Preaching - A Divine Activity


Paul says, "We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal
through us" (2 Cor.5: 20).

Preachers are representatives of the all mighty God.
Preachers are beseeching men to be reconciled to the King of the Universe.
God uses preachers' voices, and mannerisms to appeal to people.
When Jonathan Edwards set out as a preacher he was absorbed with God.
Ultimate reality to him was the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

God overwhelmed him.
God laid him low.
The contemplation of God was his delight.
The experience of God's nearness was heaven on earth.
God was his magnificent obsession.

Nothing on earth can compare to preaching the good news about the Lord of glory,
when it is declared not only in word, but with power and with the Holy Ghost.

When Edwards heard Whitefield preach from his own pulpit he wept with thankfulness
for all that he was hearing.

We sing the words; "Those who know it best are hungering and thirsting to hear it like the rest."

George Whitefield never had a single lesson on how to preach, but God was his alpha and his omega.
He could say from his heart, "For me to live is Christ," his conscience bearing him witness that it was so.

There were years in his life when there was not a single day in which he did not speak to multitudes
about God, and counsel individuals about God, and pray to God to assist and bless what he was doing.
When he rose in the morning he would appropriate his great High Priest as his first thought for the new day.

Then, he sought to walk with God throughout the day.
He sought opportunities to serve the Son of God morning, afternoon and evening, and at the close
of the day he commended himself to the living God.
God was in all his thoughts, and God used Whitefield to change two nations.

Preaching is a saving and sanctifying act of God.

We have the notes. We've got the tape. We've done the course.
We've read the book. We can assess shrewdly.
We know the men, and we've chosen the best role models, contemporary and historical.
But, do we know God, as those role models have known him?
Are we a clone of them, or are we true pastors?

We can take our notes into the pulpit with us.
Our preparation has been thorough.
We studied the exegesis, historical insights, structure, a personal reference or two and application.

So our preaching goes on, year after year.
It is a better ministry than thousands, but are we accepting the good at the cost of the best?

Prepared by Dr. Harold L. White