Off Topic: Good and Bad Preaching

Floyd,

Wow....that's not a Monday morning kind'a question. Good preaching is at its core a reflection upon how a word from God speaks to me and calls me to respond. Inversely, poor or bad preaching is my musings about my world devoid of any real word from God or call to respond to God's word.

Now..back to my Monday morning nap.

I have observed that the best preaching happens when the preacher gets out of the way of the Holy Spirit and lets HIS message flow. When this happens each member of the congregaton feels that the message was tailored just for him/her.  Homework is important, ist is one of the ways we pray  for the Spirit to provide a good message, but surrender is much more important.

 

The worst preaching happens when we bring our own message and prejudice to the pulpit. 

Good: Relevant to real life, clear flow and easy to follow the train of thought, speaks to what the scripture is actually saying.

Bad: Academic/theoretical, disorganized/meandering, speaks to preacher's personal opinions or just a string of anecdotal stories.

Disclaimer: I'm an occasional lay preacher myself.

Peter

Good:

Clarity, especially using everyday language and illustrations from what is really happening "in the world out there." Accuracy in use of scripture and reflecting both the time and the tone as well as the core definitional meanings of the scripture.

Bad:

Unapplied commentary. If you simply tell me stuff *about* the scripture without helping me understand what changes I can make to improve, you haven't helped me very much. Head knowledge unapplied is virtually worthless. Give ms something to do or to change, please?

Good:  when preacher is preaching at him/herself, not just a message for the laity in the pews.  When he/she speaks from a position of weakness, with which I can identify,not from 6 feet above contradiction, which switches me off.

Bad (we get it here from one preacher who ought to know better...):  harranguing, long irrelevant lectures on etymology.  Also mumbling!  If acoustics are bad, get someone to stand in the part of the church where it's hardest to hear and make you go on until you can be heard.

If Bible passage doesn't impact me, it won't impact anyone else either.

I think a reaLLY HELPFUL SERMON for me IS ONE THAT opens my heart to hear what God is saying to me, so that at the end I've got my message from God, sparked off by what the preacher said, but now I couldn't for the life of me tell you what the preACHER SAID.

Another helpful sort of sermon is one that opens up whole new dimensions in a Bible passage I thought  I knew and understood.

 

 

A good sermon (particularly one based on the O.T.) preaches Christ in the context of the history of redemption.

 

Good: "Brethren, we could well manage to be half as intellectual if we were twice as spiritual. Preaching is a spiritual business. A sermon born in the head reaches the head. A sermon born in the heart reaches the heart. A spiritual preacher will under God produce spiritually-minded people. Unction is not a gentle dove beating her wings against the bars outside of the preacher's soul; rather she must be pursued and won. Unction cannot be learned, only earned by prayer. Unction is God's knighthood for the soldier-preacher who has wrestled in prayer and gained the victory. Victory is not won in the pulpit by firing intellectual bullets or wisecracks, but in the prayer closet. The meeting is won or lost before the preacher's foot enters the pulpit. Unction is like perfume. Unction is like dynamite. Unction comes not by the medium of the bishop's hands, neither does it mildew when the preacher is cast into prison. Unction will pierce and percolate. It will sweeten and soften. When the hammer of logic and the fire of human zeal fail to open the stony heart, unction will succeed."

Bad: "The tragedy of this last hour is that we have too many dead men in the pulpits giving out too many dead sermons to too many dead people. There is a strange thing that I have seen even in the fundamentalist circles: it is preaching without unction. What is unction? I hardly know what it is, but I know what it is not, or at least I know when it is not upon my own soul. Preaching without unction kills instead of giving life. The unctionless preacher is a savor of death unto death. The Word does not live unless the unction is upon the preacher. Preacher, with all thy getting, get unction."

 

UNCTION! By Leonard Ravenhill (Standard disclaimer... I don't agree with everything Leonard ever said, or all of his theology, but MAN!  He was spot-on with this)

Good: When it comes from and is delivered from the heart. 2 Tim. 4:2.. Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. 

Bad: When a text is read, the sermon thought is given, and the preacher preaches everything except the text/thought that was given. 1 Cor. 10:23 [*-)].

A good sermon is about Jesus Christ and what He has done, about His righteous life lived in our stead, His sacrificial death on the cross and His resurrection assuring us of eternal life.
A bad sermon is about me or the preacher. I don't want to hear about the preacher I need to hear the gospel every Lord's day.

Good:

Christ-centered, expository preaching prepared and delivered by a man of prayer, who is diligent in study and loves his flock.

Bad:

A sermon, such that when heard or read 150 years later, the hearer or reader would be clueless as to the message.

Ditto when translated into another language.

Brother Mark said:

If a good sermon is discipling the believers, why would it contain the gospel

Because we need it.

Robert M. Warren said:

Brother Mark said:

If a good sermon is discipling the believers, why would it contain the gospel

Because we need it.

Apologies Robert, I wasn't very clear:  You characterized good preaching as including the gospel for believers, and contrasted that against bad preaching specifically because it focuses on unbelievers (presumably by including the gospel).

 

I really like Steve's whole answer:

Steve Hultquist said:

Good:
Clarity, especially using everyday language and illustrations from what is really happening "in the world out there." Accuracy in use of scripture and reflecting both the time and the tone as well as the core definitional meanings of the scripture.
Bad:
Unapplied commentary. If you simply tell me stuff *about* the scripture without helping me understand what changes I can make to improve, you haven't helped me very much. Head knowledge unapplied is virtually worthless. Give ms something to do or to change, please?

I do think it depends on who you are preaching to:

1. The Church needs to hear the apostle's doctrine and commands of the Lord.
2. The unsaved need to hear the Gospel.

"Give me something to do or to change" !

I think you are right MJ, its a very subjective question, am amazed the diveresity is as narrow as it currently is

For me, a good preacher is one who makes it clear the reasoning and method behind the move from exegesis of the text to the message to the congregation. It needs to be clear what is clear from the Bible and what is the preacher's advice. Too often I spend time during sermons trying to convince myself whether the preacher's "it says it here, so it must be true in exactly the same way today" approach is justified or whether there needs to be a more careful consideration of how the Bible applies to us today. Having spent many many years in evangelical churches, very rarely have I heard a preacher really wrestle with and make clear to me how to interpret the Bible.

However, I realize that most of the congregation probably doesn't think about things in quite the same way as I do. Many may be turned off if the preacher went into the detail that I want. As one poster above said, know your audience.

Floyd Johnson said:

The following questions are addressed specifically to the lay members of the forums.  This was the specific request made within the group from which it came.

I have just received a dare from a group of pastors to which I belong to ask a couple of simple questions: What is one characteristic of good preaching? And, what is one characteristic of bad preaching?

Just to be honest, I do plan on sharing answers with the group without giving the sources - but it is my hope that answers will help me and othesr to become better preachers.

Thanks in advance for any answers.

I haven't read this thread in its entirety yet, but here is my answer. Good preaching = Expository Preaching. You get the entire Bible preached. Bad preaching = Topical preaching. You get the feel good in the moment not the entire Bible preached.

Rev. Nannette La Fosse said:

Hi:

 I am a minister, but was a lay in the past.

Good preaching: Spiritual message with teaching pockets that instruct and inspire the congregation to learn more about the Bible and  to get closer to God.

Bad preaching: Academic vocabulary that the people do not understand, too technical, dry and unrelated  to their daily live problems.

Nannette, I totally agree that this is the way many church members perceive good and bad preaching, however it has always frustrated as an aspiring pastor.  Why is it that we have to almost "trick" listeners into hearing the word of God through smooth speech and catchy phrases instead of inviting them to come sift through the wealth of language they are perfectly capable to pursue.  

I agree that speaking language over everyone's head benefits no one, but in a sermon where essentially we have the ability to reflect and study, shouldn't there be some academic rigor to the language being spoken?

I wish I could appeal to both the student and the non student

Robert M. Warren said:

Brother Mark said:

If a good sermon is discipling the believers, why would it contain the gospel

Because we need it.

If I may expand on that answer:  As Christians we need the constant reminder that our salvation was the result of the obedience and sacrifice of Jesus Christ, not our work and striving. As still-fallen creatures, we will continuously try to revert to depending on our work for assurance of salvation, so we need the constant reminder of the Gospel.

Michael Childs said:

Some good preaching:  I could name some names.   Martyn Lloyd-Jones, John Piper, Maxie Dunnam, Billy Graham, Bill Bouknight, David Seamonds, N. T. Wright, David Wilkerson, John Ed Mathison, Jimmy Buskirk, Adrian Rogers, Charles Spurgeon...  Of course, good preaching is not imitating some other good preacher, but it helps so hear some examples.  A preacher must be authentic.

Some bad preaching:   When Scripture, Sermon, and Real Life remain strangers throughout the message.  God wants you rich - prosperity preachin'.  I could name some names here, too, but I won't.

Michael,

You gave us some great examples of "good preaching"  but you stopped short of "bad preaching"...  Who are some examples you could give us for bad preaching?[:)]

This probably will sound really simplistic, but it is something I've never forgotten:

Good - Any sermon that brings us to the foot of the cross of Christ, encouraging us to behold His Glory in all that the act and the history leading up to that act entail.

This will strengthen the motivation of the hearers to be transformed.  Whatever the theme, this is the goal.

Bad - Any sermon that doesn't do the above. 

MJD said:

Michael,

You gave us some great examples of "good preaching"  but you stopped short of "bad preaching"...  Who are some examples you could give us for bad preaching?

I would think you wouldn't know the names of the "bad" as they live in anonymity, but that may not be the case (unless of course you equate bad with "doesn't see things the way I do")

Who are examples of bad preaching? Well, you know who you are! Seriously, I decided not to go negative. I tend to do that too much.