PreachingNow

Later this week I'll be at Clear Creek Baptist Bible College in Pineville, KY, presenting their annual James Barry Lectures on Preaching. This is actually the second time I've been invited to present these lectures; ten years ago I also gave the lectures, but that time I was filling in as the substitute lecturer. The one who had been originally invited (I won't mention his name since he's still a good friend!) had inadvertently double-booked himself, and had to bow out, so I got the call.

Actually, some of my most enjoyable opportunities in life and ministry have come filling in for others. Being a pinch-hitter might not make your baseball card the most valuable one in the deck, but it does get you onto the field!

For example, have you ever heard of Gates Brown? According to Baseball Almanac, he played 13 seasons for the Detroit Tigers (1963-19765), and holds three American League records as a pinch hitter: most pinch hit at bats (414), most pinch hits (107), and most pinch hit home runs (16). Gates is also one of only 13 players in major league history to have been called into a game and hit a pinch-hit home run during their first ever Major League at-bat. I'm shooting to be the Gates Brown of preaching!

The nice thing about being a pinch-hitter in ministry is the recognition that, in the sovereign will of God, you were the one He intended to be there all along!

Plans are underway for the 2007 National Conference on Preaching, which will be April 24-26, 2006, at Fellowship Church in Grapevine, TX (suburban Dallas). Our theme will be "Preaching Creatively," and when you attend you'll enjoy a team of great speakers, including Haddon Robinson, Calvin Miller, Jack Graham, Dieter Zander, Steve Wende, Doug Pagitt, Brian Carter and many more. Visit the NCP website Click here for information on NCP 2006.)

James MacDonald (Harvest Bible Chapel in Rolling Hills, IL) recently wrote for the "Out of Ur" blog on reasons why he "is not emerging." Among the reasons: "Because Christ's is a kingdom of substance, not style." He explains:

"Candles and bells, paintings and sculpture, incense and chanting -- great! Let's bring back the best of all those offerings of worship, but let's not confuse style and substance. According to Jesus it's still truth that sets you free, not artistic expression. Wearing suits and ties is certainly not necessary and it can be contrived and unnatural, but wearing jeans and sandals is not a means to the revealed presence of Christ. John 14:21 teaches that obedience to the substance of Christ's teaching brings His "manifest presence," not forms--old or new. In most of these discussions we are simply inserting an ancient-dead form in place of a modern-dead one. The former feels new because it's so ancient, as in "wow, we lit candles and sat in circles at church -- that was so powerful." Or wait, was it the form that was powerful or just the broken routine that allowed my heart to worship with fresh sincerity? The renewed, ancient forms of worship are powerful if they are offered in spirit and truth and will become just as worthless as they become routine.

"The power of Christ is not experienced in style, but in heart-felt substance and to miss that point is to set the stage for Emerging Church II when our kids get sick of the currently cool. Style is fun and fresh methods can promote sincerity, but the manifest presence of Christ which is the life of the church comes in response to biblical substance from the heart, not surface adjustments which can quickly become an end in themselves." (Click here to read the full commentary.)

R. Albert Mohler recently wrote, "In postmodern America, the Christian Gospel is strange in its whole and in its parts. Most Americans assume themselves to be good and decent persons. They are amused at the notion that they are sinners against God.

"We assume our need of therapy. The Gospel insists on our need of salvation. We want to work it out ourselves. The Gospel argues that this leads to death. We want to look within. The Gospel points us to Christ. We want to do our part. The Gospel insists that Jesus paid it all. We demand to get what we deserve. The Gospel warns that this is exactly what we will receive, unless we turn to Christ in faith.

"Grace is an alien concept in American culture. Sin is almost outlawed as a category. A substitutionary atonement sounds unfair. God in human flesh is too much to take. But that is what we preach." (Click here to read the full commentary)

In an article in Friday's Wall Street Journal (entitled "Church Ladies"), Christine Rosen observes, "At many Protestant seminaries, women pastoral students now outnumber men, and between 1983 and 2000 the number of women who identified themselves as clergy tripled. It seems that Catholic scholar Leon Podles's prediction of a few years ago, that 'the Protestant clergy will be a characteristically female occupation, like nursing, within a generation,' might soon prove true.

"But pulpits aren't the only places that women dominate. According to a recent survey, the typical U.S. congregation is 61% female. Women are also the force behind most lay organizations and volunteer activities and make up the majority of church employees.

"This lopsided picture is not a new development. Women have dominated American churches since the nation's founding; church records from the early colonial period document largely female congregations. Lamentations about the lack of men in the pews are similarly longstanding. In the 1830s, Rev. Sebastian Streeter observed: 'Christian churches are composed of a great disproportion of females.' As historian Ann Douglas notes in The Feminization of American Culture, the '19th-century minister moved in a world of women,' and concerns about whether a feminized church could retain its men were a recurrent theme in the spiritual literature of the era. By the 1920s, the 60-40 gender split that is today the norm was firmly entrenched (the 1950s and 1960s saw a brief return of men to churches, but by the 1970s it had again eroded)."

Rosen then highlights the book Why Men Hate Going to Church (Thomas Nelson) by David Murrow. While discussing Murrow's arguments, she also observes, "Although Mr. Murrow offers a useful diagnosis of the feminization problem, he overlooks a simple answer to the question of why church is more appealing to women than to men: its domesticating influence. Why else did pioneer women who helped settle the West make one of their first priorities the erection of churches? This leads to another observation, albeit an unpopular one in our age of gender egalitarianism: For as long as women have tried to tame and domesticate men, men have resisted. Understood this way, perhaps the lack of men in the pews is not so much cause for alarm as it is an affirmation of that unspeakable truth -- men and women are different." (Click here to read the full article. For more information about The Feminization of American Culture, click here. For more information about Why Men Hate Going to Church, click here.)

The September-October issue of Preaching contains an interview with Murrow. If you'd like to obtain a copy of that issue, just click here to visit the Preaching Store (and order as a back issue). Or you can begin your subscription and ask us to start it with the September-October issue; call us (toll free) at 1-800-288-9673.

Hundreds of pastors have already been part of one of our "Preaching Truth in a Whatever World" one-day conferences. Register now for next week's Orlando conference (the hurricane will be long gone), or plan to be part of one of the other sessions scheduled for 2005. www.preaching.com/truth.

Using the theme "Preaching Truth in a Whatever World," each event will feature presentations by Dr. Michael Duduit, editor of Preaching magazine and PreachingNow, and an array of outstanding guest speakers.

Here are dates and areas for fall conferences (exact church location/address is at our website, www.preaching.com/truth):

Here's a comment by a pastor who attended the Philadelphia conference in October: "I thoroughly enjoyed the conference. I found it to be very informative, conducted very well and a blessing to my ministry." (Minister Jeff Hickson, New Gethsemane Baptist Church, Philadelphia, PA)

These conferences will offer insights into the unique preaching challenges of today, and will offer a toolbox of strategies and ideas for effective biblical preaching in today's "whatever" culture. Visit our information page (www.preaching.com/truth) for more information or to register.

Earl Allen told the story of how King Ptolemy decided to commission the building of a huge lighthouse. He ordered Sostratus to construct it. The lighthouse was called "The Pharos." Ptolemy required that the structure should bear his name, but Sostratus did not think the king should be given sole credit. Nevertheless, he complied and in thick plaster, Sostratus inscribed the name of Ptolemy. Secretly, beneath the plaster, in granite, Sostraus inscribed his own name.

As long as the king lived, he saw his name on the building. With time, however, the sea wore away the name of Ptolemy, leaving eventually the name of Sostratus. (J. Michael Shannon)

Gambling by cell phone has sky-rocketed. The number of betting pages downloaded is expected to approach three million this year, a rise of 367 per cent over 2004. The conclusion of research by Mintel has sparked concern that the almost unlimited access to gambling provided by cell phones will fuel a rise in addiction. Another potential problem is children gambling by phone. (Pastors Weekly Briefing, 9-23-05)

"Never before has any civilization made available to its populace such a smorgasbord of realities. Never before has a communications system like the contemporary mass media made information about religion -- all religions -- available to so many people. Never has a society allowed its people to become consumers of belief, and allowed belief -- all beliefs -- to become merchandise." (Walter Truett Anderson)

Chuck Swindoll shares this insight into the need we have for a great goal in life: "My first direct view of Titanic lasted less than two minutes, but the stark sight of her immense black hull towering above the ocean floor will remain forever ingrained in my memory. My lifelong dream was to find this great ship, and during the past thirteen years the quest for her had dominated my life. Now, finally, the quest was over."

So wrote Robert Ballard after discovering the ghostly hulk of the R.M.S. Titanic in her lonely berth more than two miles deep in the North Atlantic. For nearly three-quarters of a century, since early April 1912, the great ship had been celebrated in legend, along with the 1,522 souls who had disappeared with her beneath the icy waters hundreds of miles off the coast of Newfoundland.

On several occasions, the explorer used the same word to describe his lifelong dream: "quest." It means a pursuit, a search, or, as Webster colorfully adds, "a chivalrous enterprise in medieval romance usually involving an adventurous journey."

What is your "quest"? Do you have a "lifelong dream"? Anything "dominating your life" enough to hold your attention for thirteen or more years?

Without a quest, life is quickly reduced to bleak black and wimpy white, a diet too bland to get anybody out of bed in the morning. A quest fuels our fire. It refuses to let us drift downstream, gathering debris. It keeps our mind in gear, makes us press on. (Dallas Seminary Daily Devotional, 10-12-05)

"A man is rich in proportion to the number of things that he can afford to let alone." (Henry David Thoreau)

ILLUSTRATION: Persistence

In his Pastors Weekly Briefing for October 21, H.B. London writes, "The fall classic, as the World Series has been called, will feature two teams who define persistence. The Houston Astros have never played in a World Series game. In fact, there has never been a series played in Texas. The Chicago White Sox last won a World Series in 1917. Now they will face off in a best-of-seven games for the championship of the baseball world.

"One of the big stories features two men on the Astros -- Craig Biggio and Jeff Bagwell. These players have spent most of their careers in Houston. They have played more than 2,000 games, but never a game in the World Series. For Biggio, it has been 18 years on one team. He was heard to say after Wednesday's game, 'Good things come to people who wait.'"

Tithe if you love Jesus. Anybody can honk.

Insights on aging . . . from those who are there

~ "I feel like my body has gotten totally out of shape, so I got my doctor's permission to join a fitness club and start exercising. I decided to take an aerobics class for seniors. I bent, twisted, gyrated, jumped up and down, and perspired for an hour. But, by the time I got my leotards on, the class was over."

~ Reporters interviewing a 104-year-old woman asked, "What do you think is the best thing about being 104?" She replied, "No peer pressure."

~ "The nice thing about being senile is you can hide your own Easter eggs."

~ An elderly woman decided to prepare her will and told her preacher she had two final requests. First, she wanted to be cremated, and second, she wanted her ashes scattered over Wal-Mart. "Wal-Mart?" the preacher exclaimed. "Why Wal-Mart?" "Then I'll be sure my daughters visit me twice a week."

~ "My memory's not as sharp as it used to be. Also, my memory's not as sharp as it used to be."

~ "Know how to prevent sagging? Just eat till the wrinkles fill out."

~ "I'm getting into swing dancing. Not on purpose. Some parts of my body are just prone to swinging."

~ "I've tried to find a suitable exercise video for people my age, but they haven't made one called 'Buns of Putty.'"

~ "Don't think of it as getting hot flashes. Think of it as your inner child playing with matches."

~ "Don't let aging get you down. It's too hard to get back up!"

~ "I've sure gotten old! I've had two bypass surgeries, a hip replacement, new knees. Fought prostate cancer and diabetes. I'm half blind, can't hear anything quieter than a jet engine, take 40 different medications that make me dizzy, winded, and subject to blackouts. Have bouts with dementia. Have poor circulation; hardly feel my hands and feet anymore. Can't remember if I'm 85 or 92. Have lost all my friends. But, thank the Lord, I still have my driver's license."

And finally . . .

Let's get these folks a class on money management.

An Indiana woman needed money to post bail for her husband, who was being held in the Miami County Jail on charges of dealing methamphetamine and illegal possession of anhydrous ammonia, a chemical used to make the drug, according to an Oct. 22 Associated Press story.

So the woman allegedly stole three credit cards from her parents' home, used them to get a cash advance, then used the money to pay the 10 percent surety bond required for her husband's release on bail. She also used the credit cards to hire a lawyer for her husband, according to state police.

Now the woman has been arrested and is being held in the Miami County Jail on $9,000 bond on theft charges. Her husband, however, remains free on bail.

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