What Doesn't Make It Into a Sermon

When I was writing the sermon last week, I began with a bit on what it takes to write a sermon. Frankly, it didn't belong in the sermon so it never made it there. This is a good thing. But still, I believe there are some words that may be valuable about the creation of "the interpretation of the Word of God."

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There are days when writing the sermon is easy. Those are days to be reckoned. No matter how easy the gospel seems to be, no matter how easy the words seem to come, the easy sermons are always the ones that lead us into peril.

The hazards of the sermon make themselves known in many ways. Some days they come up as a just a surface rendering of scripture. These days the sermon is like a wood veneer on some sort of cabinet. The outside says it’s oak, but on the inside it’s just so much sawdust and glue. It looks sturdy, but in truth, once the rubber meets the road, it’s not durable at all.

Another way the sermon can become a hazard is when the sermon is all sunshine and flowers. The opposite side of this same coin is when the sermon is nothing but doom and gloom. Neither of these sermons can carry the full weight of the gospel of Jesus Christ. One of them discounts the reality of sin and devastation while the other foregoes the reality of grace and redemption. The promises made by both of these sermons are incomplete. Yes, there is sin and devastation and there is grace and redemption, but one without the other is imperfect.

There is another quality to the sermon which when neglected causes the word of God to sound like a banging gong or crashing cymbal, a lack of love. The better way to say that for this situation is a lack of pastoral care.

Extending that musical instrument metaphor, I know that God will use me as his instrument. In God’s way, one of the extremes of how I will be used as his instrument is like a fine Stradivarius violin. This instrument, in the hands of a master will be in total harmony. The music will be finely tuned. The melody will be exquisite. The song will give glory to the one who plays it. In fact, while the Stradivarius is the finest violin ever made, its only glory comes from the one who plays it.

The other extreme is that God can play me like a cowbell; a one note, 1-2-3-4, hit-it-hard, keep-the-time cowbell. It’s useful. It keeps time as well as the one who hits it, and if it’s the Lord our God banging on the cowbell, it will be perfect. Of course, there are other ways to keep time. If all I can be in the pulpit is a cowbell, then the Lord can easily have me replaced.

In short, I need to approach sermons, and all of life, in a pastoral way. A way that glorifies God, shares the Gospel with the world, and sends us into the world to live the life God wants us to live. Let’s just say that this week; I have been played like a cowbell, hoping not to preach God’s word with the substance and nutritional value of cotton candy