In 1995, John Piper delivered a lecture to students at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. The lecture was titled “Preaching As Worship: Meditations on Expository Exultation.” This was the precursor to his 2018 book Expository Exultation. The lecture provides a corrective to much of what passes as preaching. It was a corrective 25 years ago, and it is still a corrective today. Preaching, as Piper argues, became decidedly human-centered. This is a shift that begins in German liberalism and in the later Great Awakenings in America. Today, preaching is often characterized as a TED Talk. Biblical and theological content has all but been jettisoned in favor of stories and life advice. Emotional manipulation—introduced from revivalism—is something of a staple in much American preaching. In his lecture, Piper walloped every person who steps into a pulpit with this haymaker:
[T]he reason we preachers do not believe that the greatness of God, the spirit of transcendence, the glory and majesty of Christ, the deep things of the Spirit, will move the hearts of our people and awaken profound affections is that these things do not move us; they don’t awaken our affections. We preachers prefer to read books about anger and intimacy and marriage and success and all manner of how-to strategies for home and work and church, than to read books about God. Ask any publisher what sells—even to pastors.
What gets preachers’ juices flowing is a new psychological angle on family dysfunction; a new strategy for mobilizing lay people; a new tactic for time management; a fresh approach to dealing with depression; an emphatic focus on his own resentments and pain and anger after years of being beat up by carnal Christians. But not a book about God. Not the infinite expanse of God’s character. Not the inexhaustible riches of the glory of God in Christ.
Perhaps the decline of the American church began in the pulpits. I’ve heard enough preachers in my lifetime mocking Bible scholars and theologians. When those tasked with teaching are bored by the things of God, those in the pews will be starved. Some will realize they are starving, and by God’s grace they will find nourishment. Many others, however, will never realize they are starved. The Old Testament prophets are replete with warnings for those whose task it is to teach. Those who are tasked with preaching are not tasked with entertaining the congregation for the week or providing a devotional thought. They are tasked with teaching the things of God so that the triune God might be worshiped and loved. This task must begin with the preacher’s affections being stirred by God. The preacher must be set free from the expectations of people and instead seek to worship God through preaching. I’m convinced that churches aren’t thriving by providing people with fluff. All the evidence points in the other direction. We don’t need preachers to tell us about the clever idea they had or the fishing trip they took. We need them to tell us about the living God otherwise we will amble about wasting our limited lives. As Paul puts it in Romans 10:14, “How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?”