A sermon full of mere words, how neatly so ever it is composed, while it wants the light of evidence, and the life of zeal, is but an image or a well-dressed carcass.
The Reformed Pastor, Chapter 3, Section 1.
One of the reasons for the disinterest in expository preaching is surely that so many attempts at it prove lifeless, dull, and even thoroughly boring. I never cease to be amazed by the ingenuity of those who are capable of taking the powerful, life-changing text of Scripture and communicating it with all the passion of someone reading aloud from the Yellow Pages!
Preaching for God’s Glory, Crossway, 1999, p. 22. Get this book!
Delivery does not consist merely, or even chiefly, in vocalization and gesticulation, but it implies that one is possessed with the subject, that he is completely in sympathy with it and fully alive to its importance; that he is not repeating remembered words, but setting free the thoughts shut up in his mind.
If you would make others feel, you must feel yourself… The heavenly flame must be kindled first in your own bosom, that by this law of sympathy it may radiate thence into the souls of your hearers.
Quoted by Curtis C. Thomas, Practical Wisdom for Pastors, Crossway Books, 2001, p. 241.
Some preachers ought to put more fire into their sermons or more sermons into the fire.
Quoted by Curtis C. Thomas, Practical Wisdom for Pastors, Crossway Books, 2001, p. 79.
From the beginning of the sermon to its end, the all engrossing force of the text and the God who speaks through that text must dominate our whole being. With the burning power of that truth on our heart and lips, every thought, emotion, and act of the will must be so captured by that truth that it springs forth with excitement, joy, sincerity, and reality as an evident token that God’s Spirit is in that word. Away with all the mediocre, lifeless, boring, and lackluster orations offered as pitiful substitutes for the powerful Word of the living Lord. If that Word from God does not thrill the proclaimer and fill [him]…with an intense desire to glorify God and do His will, how shall we ever expect it to have any greater effect on our hearers.
Toward an Exegetical Theology, Baker, 1981, p. 239.
What is preaching? Logic on fire! Preaching is theology coming through a man who is on fire. A true understanding and experience of the Truth must lead to this. I say again that a man who can speak about these things dispassionately has no right whatsoever to be in a pulpit; and should never be allowed to enter one.
Preachers and Preaching, Zondervan, 1971, p. 97, Used by Permission. Get this book!
A preacher must always convey the impression that he himself has been gripped by what he is saying. If he has not been gripped nobody else will be. So this is absolutely essential. He must impress the people by the fact that he is taken up and absorbed by what he is doing. He is full of matter, and he is anxious to impart this. He is so moved and thrilled by it himself that he wants everybody else to share in this. He is concerned about them; that is why he is preaching to them. He is anxious about them; anxious to help them, anxious to tell them the truth of God. So he does it with energy, with zeal, and with this obvious concern for people.
Preaching and Preachers, Zondervan, 1971, p. 87-88, Used by Permission. Get this book!
The three essentials for great preaching are: truth, clarity, and passion.
I am not arguing for mere excitement. Painted fire never burns, and an imitated enthusiasm is the most empty thing that can possibly exist in a preacher. Given the preacher with a message…I cannot understand that man not being swept sometimes right out of himself by the fire and and force and the fervency of his work.
Preaching, Baker, 1974, p. 36.
I fear preaching in such a way that when people hear about God, they’ll want only to yawn.
Leadership, v. 11, n. 2.
