Professor of Preaching at Beeson Divinity School in Birmingham, Alabama. He is a Contributing Editor to Preaching.
From Doctrine to DoxologyDoctrinal preaching serves not only to usher people into the presence of God to learn about Him but also to worship the God who is the object of study. Jesus said to the woman of Samaria, “You worship what you do not know” (
John 4:22, ESV). The doctrinal preacher must prevent the church member from engaging in unintelligible worship. The 19th-century Danish theologian Søren Kierkegaard critiqued the liturgical model of his national church and many other churches. He argued that God is the audience. C. Welton Gaddy explains:
Concerned about attitudes toward worship and practices in worship in the churches of his time, Søren Kierkegaard, a 19th-century Danish philosopher/theologian, compared what was taking place in the theater and what was happening in Christian worship. In a theater, actors, prompted by people offstage, perform for their audiences. To his dismay, Kierkegaard found that this theatrical model dominated the worship practices of many churches. A minister was viewed as the on-stage actor, God as the offstage prompter, and the congregation as the audience. Unfortunately, that understanding of worship remains as prevalent as it is wrong.
Each ingredient of the theatrical model mentioned by Kierkegaard is an essential component in Christian worship. Crucial, though, is a proper identification of the role of each one. In authentic worship, the actor is, in fact, many actors and actresses—the members of the congregation. The prompter is the minister, if singular, or, if plural, all of the people who lead in worship (choir members, instrumentalists, soloists, readers, prayers, preachers). The audience is God. Always, without exception, the audience is God!
If God is not the audience in any given service, Christian worship does not take place. If worship does occur and God is not the audience, all present participate in the sin of idolatry.
[iii]Preaching is an act of worship. Preaching that simply investigates a body of truth without leading people to worship the God who is truth personified in the person of Jesus misses the ark.
Doctrinal preaching desires to bring people into the presence of God, singing:
Then sings my soul, my Savior, God to Thee;
How great Thou art, how great Thou art!
[iv]