Glen Cartwright

Learning to preach with variety!

Phil Magee

New Year message

Having witnessed the sun setting on 2007, and saw the dawn of a brand New Year, 2008, it’s good to reflect on the Word of God as that compass bearing which has not only guided us in the past as an Association, but acts as that needle pointing us forward into all that God has, I believe, for us.

When Phil asked me to write a ‘New Year Message’ for the website, I have to confess I felt a bit like HM The Queen with her ‘Christmas Message’ : what do you say to a constituency of people at the end of a year with its challenges, aspirations, fulfillments, disappointments, highlights and as you look forward to the uncharted waters of a brand New Year? Well, my thoughts turned to Psalm 90, which captures the essence of looking back and looking forward.

Affirming the fact that God has been the dwelling place in all generations and acknowledging that to gain wisdom, we should number our days, the Psalmist, with these twin perspectives, prays that “the beauty of the Lord would be upon us and that the work of our hands would be established”. Wise counsel which we would do well to take to heart as we cross over into 2008. May we in doing so be careful to affirm the fact that God has guided the Association for 84 years, and acknowledge that we have, as we number our days, like David who we read of in Acts 13:36, who wrote many of the Psalms, to “serve God’s purpose in our generation”.

My prayer for us in taking a spiritual compass bearing for 2008 as a growing network of lay preachers drawn from a rich tapestry of Baptist churches throughout Scotland, is that “the beauty of the Lord would be upon us and that the work of our hands would be established”. Would that God would be pleased as we aspire to live those Christo-Centric lives, as we serve Him well, aiming at excellence in all that we do as we rightly handle the Word of Truth, and that God would pour His favour upon us.

Let me share with you a true story about Arnold Palmer, the famous golfer. Arnold tells the story of when he received an invitation to go and play golf with the King of Saudi Arabia. He flew over and he and the King enjoyed a few days golf together. On the day that Arnold’s getting ready to fly back over to the United States, the King tells Arnold he’d like to give him something as a momento of their time together.

Now Arnold Palmer being a very wealth man himself says “No, no, honestly, I’ve enjoyed being here”, but the King insists “No, what can I get you in terms of a gift that would be a good memory of our time together”. Arnold was gearing up to say “No, it’s really not that important”, and then it clicked that you don’t say no to a King! So he said, “Well maybe you could give me a golf club to add to my collection”. He then gets on the plane and flies home.

Flying 36,000 feet over the Atlantic, Arnold starts to wonder what this golf club will look like. Will it be a solid gold putter? Or a diamond studded driver? After all, what kind of golf club does a King give as a present? The anticipation begins to build and every day Arnold goes out to the mailbox to see what the post has brought, but nothing.

On the eighth day, Arnold goes out and there’s a large square envelope in his mailbox bearing the seal of the King of Saudi Arabia, but clearly no golf club, and so Arnold wonders what it could be. He opens it up and discovers it’s the title deeds to a 500 acre golf club!! So it’s possible that Kings think a little different to the rest of us. Arnold thought ’golf club’ : the King thought ’GOLF CLUB’!

The point of the story is abundantly clear. God, our King, is way bigger than we think : He is such a good God : and, I believe, wants to pour His favour upon us way beyond the confines of our human expectations. We think ’golf club’ : God thinks ’GOLF CLUB’!!! So as we enter 2008, may we be open to embracing all that God wants to do in us and through us, that we would have wisdom, ’the ability to see things from God’s point of view’, and that as we serve God’s purpose in 2008, He alone would establish the work of our hands and prosper it way beyond our expectations.

A Happy New Year to you all.

Glen

Learning to preach with variety!

Phil Magee, Active member, Dingwall

If you read a book you will find that it will have a particular genre such as biography, poetry etc but when you turn to the bible you find a number of genres. As someone who is only begun preaching in the last five years I am only learning how to preach from the various genres. I was encouraged to read recently Preaching with Variety by Jeffrey Arthur. His real aim is this:

“To that end, the book describes the rhetorical dynamics of biblical genres and suggests how preachers can reproduce some of those books reproduce some of these dynamics in their sermons”.

It is interesting to note that most of the Bible is not structured like the standard sermon with three points that folks have become accustomed to. In fact 60 % of the bible is told in a story form. He encourages us to preach either in first person narrative or third person narrative. This has big implications for our preaching that we shouldn’t be afraid to be in story-telling mode. So often as Christians we are afraid to story-tell but Arthur tells us that as long we have done good exegesis we should be well prepared for preaching in such a style and at the same time not comprised what the Bible is saying.

I was particularly encouraged by what he says about the Psalms. He encourages us to linger over the text of poetry and imagine the metaphors that are being used. He says that reading these verses should encourage us to use vivid and concrete language in a sermon based on the psalms or any poetry. He also encourages us to think of the book of Proverbs not as a set of promises but as general observations.

The Epistles, We are told are probably the closest example we have to that of a sermon. It was worth noting in this chapter that as all scripture would have been spoken in public – those who heard Scripture being read publicly generally in those days would not have seen it as a mark on a paper but heard it as a spoken word. He describes the letter as a “one way conversation”. Even in the chapter about this particular form, he encourages us to be imaginative about the way we preach from such a text. He encourages us to think about having dialogue with the congregation during a sermon. For those where the congregation is not used to this kind of thing, it may be worth trying a question and answer time after the sermon or the after the service has come to an end.

This year is the national year of book reading and if there is a book you might want to read as a preacher seeking to develop, then I would recommend this one. It is a book geared specifically to helping the preacher think about genre and how you communicate the dynamic of the text to a congregation. But what strongly comes through is the need to be imaginative and learning to preach with variety!