The True Import of Applicable Preaching

As usual, my brother preacher over at soulpreaching.com has a wonderfully thought provoking article on his blog. Talking essentially about the need for sermons to be practically applicable as well as socio-politically relevant, (well, maybe he doesn't explicitly say this, but I think I know what he means), my brother made me take a pause and remember one of the great lessons my pastor has been trying to teach me for years . Minister Cox states, " ...too many sermons are 'Lectures' and not 'Sermons.' The people are given facts or are given an argument that a fact is true and then the sermon ends without the people knowing what to do with the information. " This is one of the great sins of preaching according to my pastor and I don't think Cox or the author (one Eugene Lowry) he is quoting would disagree with that. In fact, my pastor believes in the centrality of practical application to gospel preaching so much so, that he clearly identifies an "assignment" in every sermon he preaches. I am not quite there yet in my preaching, but I aspire to be at least that intentional in my sermonic endeavors. Pray for me.


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