United Methodeviations

Biblical Preaching May 15, 2010

If ever there were a more confusing claim, I don’t know what it is.  Biblical preaching.  In the past few months, I have encountered people who either complain that their pastor doesn’t “preach the Bible,” or proudly boast that they have a “Biblical preacher.”  (One over 2000 years old…?)  But to probe what people really mean gets confusing.  ”Our pastor doesn’t interpret scripture, he just preaches truth,” is a favorite of mine.  I have never, ever met a preacher who doesn’t interpret — though many would have us believe that their interpretation was God’s own truth.  Another favorite of mine is, “our pastor preaches mercy, justice, compassion — everything but the gospel!”  Okay, here is my interpretive lens, but I thought mercy, justice, and compassion were good news.  Now, I have been in churches (thankfully very few United Methodist Churches) where the names “God,” and “Jesus” are never actually spoken, and that it a problem.  I once interviewed some people who were leaving worship at a “hot” new UMC, and I asked them, “What did you learn about God today.”  Reply after reply was something along the lines of, “You know?  I don’t remember hearing anything about God in church this morning!”  Not good.  On the other hand, some people think they are only hearing “biblical” preaching if the preacher peppers the message with scripture bits, creating the equivalent of a platitude collage.  Some folks feel that too much scholarship and study is actually bad for “biblical” preaching.  One pastor told me, “the Bible was good enough for Jesus, it’s good enough for me.  He didn’t need commentaries and dictionaries and study guides.  Of course, he didn’t have the New Testament either, but he made out fine.”  I know another pastor who proudly boasts, “I haven’t cracked a text-book since leaving seminary.  Everything one needs is right in the Bible.”  This person preaches from Petersen’s, The Message.

On the other side, academic snobbery rears its head.  ”Preaching is a lost art.  We have some of the absolute worst messages being preached, and people eat them up like candy,” a friend laments.  Another holds in contempt any pastor who doesn’t preach the lectionary.  Some preachers can exegete the hell out of the Bible, but they aren’t making it better.  I am of a mind that the gospel doesn’t need our help — it does just fine on its own.  At the same time, I believe it is the responsibility of every preacher to bring the very best thinking and scholarship to the pulpit.  Preachers should never get in the way of God’s word, and all too often we do.

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