Principled and Pragmatic (Part I/II)
“Did you know that conversion rates for companies using custom visual content are 7 times higher than companies that do not?” I could hardly believe my eyes when I first read these words. They were in the subject line of a message sent to our church email account. I was relieved when, upon closer inspection, I saw that it was not from a parachurch ministry, and the “conversion” to which it referred was not of the spiritual sort....
Preaching and Teaching Mark: Opportunities and Challenges
We made it: Nineteen months and fifty-three sermons later, our congregation completed a Sunday morning series on the Gospel of Mark. As I said in an earlier post, we regularly study through entire books of the Bible as part of the pulpit ministry. We don’t always do this, but we often do. And seldom do we proceed through an extended study without several planned breaks (usually due to holidays, guest speakers, or other series). This...
Preaching: A Review
Mark Dever rightly notes, “Right preaching of God’s word is central to the church’s worship, forming its basis and core.”[1] It is the main role and responsibility of an elder of the local church to study and preach God’s Word. Paul tells young Timothy to “preach the word” (2 Tim. 4:2) and to “do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth” (2 Tim....
The Vine Project: A Review
Does church make you tired? By this I don’t mean do the sermons make you sleepy. But are the programs, events, and demands too many, and the laborers too few? From my experience, many pastors, deacons, and laymen feel this way. They’re overworked, underequipped, and a bit distressed by the seeming lack of success that their church is experiencing. The problem may be that twenty percent of the members are doing eighty percent of the...
What Makes a Sermon ‘Good’? An Interview With Jeff Jones and Jeff Manning (Part II of II)
by Jacob Riggs “The preacher . . . is the only one who is in a position to deal with the greatest need of the world” (Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Preaching and Preachers, 40). In this post, we continue our interview with Jeff Jones and Jeff Manning. To see Part I, click here. Can and does God use “preaching” that neglects or misinterprets the text? If so, why is it still important to proclaim what the original author meant? Jones: In Numbers...
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