Something I’m not used to in American mainstream Christianity is all the topical sermons. In all the churches that I’ve visited in the past few weeks the sermons have almost ALWAYS centered on a topic (10 Steps to a Healthy Marriage, Improving Emotional Health, 5 Questions You’ve Always Wanted to Ask About Christianity, Facing Doubt, etc.). These sorts of sermons have at their center a topic or a theme, then use Scripture to support the points that the pastor wants to make.
This is backwards.
What ever happened to expository preaching in the US? What happened to the central role of scripture in the pulpit? We must turn this around. I think there’s very little doubting that there is a correlation between the declining health of the church in North America and the peripheral role of the Bible in congregational worship. I must admit, I don’t understand this move.
Can I say it again? The Bible should be central in worship. The Holy Spirit has ordained the Written Word as the means through which he dispenses his grace and glorifies the saving work of Christ in the life of the church. If the Bible becomes peripheral, Jesus becomes peripheral. This is dangerous.
Lest we forget Psalm 1, 19, and 119. The purpose of these psalms is to remind us, as the covenant people of God, that the Word of God is perfect and without fault. It is sweeter than honey. It’s wisdom is beyond the wisdom of men. It/He alone can save (and we usually differentiate between the Written Word (the Bible) and the Living Word (Jesus)).
Psalm 1: When we abide in the word (meditating on it day and night) we will be like a tree planted by streams of water. In other words, the only way to true heath of an eternal quality is by abiding in the Word.
Psalm 19: God has revealed himself in the cosmos (General Revelation). The creation pours forth speech. Learning of God is the key to life. Not only this, but God has also revealed himself in his Word (Special Revelation), and His Word is without compare. We can not only know him from a distance, but we can enter into a dialogue, a conversation of saving faith. We can know him personally through the Word.
Psalm 119: From beginning to end, the Word of God is perfect and complete. THERE IS NOTHING MISSING. It lacks nothing. This is the point of the psalm being arranged around the Hebrew ALEF-BET (the equivalent of saying that He is the Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the End). Each letter (consonant to be specific) has eight verses. The number eight symbolizes being beyond perfection. In other words, the Word of God is BEYOND PERFECT. IT HAS ALL WE NEED AND MORE.
The bottom-line is this: knowing, loving, and obeying God alone can give us eternal life (see 1 John). The way to knowing God personally is through the Word (both Living and Written). If we believe this, then we will once again make the Bible central in worship.
Let’s put the accent on the right syllable, folks.
This nicely extends the conversation about the role of the spoken Word in Christian life and worship. The written word is often reduced to nothing more than a single sentence support for the main point of the day. I’m beginning to wonder if the word “revolution” is appropriate when thinking about what will happen when there is a full recognition and recovery of the oral foundations of Scripture.
I couldn’t agree more.