I have a confession to make I sometimes struggle with doubt. Deep doubt. Sinful doubt. One of the greatest areas that I battle is in regards to God's ability to change believers. The sinfulness of believers (myself the chief) causes me to question whether or not God really is able to sanctify his followers. Yes, I know that we have to choose holiness over sin and I know that this is a huge part of the slowness of our progress in holiness.

One of the greatest areas that causes me pain (as I am sure it does Christ as well) is when believers are involved in ridiculous slander and pride. I can be horrible about this myself. I know that I stand guilty of slander and deep pride. Of this I must confess and repent anew.

This is proof that God is in the process of redeeming a people for Himself and that He is able to conquer our sinful hearts and bring unity where there once was discord. Only God could have done what is taking place in the heart of Steve Camp as it concerns Mark Driscoll. You have to read Steve Camp's humble confession and repentance. It caused my heart to leap for joy and my confidence in the power of God to grow. Grace truly does reign.

Isn't it amazing the ripple effect that a humble confession can have? It really proves the truth of Scripture in regards to the unity of the body of Christ. Sin hurts every member and repentance heals! Oh, how I long for the day when the bride is in unity and we stand before Jesus pure and spotless.

If we believe that our greatest good is that God might exalt us, make us happy without him, and affirm our innate goodness then we will be sorely disturbed when everything in creation and in the mission of God cries out the opposite.

God's mission is to be known among the nations not to make much of us. Creation testifies to this. The sun, the moon, and the stars do not cry out to testify of our greatness--they proclaim the majesty of God. Everything but our own hearts testifies to the greatness of God. If we think it's about us then life will deeply disappoint us.

I think I know how it happened but I have conflicting citings. D.A. Carson gives credit to McCheyne, I have it written down as John Owen.

"What a man is on his knees, in secret, before God that he is an no more".

I have an Owen quote that says

"A minister may fill his pews, his communion roll, the mouths of the public; but what that man is on his knees, in secret, before God Almighty, that he is, and no more."

Does anyone know where the McCheyne quote comes from? Carson does not cite it but attributes it to McCheyne. I have it written down as Owen--but also not cited. My guess is that McCheyne rephrased Owen's quote to make it more universal in scope. Anyone know?

Occasionally I will have students ask me how to put together a Bible study or a sermon. Rather than giving them a full course on hermeneutics and homiletics I try to keep it simple. If they have a text or topic (if not we first discuss how to pick a text) in mind we go to the Scriptures and begin discussing sermon preparation.

Let’s imagine that a student feels led to preach on John 3:16. The first thing I do is tell the student to imagine time travelling; travelling back to the time when Jesus originally said these words, or when John originally wrote them. At this point I ask the student to imagine all of the things that would make it difficult for them to understand what Jesus is saying. We talk about language, culture, and the like.

At this point I pull out a sheet of paper and write the name Biblical Bob. I remind the student that what matters most in a Bible study or sermon is not what you want to say or what you think the audience needs to hear, but rather what God says. The first task in preaching John 3:16 is to understand the world of biblical Bob. This means that you study the text, you study the times, and you study the context. I usually offer a few resources to aid them in discovering these things.

Secondly I write the name Modern Marv. This is your audience. You need to know the people that you are preaching to. You need to have a vague idea of their struggles. There are many things that are universal to all men and women. And there are some things that are unique to your environment. We must be aware of these.

The task of preaching is building a bridge between Biblical Bob and Modern Marv (Or Post-Modern Percy if you prefer). How do you communicate the biblical message to our modern ears? In order to do this effectively you have to know what the message is—this is your chief task. At this point I usually draw a bridge between the two and begin discussing things that Biblical Bob has in common with Modern Marv. Then I remind the student that Jesus is the hero of both Biblical Bob and Modern Marv.

There are numerous other things that go into sermon preparation but I feel that explaining it this way helps the student to understand the task at hand. As they begin preaching you will find many students will fall off on one side or the other: either they will preach a very “biblical” message that has little to no relevance for today or they will preach a very “relevant” message that has little to no biblical fidelity. Having this framework in their mind will help them grow and be faithful to the text and to their audience.

Questions?

By the way, none of this is new to me. The way it is communicated might be, but the general principles can be found here among other places:

Between Two Worlds by John Stott
Christ-Centered Preaching by Bryan Chapell
The Supremacy of God in Preaching by John Piper
Spirit-Empowered Preaching by Arturo Azurdia
The Modern Preacher and the Ancient Text by Sideny Greidanus
Preaching Christ in All of Scripture by Edmund Clowney
Preaching to a Post-Everything World by Zack Eswine

I have no idea where I got this. All I know is that it is from D.A. Carson. If someone knows where it is from please leave it in the comments. This really puts contextualization into perspective:

Paul refuses to circumcise Titus, even when it was demanded by many in the Jerusalem crowd, not because it didn't matter to them, but because it mattered so much that if he acquiesced, he would have been giving the impression that faith in Jesus is not enough for salvation: one has to become a Jew first, before one can become a Christian. That would jeopardize the exclusive sufficiency of Jesus.

To create a contemporary analogy: If I'm called to preach the gospel among a lot of people who are cultural teetotalers, I'll give up alcohol for the sake of the gospel. But if they start saying, "You cannot be a Christian and drink alcohol," I'll reply, "Pass the port" or "I'll think I'll have a glass of Beaujolais with my meal." Paul is flexible and therefore prepared to circumcise Timothy when the exclusive sufficiency of Christ is not at stake and when a little cultural accommodation will advance the gospel; he is rigidly inflexible and therefore refuses to circumcise Titus when people are saying that Gentiles must be circumcised and become Jews to accept the Jewish Messiah.