking about when we say pastoral preaching?
And so I think this is a good place for us to do it. Again, we've looked at the overall understanding of teaching in the Old Testament and Jesus as the teacher. So here we come. We're going to try today to give words that clarify what we mean by that. And I would even say this, and please give your thoughts here, Charlie, one of the things that we did even when we were looking at what is a pastor last semester in the fall, we came to the point where we tried to say, "This is what we mean. When we use the term pastor, here's what we're talking about." And the reason I think that's good, even as we move into now, "What do we mean by preaching or pastor or preaching?", I would say even if our listeners don't completely agree, maybe they would nuance it differently, maybe they completely disagree, but I do think words matter. I think definitions matter. And so I think it is helpful for you and I to say, "Here's what we mean by that."
Charlie: Yeah. I think a lot of conversations or disputes today sometimes come down to the meaning of words. So just for a very practical example, we're evaluating a sermon, and I hope you understand how I'm using that, a guy stood up there before a group of people and said some things. One of the questions was, did he do a good job or did do a bad job? Well, we can't evaluate that unless we know what he was supposed to be doing. And so that's I think what we're trying to get at, because I often like to say that I was probably called preacher as much as I was called pastor. That's maybe sort of a cultural thing that varies from region to region, but preaching is so associated with a pastor, that that's often just become the word. A preacher, I probably got that more than anything else. But then the question in becomes, "Yeah. What do we exactly mean by preaching?"
Adam: Absolutely. I think that that's a good segue. Pastors are often called preachers, but what do we mean when we say a pastor is preaching? And so I'm just going to start by giving the definition that you and I have come up with. Maybe I shouldn't say come up with. That you and I have I guess you would say decided upon, and then we'll try to unpack it.
Again, here's my Southern Baptist preacher coming out. We've got three different component parts that we want to talk through there. And I would even say to them, they can go... And you've written an article where you've worked through this a little bit and they can even go read that article on our website, but here's essentially the definition we've come up with and then we'll walk through each part. Pastoral preaching is the explanation and application of God's word, the Bible, to a specific local church by the qualified and accepted leadership of that church. So Charles, we think about that definition and we parcel it out a little bit. Help us think through each of these parts. And perhaps the place to begin would be to ask the question, what are we talking about when we say the explanation and application of God's word?
Charlie: You and I went back and forth on email some on exactly how do we nuance this stuff? I was reading Alistair Begg and his preaching for God's glory yesterday. He says that the preacher's task is to declare what God has said, explain the meaning and establish the implications so that no one will mistake its relevance. And I think his definition really fits under this first task of what we're saying preaching is, that in other words, you take God's word, you explain its significance and then you press in on the people the implications of the significance of God's word. Alistair Begg also mentioned that you've got to deal with a text like Nehemiah 8, for example, when you deal with preaching where the word of God is open to all who can understand it as the language that's used in Nehemiah 8. And then you also have the explanation of it, but then you see the implications as the people actually begin to walk in obedience to God's word.
Adam: They go celebrate the feast that they should have been celebrating in the first place.
Charlie: Exactly. And so I think that's where we're trying to say that that preaching falls short. First of all, preaching must explain God's word, but then it also must make application. Both of those elements are required for faithful preaching. But you and I even went back and forth, originally the definition just had God's word there. And then we put the Bible in parentheses because then we do want to clarify, "What is God's word?" To say, this is not the word that God gave to me, that kind of thing. But it is, it is the explanation of scripture, the Bible, the revealed special revelation word of God, set it apart from me being able to just get up there and say, "Well, this is what God showed me." Or something along those lines.
Adam: Absolutely. And I want to take and just unpack a little bit more here for a moment, this concept of explanation and application. I was thinking, as you were talking about that, I think these are so important to pull out. If you don't explain God's word, the Bible, you have nothing to apply. But at the same time, if you don't apply what you've explained, have you really preached? I think those are two important questions and concepts to look at. I often say to my students that I actually think the explanation, and bear with me on this for a moment, is the most significant part of the preaching that you're doing. But that doesn't necessarily mean that that's where the most weight of our time will be given. It's just simply that if you don't show them this is in fact what the word of God means, and how we know this is what it means and how this is what God is saying in context, you don't really have anything with authority to give to them to say, "Thus, saith the Lord therefore in your life."
And one of the other things that I say, and this might go further than we want to go here, but when I think about explanation, I think about the connection between but yet not exact a synonymous idea between what's said and what's meant. We have to show our congregations what's said, what God meant by that before then we can show them, forgive me for saying it this way, what it means to them. Now, when I say what it means to them, I don't mean unattached from what it meant, because it's a cliche, but we do believe it can never mean what it never meant. So we do have to spend some time showing, "Here's what it says. Here's what God meant and means by it." And then this is in faith and obedience, how you must respond to what God is saying.
Charlie: I use this example in class all the time, so forgive me if I've used this before. I give the example of my kids all the time to say, let's just say for example, the entire time they're raised in my home, we go to a church and everything they hear preached on a Sunday morning is sound theology. Everything they hear is true in that sense, but it's never connected to a text of scripture. In other words, it's just somebody who stands up there and teaches them good theology, but never attempts to demonstrate how that comes from the text. One of the points that I make there is there is some benefit to that. They're learning true things about God.
But what happens when they leave my home and they go join another church, and now the guy who's standing up there to preach or whatever and you can call this preaching, but now it's bad theology, but it's also not connected to the text. Or maybe even worse than that, it's bad theology-
Adam: It's somewhat connected to it.
Charlie: Supposedly connect to the text. Then how are my children being prepared to respond to that kind of scenario? And so I think in preaching, we do our people a disservice if we don't clearly demonstrate for them how that theology comes from the text. The other factor there is take that example of the guy who stands up there and says everything that's true, good theology as it were, where is the authority for that proclamation? And so he is grounding the authority and I'm the guy standing up here talking to you, not, "This is based on the revealed word of God." And so I think there's a couple of different things. We might inherently look at that and say, "Well yeah, but they're learning all these true things. Isn't that good?" And I'm stepping back and saying, "Well, yes, there's some good in that, but there's also danger in that kind of preaching."
Adam: And I don't know about you, but let me speak to the pastors out there for a moment. If you believe in this type of preaching that Charlie and I are talking about, don't be afraid to say to your people, "You even judge what I'm saying in the pulpit by the word of God. Don't take my word for it just because. You need to be holding me accountable to it." And I said that to my people all the time, you need to be a good Berean. You need to know the word yourself and study the word because my words even must be examined, evaluated by the word of God itself.
And that I think this does, Charlie, relate to what we're talking about with pastoral preaching and specifically as it relates to this functional element of explanation, making sure that we're showing them, "This is how we know this is what God and God meant." And I think that's half of it and then we're talking about the other half of it. And I don't want to blather this too long, but then we also then I think are called as preachers. We're not just reading an exegetical paper, we're actually applying it to people's lives. And so that other part of it is important there. I will say to you, and there's a couple different thoughts that come to mind here... Back in the 1970s, and I'm not trying to hammer anybody, but the preaching students out there will be aware of a form of preaching that in some sense is still popular today called the New Homiletic. One of the problems that was wrong with the New Homiletic, it's often sometimes referred to as narrative preaching, where it's the idea of you never give propositional truth.
You just take them through the journey you went on and let them come to their own conclusions. Well, I think that's dangerous too, because that's making the assumption that they're going to come to the right conclusion that God wants them to come to. And I think as pastors, it's not just that we explain the text, but then we do have to press that truth into them and say, "Thus, saith the Lord." I think we have to go to that next level. I think a little bit about John Stott. And if you've never read his textbook on preaching, Between Two Worlds, he pictures this really, really well. It's the idea of the pastor is the exegete with one foot in the world of the text, and he's the Herald in one foot in the contemporary world. And he is the bridge. He's got to have one foot in the world of the text, but then he's got to bring that to the world of today and make application.
Charlie: I think some of that is our anti-authoritarian culture. I do think, I've probably used this example before, a lot of people do promote that kind of preaching as dialogue, that it's not a lecture, it's a dialogue. And on the one hand, if they're trying to say something about having a foot in the present world of, okay, maybe. I think I have told you this before, I was reading a commentary on Proverbs and they were trying to argue for that kind of preaching from Proverbs. And it just struck me as the irony of the whole beginning of Proverbs is, "Son, listen, as I tell you what wisdom is."
And so there's an authoritative strain to the book of Proverbs where the father teaches the son, "This is what you need to know and listen to wisdom and the wisdom that I'm going to offer you." And so as much as our culture wants to have this... I don't want to call it wishy-washy necessarily, but this whole, "It's a journey." All that kind of stuff. No, we actually are saying imperfectly, sure, not everything I is true. We want people to touch the scripture, but when I stand up to preach, I ought to be having some authoritative proclamation of, "This is what God's word says, and this is why it matters."
Adam: Absolutely. And just again, to try to press this home as to how closely connected application should be to explanation, I think it was Brown in the late '60s, like '68, wrote a book called Torture, Reformation and Preaching. And he gave different categories of application in the sermon as it relates to biblical authority. And so you have this direct, this indirect, and then you have this casual and you have then this corrupt. I'm probably missing one there off the top of my head, but the idea is when we're preaching, what we certainly strive for is the direct biblical authority and the application that we make. Sometimes I think carefully would we perhaps make an indirect application to people's lives? Maybe, but you still have to make sure that it is indeed something that the text speaks to. But certainly what we stay away from is those that are doing pastoral preaching or any kind of preaching, but certainly pastor preaching, Charlie, is we're advocating here based on the explanation of and what's actually in the text. We must stay away from corrupt application of the Bible.
Charlie: And we could give lots of examples there and we probably need to move on. I think about the example of, as I was preaching through Deuteronomy, and you get to, "A man shall not wear a woman's clothing and a woman shall not wear a man's clothing." There is truth to that text that we need to proclaim to people that I think still applies today. That it's good for gender distinctions to be maintained, even in dress in some functions. A man shouldn't try to dress in a way that comes across as a female intentionally. So as you think about it, even applying a text like that, there's that kind of direct universal application.
But then where a pastor is going to have to sometimes come in and say... I give this example in class all the time.
There's probably a day and an age for when a man to wear a pink shirt in some cultures was intentionally effeminate. Well, that's not true today. It's just not the culture in which we live in. So that's where you have to be careful with application where... I think a pastor needs to be thinking into, "How does this apply to my people?" But we have to be a little bit cautious there in making those cultural applications and understanding when we're saying, "This is what God's word says." Versus, "This is how I think it applies to us today." We could probably give 100 different examples there, but just one thought that came to my mind.
Adam: Absolutely. Pastoral preaching then is the explanation and application of God's word, the Bible, secondly, to a specific local church.
Charlie: I think a lot of definitions of preaching stop at the first part. And so I think we are trying to press that a little bit further to say... Even go back to what we did when we talked about the qualifications of a pastor and we said that teaching is most connected to a pastor that you have to be able to teach. So we are trying to make an argument that that kind of pastoral preaching is connected to a specific local church. And we're going to press in even on this a little bit further in the next part of the definition, but that preaching is intended for the church. I think there's a couple of different implications there is it's not primarily intended for unbelievers. We'll I think have a practical podcast later on preaching in relation to unbelievers so maybe we can cover more of that there, but that it's primary intended purpose is a specific local church.
Adam: Absolutely. I was going to press that a little bit with you and just ask the question about evangelism. And again, I've wanted to hold this balance throughout. I don't want anyone to hear this and our colleagues or others and say, "So we're downplaying evangelism." Of course we're not downplaying evangelism. We must do that. It's a part of what Christ has called us to do. The question we're just asking is primarily when we look at the biblical testimony, if I can say it that way, with what pastors are called to do amongst the gathered church is primarily what they're doing there? Is what we're talking about there a evangelism or is it something else? And what all you and I are saying is when we talk about that, when we're specifying that, primarily that's something else.
Charlie: Correct. So in other words, the primary function of what we're calling pastoral preaching is not evangelistic. It is built on the assumption that you are speaking to God's people. This isn't our definition, but I like to say it this way sometimes, using God's word for God's people for God's intended purposes. You are applying God's word to God's people for those intended purposes that we talked about in [inaudible 00:18:41] Timothy for instruction, correction, rebut, training, and righteousness, all those sorts of things. So I think it begs a lot of questions, not just about evangelism, but what about preaching at a conference? And so our church had some people go to a conference recently and there was preaching at that conference. So how do we distinguish then between preaching that takes place at a conference and preaching that takes place in the context of a local church?
Adam: By the way, can I just throw this in here? Don't lose your train of thought, but I just want to say this as encouragement for you and I and any of our listeners. When your people come back from a conference like that and tell you about how great preacher X was, don't worry. Understand that he's probably preached that sermon 752 times. He's been able to iron out all of the details and sometimes, sure, people don't understand that. But I think that gets to the point you're making, actually.
Charlie: Well, ironically, before I was one of the pastors at our church, I preached for first Timothy 5. And one of the points I made from there is don't despise the preaching of your pastor based on what you hear at a conference. And one of the points that I made was that conference speaker doesn't even know your name. Theoretically, they could obviously. But you understand the point. They don't know who you are. They're not accountable for your soul. And so I think there is a temptation among church members to hear the guy on the radio, that makes me sound old, but you get the point. The conference speaker, the guy on TV, whatever it is and say, "Man, I wish my preacher preached like that." And I think church members need to be very careful with that kind of language, because something different is going on at that conference. That's not a person preaching to you as one who's been given charge to shepherd your soul. And so I definitely encourage churches to say, "Don't despise the preaching from your pastor or pastors for the sake of some guy you hear at a conference."
Adam: Absolutely. Forgive me for doing this because I know we're going to get into this in a moment, but I was thinking back to some of the things last fall that we talked about also about the office of pastor. And I remember one of the podcasts we did, one of the things we talked about is getting to know your sheep. And there's this concept of walking amongst your sheep, walking slowly amongst your sheep as their shepherd if you're really going to get to know them. And I guess hypothetically, like you said, it could be this case, but that conference speaker's not doing that with the congregation. Just like with evangelism, we're not saying there's no value in a conference or convention sermon or whatever. But what we are saying is we are wanting to highlight and hold up in a different way what we're arguing happens here and in the local church from the pastor or pastors of that local church on a weekly basis.
Charlie: Or to say it another way... And this is why maybe the third part of our definition, maybe we need to bring it in here by the qualified and accepted leadership of that church, because maybe you can't separate these two things. It's to the church by the leader of that church. And I'll say it this way, there is an office of pastor, there's not an office of conference speaker. Or maybe to bring it a little bit more closely home for you and me, there is an office of pastor, there's not an office of seminary professor. We could go that way even if we wanted to. And so I think that we are trying to connect, yes, the explanation and application of God's word. But what we are talking about is for a church by the of God-called leadership of that church.
Adam: And again, to help connect the dots even more, if the people that are listening to us today go back and even think about what we did with a lot of those passages' scripture. We intentionally asked a question, "What's the context? Who's it being said to? What's being said and who's saying it?" Because there is something biblically speaking about the pastor of that local church, or that church that's being identified there in scripture, taking the word of God and explaining it and applying it, teaching it to particular context, those particular people. And so that's what we're bringing to bear here on our definition, as we think about what pastor preaching is.
Charlie: I think application can be much more specific in that context. So one of the issues you have in a preaching conference, or even a podcast, where you don't know who in the world's going to be listening to this, but you that same issue in a conference. You can make application in a conference setting. You can know the culture in some senses. But there is a different kind of authority there I think we're saying where you're not then able to say to that group of people, "Hey guys, this is what we need to do." You can in some senses, in those universal applications. But the pastor proclaiming to the sheep that God has called him to shepherd, there is a different sense of authority, a different sense of being able to very specifically hone in that application because they know their sheep.
Adam: Absolutely. So just to clarify again, this is what we mean. And this is what we've worked towards, as we've said, our definition of pastoral preaching. Pastor preaching is the explanation application of God's word, the Bible, to a specific local church by the qualified and accepted leadership of that church. There's a couple thoughts that come to mind maybe as we think about wrapping up this podcast, Charlie. Is there something to be said, and maybe that's implied in here, about the accepted leadership of that church? We're talking about those that have been recognized. This takes us back again a little bit to last semester, but those that are indeed qualified and recognized by that body to have oversight over them, to have oversight and authority as it does relate to saying, "This is what God is saying."
Charlie: I think so. It's an interesting analogy there. I preached last Sunday from Joel chapter one, and I was asked last second to come and preach at another church. Our church is meeting on Sunday nights right now and so I was able to go preach at another church on Sunday morning. And since it was last second, I ended up preaching the same sermon, same text.
But we are saying there is a difference in me coming in to people that I may never see again and proclaiming that message. Now, obviously I hope they gain some benefit out of the explanation of Joel chapter one to them, and there is an authority that even is there as I proclaim, "This is what God has said through Joel." But we are trying to push in on when I stood before my church... I hate when people say "my church" sometimes.
The church that I'm a part of and the church that I'm one of the pastors at, there is a slightly different thing that happens there. When people join our church, part of the membership vows are to submit to the pastors and these sorts of things. So there is a difference when me standing up to this group of people that has said to me, "You are one of our leaders. We want to follow you, to submit to you." That wasn't true on Sunday morning for me in the same way that it was true for Sunday night. And I think we're trying to say that that matters in a way that we don't disparage what happened on Sunday morning, but we actually do say that, "No, there's something significant here."
Adam: Matter of fact, starting I think in a week or two, we're going to get into now some practice of this. But I would just say some very practical implications that come to my mind for this is then for the congregation. You said don't despise your pastor's pastoral preaching. I would also say to the congregation, I think by our definition of what a pastor is and what pastoral preaching is, be mindful of joining a church where you can glad and willingly submit to your pastors' preaching and teaching. His leadership as a whole, but certainly that primarily comes to his teaching and preaching. And I know we don't probably have a lot of congregation members listening to this, but I think that's a practical implication. If what we're saying is the definition of pastoral preaching, there's something to be said about then joyfully learning to submit to and follow your pastor and his preaching and teaching to the pulpit.
Charlie: I think that goes back to the primary nature of this. You'll hear sometimes, "Man, he is a great guy and he is good at so many different things pastors have to do, but he's a terrible preacher." Or something along those lines. We are trying to say, "Well, no, that's actually such an important part of what he has to do." Doesn't matter how much you liked the guy, that if he's not faithfully proclaiming the word of God, explaining what God has said in his word and then making application, then you need to ask questions about whether or not that's a church you can be a part of because preaching is so integral to the health of the church.
Adam: And then, Charlie, I would say this as well, just maybe a final thought here. You made the comment that you say to congregations all the time, "Don't despise your pastor and his preaching." Is it appropriate then based on what we've just said about, "There's value in a seminary professor, we're not saying there's not. There's value in a conference speaker." But at the same time, I think sometimes we can so aspire to those things, we can lose sight of what God has said and called in his word. So perhaps a practical implication just on the end of this, is to say to the pastor out there where the congregation doesn't need to despise you and your preaching, pastor, don't despise your calling. Understand that you have the highest calling in what you get to do matters and is significant.
Charlie: That's good. I think that cuts both ways. So I would say that the church member who says, "Man, I wish my pastor preached like guy X that I hear." I would actually say to him, "Stop listening to that guy." Assuming it's a faithful preacher, if his more eloquent delivery style is going to make you be discontent with your pastor, I would say stop listening to him. It's not helpful for you. But at the same time, to the pastors out there, don't think it's a higher privilege to get invited to the state convention to preach, than to stand in front of your people each week. That's a higher privilege than getting the invite to the conference.
Adam: Absolutely. And Charlie, I think that's a good place to stop today. I always say, I appreciate you leading us through this and the writing that you've done on this, but I certainly hope this was an encouragement and I help to our listeners. So to our listeners, thanks for being with us again today and we hope you have a great rest of your week. And we look forward to being with you again next time.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening. For more resources on pastoral ministry, visit us at faithfulpastor.com. And to learn more about training to become a pastor, visit us nobts.edu.