What Is Wrong with Preaching Today?

On yesterday’s Things Unseen, we were talking about preaching. And I was commenting on how our forefathers believed that preaching was the chief means of conversion and spiritual growth, but I suspect many Christians don’t think that way any longer. Yes, our services should have a sermon, but for many Christians, it’s a kind of added extra to their own Bible study, or the house group, or some other Bible study program. Why then did Jesus and the Apostles do so much of it? Could it be that we’re looking at things the wrong way around? What if preaching is still meant to be the chief means of converting people and building them up in their most holy faith? Why then isn’t it doing that?

I saw a fascinating interview with the late John R.W. Stott, the distinguished Anglican evangelical preacher. He was asked what he thought of the state of preaching today. I can still hear his answer ringing in my ears, articulated in the beautifully modulated accent of an upper-class graduate of the University of Cambridge. He replied with one word: “Miserable.”

That really hurts if you’re a preacher. But if Dr. Stott was right—and he certainly believed in the centrality of preaching—then the problem today is not so much preaching but preachers. And I think we need to think seriously about that. Wherein lies the problem?

Well, we can all think of answers. In a moment, I want to mention one in particular that we need to think about, but here’s one answer: you might think that the answer is that there are men who preach who shouldn’t. They want to serve the Lord. Preaching is one of the most obvious ways to do that, and so they become ministers, but they’re not actually gifted to preach. And so, when they become preachers, the fact that as one book title puts it, “Johnny can’t preach,” ends up being balanced by people saying, “But he’s really a very nice man.”

So, how do we recognize a preacher? Well, the threefold ingredients of a call to preach are these: first of all, gifts for preaching; second, a desire to serve by using them; and third, the recognition by others of God’s call and God’s gifts in a person’s life.

Sometimes, however, there’s simply a kind of passive acceptance that if someone wants to become a preacher, and he’s a keen Christian, then he should. And then sometimes the church blames the seminary or the theological college for poor preaching. And then sometimes the seminaries and the theological colleges blame the church for not sending better candidates to be trained by them.

In one sense, all this is understandable. It may not always be equally clear that a person has particular gifts, and it’s not always clear that what appear to be gifts are really being fed by spiritual graces. And the people who make the decisions in this area can vary from hardliners—not all of whom exude the fruit of the Spirit themselves—to soft-hearted—who, because they don’t want to hurt anyone and are conscious of their own weaknesses, are very reluctant to ask the important questions about a call to preach. We all need help in this area. But while that’s true, there’s something here I think is really important to say, and I can’t be dogmatic about what it is, but I have a sense that one answer to the question, “What is wrong with preaching today?” is found in the words of James 4:2: “You do not have because you do not ask.”

I signed off yesterday with the question, When did you last pray about preaching? I really do wonder if we pray for preachers maybe only when we happen to be looking for a new one in our own congregation. But preachers don’t just suddenly emerge full-grown when congregations need them. If Luther was right that it’s prayer, meditation, and temptation or testing that makes a man a preacher, then preachers are long in the making, and so this should be a constant prayer burden for us.

And there’s something else that we should remember. In a way, congregations make preachers. I don’t mean during their ministry, although there’s a lot of truth in that. I mean when youngsters are being nurtured and nourished in your congregation, that’s where they are being prepared—not by experts in exegesis and theology but by the care, the nurturing, the example, the counsel, and the love of older fellow believers, and especially by their praying that already, in their own fellowship, God will prepare and call and equip the preachers who will preach to their grandchildren. So, “Pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into the harvest,” isn’t just about overseas missionaries; it’s about praying for preachers.