Well said, yielding to Christ does seem to be the more difficult part.

 

When will you write a book with all this great stuff that you point out? This is great for teaching my family. If only we heard stuff like this from the pulpit on Sunday! I praise God for what he reveals through you, Daniel.

 

When we serve a meal for the whole family, there has to be meat for the mature, and milk for the babes. Sometimes there are so many babes, by the time the milk is all passed out, the meal is over. So it is, I think, in some churches. There are a few who are mature enough to digest the deeper truths, but they are not being fed because most of the flock is in spiritual diapers, so most of the sermons are directed at trying to get these babes out of the cradle.

There are all sorts of reasons why that can happen. In fact, that might make a good post some time.

 

I'd be interested in a church that had two services, which, instead of the usual "contemporary" and "traditional" were "milk" and "meat." :)

Think it could catch on?

Jennifer

 

Jen - I think it could catch on, but I think the meat sermon would be pretty rare. (Leghorn: that's a joke son, ah say, that's a joke thar boy, meat! rare! A joke boy!)

 

Daniel,

Even if the sermons were "milk" sermons, I think I could still get something out of them, but they aren't even that. For instance, I would say that Marc Driscoll's sermons are "milk" sermons because his congregation is made up of largely unchurched people. Yet, I still get one of two morsels to chew on from his sermons. I don't live close enough to go to his church, so at the churches I've attended I don't even get a couple morsels. It is really indescribable. There isn't any history of the church or the faith, very little (if any) exegesis of scripture, and little insight or wisdom. Mostly I just hear humorous anecdotes from the pastor's personal life.

P.S. I have to appreciate someone who enjoys Foghorn Leghorn humor.

 

Bftp, the best sermons are one where God teaches me something; I have come to know that I don't need to sit under a great teacher for that. I like a sermon to be interesting and entertaining - as well as edifying - but all I really need is edifying, and whether the pastor is a great communicator, or a flop, I am certain to get more out of his sermon if my heart is tender and expecting God to speak to me through him. If God sent unclean birds to feed the prophet in the wilderness, he probably sends poor communicators to feed saints in the wilderness too.

But I do suspect that much of the problem wouldn't be there if congregations stopped hiring pastors and started raising them up from within their own congregations. The idea of hiring someone to come and be an elder in a church is pretty far from biblical, and yet we see it is epidemic. We qualify men for the pastorate, not based on where they are at spiritually, but where they got their diploma, and how many letters are behind their name. It is only after they are on salary that the congregation begins to realize that these men, however excellent they may have been as scholars, and students, are by no means leaders, mature, or even cut out to shepherd.

Find me a congregation who has raised up their own pastor from within and stuck with him for five years or better, and I will show you a group of believers who is close knit, prayerful, and growing.

But I digress, on account of it being a hobby horse of mine. ;)