Category Archives: intention

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Consider the Value of Faith-First Application

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Faith-first application is my term for sermon applications that call for Believers to believe some aspect of the Gospel before asking for life-change. This application approach is the result of reading the Gospels and Scott Hafemann’s book, The God of Promise and the Life of Faith. When you read the Gospels you hear Jesus asking in Luke 8:25, “Where is your faith?” In other places you hear Him address His disciples, “O you of little faith” (cf. Matt. 6:30; 8:26; 14:31; 16:8; Luke 12:28). Jesus could have easily addressed other issues, such as their anxiety in Matt. 6:30 or their fear in Matt. 14:31. But He addressed their faith.

Scott Hafemann’s book helps show that faith in the promises of God leads to obedience. He also states, of course, that the opposite is true–that unbelief leads to disobedience. So, if it’s true that every act of disobedience is first and foremost an act of unbelief, then I must attack unbelief in my efforts to attack disobedience. And the opposite? I must urge faith first, before I try to urge righteousness. 

I know you know the connection between anxiety and little faith and between fear and little faith in our examples above. That’s the point. Jesus touches on our little faith because He knows that when faith grows, righteousness also grows. The story of Jesus calming the storm challenges our faith. Take a look at your sermon application in yesterday’s sermon or the one you’re creating for this coming Sunday. See if there is a way for you to feed the faith of your congregants. See if you can make a connection between their faith and applying their lives to your preaching portion.

There is a fringe benefit to this approach to application. Faith-first application eliminates commonly heard self-help moralism by connecting faith with practical application, making the latter distinctly Christian.

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Preaching That Matches Jesus’ Sense Of Urgency

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I learned from Jesus’ application of His own parable of the four soils that every teaching time in church is urgent. He teaches us in Luke 8:18 “Take care then how you hear…” This is Jesus’ primary application, after He showed us four kinds of hearing of the Gospel. This means that every sermon requires immediate action or attention. I’ve identified four kinds of hearing that take place in faith-families (I’m sure you can add to this): Congregants can

  1. hear and not understand.
  2. hear and don’t care.
  3. hear, understand, care, but not change.
  4. hear, understand, care, and change.

Jesus’ stern warning in v. 18 has helped me realize how important it is each Sunday to explain why it’s important to hear and respond to God’s Word. In an earlier post I mentioned how Jesus continually divides us all into two categories. In this case, we have the have’s (“…for to the one who has, more will be given…”) and the have not’s (“and from the one who has not, even what he thinks that he has will be taken away.”). Your theology will probably dictate how severe the warning is (loss of rewards–demotion, versus loss of spiritual life–destruction). Either way, I want to be sure my preaching matches Jesus’ sense of urgency. I do not want to be guilty of allowing parishioners to “think” they have what they don’t have.

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Preaching Two Kinds of Faith

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Recently, I was preaching on Psalm 112 and emphasizing the aspect of fearlessness in verses 7-8, “He is not afraid of bad news; his heart is firm, trusting in the Lord. His heart is steady; he will not be afraid.” In my search for images for that Sunday’s slides, I came across this saying:

 

“Let you faith be bigger than your fear.”

 

After thinking about this for a moment or two, I realized that this kind of thinking betrays a lack of understanding of biblical faith. What struck me harder was the fact that the saying seemed to preach so well. I could hear myself saying something like this in an attempt to apply our lives to this Psalm.

At the risk of nit-picking, let me suggest that genuine faith in Christ is, by nature, stronger than fear. To tell someone to let their faith be bigger than their fear is actually telling them to exchange less-than-saving/sanctifying faith for genuine faith. So, it’s actually not about letting faith be bigger; it’s about explaining how faith in Christ conquers fear. That exercise in theological exegesis will help our congregants be the kind of person described in Psalm 112, which is what the Psalm is intended to do.

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Preaching on Fathers’ Day Can Be Hazardous!

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Thankfully, I was on vacation on Fathers’ Day Sunday.  Not that I especially like being on vacation, but because I didn’t have to twist a text to apply it to fathers.  How did you manage that Sunday?  I worshiped in a church in Maine.  The pastor selected Luke 15’s parable of the Prodigal Son.  I appreciated his emphasis on the father portrayed in the parable, though some of the principles he developed for us to follow may have been stretching the truth.  It shows how difficult it is to preach with greater accuracy if we are too focused on being relevant.  Often the occasion of the sermon takes precedence over the occasion of the Scripture.  Or, our purpose for choosing a sermon on Luke 15 for Fathers’ Day overrides the purpose for which that Scripture was given by God.  God help us for the sake of your reputation!