That is God, said Jesus. Someone out there on the road . . . calling your name.

In his sermon "Pulling Weeds," Alistair Begg advises couples headed for the marriage altar to uproot unhealthy influences and patterns that have grown up in their lives. He begins the sermon with a story from his own gardening. He knows only one way of dealing with weeds, and that is to uproot them immediately, ruthlessly, and consistently. The sermon lists various traits that need eradicating from a marriage. Begg ends the sermon: "No matter how much effort goes into the preparation and planting of a garden, it will all be in vain if the weeds are not dealt with. Let us then resolve to tackle them immediately, ruthlessly, and consistently."

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Ralph Sockman introduced a sermon, "The Divine at the Door," with two Scriptural pictures he found intriguing. In the first, from John 20, the newly risen Jesus materializes inside a locked room to meet the disciples. In the second, from Revelation 3, Jesus stands at the door and knocks for admission into the human heart. He enters the first without an invitation, but waits for the other to be opened from the inside. Sockman's sermon deals with the need for the Lord Jesus in the affairs of men.

He concludes: "Let us keep the two pictures of Christ before us. One, the powerful Christ who pervades every situation, social, financial, internation. 'Jesus cometh, the doors being shut, and stood in their midst.' The other, the Christ so personal, so patient, waiting for little people like ourselves to open the door . . . .Christ has the keys to the world's situations. But we have the keys to ourselves."

3. "Focus on your hearers."

What are you now wanting your audience to do? What do you wish them to carry away, what actions to take? Listen to any sermon from Billy Graham. "I'm going to ask you to get up from your seats and come forward and stand here and commit your life to Jesus Christ." Not one soul in a stadium full is in doubt as to where Mr. Graham is going with his message or what people are being asked to do.

Martin Niemoller ended a sermon on brotherly love with this call: "And therefore I ask you, dear brethren, for more than your sympathy, for more than your monetary help, on behalf of the church of Christ. We live by the fact that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren."

Martyn Lloyd-Jones ends a sermon called "Facing All the Facts" with this call: "Do not merely go to church to consider your present prospects; consider your latter end . . . go immediately to God and confess your blindness, your prejudice, your folly in trusting to your own understanding, and ask Him to receive you. Tell Him you accept His message concerning Jesus Christ His only Begotten Son, Who came into the world to die for your sins and to deliver you, and yield yourself to Him and rely upon Him and His power. Give yourself unreservedly to Him in Christ and you will see life with a wholeness and a blessedness you have never known before."