Preaching With the Power of the Holy Spirit Essay

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Introduction

To preach is to be called by God, to serve in the glorious undertaking of disseminating scriptural truths. Unlike any ordinary endeavor, preaching requires spiritual strength and conviction. Most importantly, preaching depends on the Grace of god, received as the Holy Spirit, as well as by and for the Holy Spirit. To take preaching lightly would be to commit the sin of pride, in assuming that the undertaking is about charisma or even just about spiritual counseling. As admirable as charisma is, and as noble as counseling, preaching is something different altogether. In the 40th anniversary edition of his classic book Preaching and Preachers, Martyn Lloyd-Jones explicates the nature of preaching with dutiful attention to scriptural authority. Ultimately, Lloyd-Jones shows how preachers can transform their sermons from mere motivational speeches into the transformative means by which listeners can achieve union with God. Lloyd-Jones presents the purpose of preaching as reaching towards unction, or anointing.

Preparation

Without discounting the importance of preparation in planning a sermon, Lloyd-Jones also extols the need to remain open to being moved by the spirit during delivery. The unction “will come upon” the corpus of work completed by the preacher during the planning and preparation phrases (Lloyd-Jones, 2011, p. 304). There is a chronology to the process of sermon development and delivery, according to the author, which is grounded in scripture: traceable to the story of Elijah but also to “many other examples of the same thing,” (Lloyd-Jones, 2011, p. 304). God ascribes a certain order of things, paralleling the divine order and structure of Creation. First one things happens, then another; first Moses obeys God’s will in detail and then Moses receives the unction in the form of the burning bush. The novice preacher will recognize a more mundane parallel in Lloyd-Jones’s analysis, in the saying “God helps those who help themselves,” (Lloyd-Jones, 2011, p 304). First, the preacher does the hard work, careful scrutiny of correspondences, and deep textual research. Then, the preacher transmutes that learning and knowledge into a purer form of wisdom guided by the Holy Spirit. The more prepared the preacher, the more powerful the sermon. Through the sermon, God is “giving power,” an act of Grace (Lloyd-Jones, 2011, p. 304).

Scriptural Support for Preparation and Anointing

Scripture unequivocally stresses the salience of the Holy Spirit in enlightened preaching, beginning with the Old Testament and reaching a peak with the ministry of Jesus Christ. All the Old Testament prophets were exemplary in their receptivity to the Holy Spirit, the anointing, even prior to God’s revelation in Christ (Lloyd-Jones, 2011). When the prophets of the Old Testament preached, there was a deep-rooted conviction that their work was preparatory in nature: starting from Elijah and onto John the Baptist, who truly paved the way for Christ’s ministry. As Lloyd-Jones points out, John the Baptist received the Holy Spirit, consumed with the love of God, which he was able to transmit to a wide enough audience to prepare them for the coming of Christ. Thus prepared, “the people were waiting expectantly and were all wondering in their hearts if John might possibly be the Messiah,” (Luke 3:15). Of course, Luke knew full well that he was only the first course, the appetizer to a special spiritual feast. “I baptize you with water. But one who is more powerful than I will come, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire,” (Luke 3:16). Herein lies the crux of the reason why the anointing remains critical to all preaching. All preaching is the delivery of Christ’s baptismal font; not the baptism in water but that of the Holy Spirit.

The Cyclical Nature of Preparation and Anointing

First comes preparation, and then the unction, but the work of the preacher is far from done when the sermon concludes.

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It is not a matter of merely preparing for the next sermon. With each sermon, the community of Christ grows. The preacher is entrusted with the responsibility of not just preparing another sermon for the following Sunday but for preparing each person’s heart to receive the Holy Spirit. As each individual listener receives the Grace of God, redemption becomes possible. The preacher helps lay the foundation for the Kingdom of Heaven on earth. The Holy Spirit descends on the preacher during the sermon, and also into the hearts of those who are open to receive the blessing, the anointing, the unction. When this happens, the heart is catalyzed and spiritually prepared for the baptism of fire. Thus prepared, each individual becomes a servant of Christ in his or her own way. Some will even be called to the ministry, others to different ways of spreading the gospel through the world.

A great deal of patience is needed to be a preacher, who often fails to see the flourishing of the flock in its fullest form. The Holy Spirit bestows deep and meaningful patience in the heart and mind of the preacher and all members of the congregation open to God’s grace. Any number of human variables can hinder one’s openness to the Holy Spirit; the preacher’s goal is to produce meaningful and profound change in the lives of individuals and in the collective life of the spiritual community. These types of deep changes do not happen for everyone at once, at the same time, or in any expected time frame. Every day, through prayer, and every week through the gathering together of Christians in His name, the cycle of preparation and anointing begins anew. With each week, the preacher can bring new ideas, new understandings, and new insights into Biblical truths. New sermons reach new people or existing listeners in new ways, helping to gradually awaken the human spirit to the Grace of God.

Beyond the Expository Sermon

The expository sermon is the cornerstone of preaching but with the unction also comes liberation and freedom. A sermon flounders without the Holy Spirit. The preacher can and should move beyond the mundane words and into the passageway through which the Holy Spirit may enter. Reflecting on the nature of Lloyd-Jones’s own sermon delivery and preaching style, Mark Driscoll (2014) notes, “he would often wander from his planned talks as the Spirit led and the length of his messages varied greatly,” (p. 1). It was not as if Lloyd-Jones lacked the discipline to remain faithful to an expository sermon. Rather, the effective preacher can remain steady at the center point of scripture—the formal thesis of the sermon—while also allowing the Holy Spirit to carry the sermon in the correct direction. The sermon ceases to belong to the preacher; it is now in the hands of God. There is no other, and certainly no greater, function of a sermon than to become transcendent. Naturally, Lloyd-Jones welcomes spiritual gifts and other signs of the Holy Spirit (Piper, 1991). Such gifts deepened faith, the key to salvation, and cultivated a “vital spiritual experience,” albeit one that was remarkably devoid of showmanship, crass commercialism, or superficiality (Piper, 1991, p. 1). Faithfulness to scripture comes before the unction; preparation precedes the Holy Spirit.

The Purpose of Preaching

If the purpose of preaching is to produce change and deliverance unto God, the preacher is neither teacher nor counselor but facilitator or even a spiritual midwife. The preacher can also be considered a catalyst for change. Considering that any number of listeners may not yet be believers, the preacher needs to consider the different needs of the audience. Some will….....

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