Bryan Chapell - The Power of Christ-Centered Preaching

my thanks to my friend Jim Shaddix and for my friend Danny akin for my time here I'm thankful to be with you and it has been a sweet welcome so thank you for our time together and for the encouragement that you have given in my first chapel time with you I said that I would talk about what christ-centered exposition is and in that time I was trying to in some way deal with caricatures that are inaccurate and at the same time to say this is what exposition is that sees the grace of God unfolding in all the scriptures and culminating in the work of Christ which is not saying that every text mentions Jesus nor should it be twisted so as to make it do that but nonetheless just say that every text stands in some relation to the person and work of Christ in ways that it is either predicting or preparing or reflecting or resulting in our obedience to the work of Christ now that was the what but I promised you then that I would say why such exposition is important because my own experience is particularly when we're in academic settings that the the conversation ends and the debate begins with the question of who's got the right interpretation and my concern for those of you who are preparing for ministry is to say I don't want that to be the end of the conversation merely saying do I have a better or different interpretation than you do we have to think about what is the pastoral what is the ministry purpose for Christ centered interpretation and that's where I want to take you today let me just begin this way once upon a time there was a king he was walking along the top of his castle walls and as he looked out into a distant field he saw that there was a child who was collecting flowers and as the king looked at the flowers that being put into a bouquet he recognized that the ribbon that was wrapping the bouquet was royal in color and the King recognized that the flowers that were being collected by the child were being collected for himself but as the Chazz the King watched the child because it was a child along with the flowers the king watched the child put into the bouquet some weeds and some ivy and some thistle and so the king called to his oldest son and he said your younger sibling is in the distant field and he's collecting flowers for me but they're not all that they should be so when your sibling comes to the castle gate I want you to take out of the bouquet the weeds and the ivy and the Fissel and I want you to put in some flowers from my garden which is precisely what the older brother did when his younger sibling came to the castle gate he took out the weeds and the thistle and the ivy and he put in the perfect flowers from the King's garden the child came on through the gates into the throne room of the King and the child holding up the bouquet that he had gathered said to the King hear my father are the flowers that I have prepared for you the King received them knowing all the time that what had made the flowers acceptable is what the older brother had done for the child all right that's the parable who is the king you can talk who is the king God the Father who is the older brother that's Jesus who's the child in the distant field that's us what are the flowers being picked for the King in the distant field that with good intent nonetheless are spoiled by the weeds in the thistle and the ivy what are those flowers our works what are the flowers that are put into the bouquet by the king through the son what are those flowers Christ's work in our behalf now that story is over a thousand years old that is known as Anselm's flowers and it is the reminder that when we stand before the king we do not stand before the king with our righteousness to establish our gift to him it is his righteousness that makes our works acceptable to him and that is not just a message for the end of our days that is the message for every day of our lives what makes our work acceptable to God is not our righteousness but Christ's righteousness in our behalf and the reason that we excavate the grace of God from all the Scriptures is that we are making sure that we and God's people know I am right before God because of Christ's work not because of my work I am living in response to his grace but my works would never earn them after all all I got are filthy rags unless they are made right by him they are not right at all the reason that we need to take care to say that there is an unfolding and unwavering message of grace that is culminating throughout scriptures is that we should recognize as those who are ministering to God's people how how common and typical it is for people to confuse their who and their do they think that what they do establishes who they are but the gospel is exactly the opposite who we are establishes what we do if you put it in theological language in a theological place you take the wording of Richard Lovelace and he says the average Christian establishes their justification by their sanctification to put it in common language if you say to most people in the church are you okay with God the internal dialogue that immediately goes on in their brains as this am i okay with God well how am i doing in which case what they do is establishing their status before God rather than their status before God establishing what they do it is not our sanctification that establishes our justification it is our justification that is the ground and the fuel of our sanctification and and it is difficult for all of us to operate against the human instinct that says my identity is formed by what I do and the gospel that says what I do is based upon my identity in in classic language what we say is this the imperative what we do is based on the indicative who we are and the order is not reversible when Herman Ritter Boss penned those words I can remember being in seminary and reading it and kind of going yeah that that's right the imperative is based on the indicative and the order is not reversible everybody should know that but it did not sink in to my life to my habits to my thought to my scripture interpretation I mean you have to recognize what the Apostle Paul is saying when he's giving all those instructions on husbands and wives and parents and Families in masters and servants when he begins it all by by saying be imitators of God as dearly loved children yeah there's the imperative be imitators of God on what basis the basis of who you are as dearly loved children it just changes the way you read scripture and ultimately the way you preach it when you begin to understand what God is saying over and over and over and his word is you must know who you are first before you seek to serve me because your service will not make you mine because you are mine that is why you serve me I I can remember as a child I have to do this in the King James because that's the way I memorized it in the King James I beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of God to offer your bodies as living sacrifices holy and acceptable to God which is your reasonable act of worship now I can just roll it off you know and say the right words but it's not what I heard in my heart this is what I heard I beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of God to offer your bodies as living sacrifices and then you'll be holy and acceptable to God which is your reasonable act of worship is that what it says no but isn't it what you hear you'd be a good living sacrifice and then you'll be holy and acceptable to God listen the word holy should have been a cue it is your holiness what's going to make you acceptable to God no it cannot possibly holy and acceptable are not statements of what you will become they are declarations of what you are you are holy and acceptable to God how can that possibly be I know my weakness my frailty my sin of this very day how can I be holy and acceptable to God where did the verse begin in view of God's mercy the Apostle Paul has just spent 11 chapters saying this is what God has done in Christ to make you acceptable to himself now in view of these mercies offer your bodies as living sacrifices that are holy and acceptable to him now the Apostles got a lot to say in the following chapters of Romans of what you are to do but he is saying recognize who you are what you are your identity in Christ I'm crucified with Christ I don't live any longer who lives Christ lives where in me and the life that I live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me it's his identity not mine I robed in Christ's righteousness his spirit lives in me his reality is my identity his righteousness covers my unrighteousness and that's not just gonna be a statement that I make when I stand before the throne room at the end of my life that is my identity every day Hebrews 10:14 God has made perfect forever those who are being sanctified in that a wonderful he's he's made perfect those who are living it out being sanctified but already holy and righteous before him and so when you begin to kind of grasp what it means to say the imperative what I do is based on the indicative who I already am Ephesians 2:6 already seated in heavenly places already resurrected already justified already positionally sanctified then I begin to recognize I'm I'm living out of the reality of the joy of Who I am in Christ not not the fear of the ogor in the sky getting me I am right before God it will change every relationship in your life when it truly sinks in the imperative is based on the indicative and the order is not reversible I tried to be square with you when I began with you bow not preaching that way when I began my ministry and it wasn't just my my preaching that was affected by you know you live up to God's standards and then you'll be okay with God it was reflecting the way I would treat my children and my spouse and other people there was a time that that I would say to my oldest son Collin you're a bad boy because you did that now it's very easy to say and a lot of us in this room have been raised under certain statements like that but as common as it is in this culture I want you to recognize how distant it is from the gospel Collin you're a bad boy because you did a bad thing which theologically means his identity is based upon what his behavior and the gospel is exactly the opposite you may think it's silly but Kathy and I would put ourselves under a certain discipline that way we even talked to our children I would say Collin don't do that you're my son and I love you I want what you do to be based upon our relationship I don't want our relationship to be based upon what you do because that's the nature of the gospel that's the nature of the gospel lived out those of you who are married it affects the way we treat our spouses I mean I'm enough of a North American male of a certain generation that my heroes are either Harrison Ford or John Wayne you know the you know the the great unmoved movers you know they're not going to be affected you know and so when there is tension with my wife and me I've got two choices I can get real mad but I can't do that because I'm a preacher and the alternative is I get real quiet she'll figure out what she did and I began to treat her according to what I perceive as her offense but according to the gospel we are heirs together of the grace of life each covered by the blood of Christ each perfectly lovely to him and are there things for us to work through of course there are things for us to work through but with with love and respect and regard for identity in Christ me for Christ and her for Christ and in treating each other with love and respect not operating on the basis of performance but on the basis of relationship before God and with each other the way we deal with people in the church just my human tendency if somebody is firing at me my immediate response is I want to do what fire right back to treat them according to their actions but what if I perceive that that inside and behind the eyes that are firing at me is Christ in them that is my eternal brother or sister in Christ then as much as there may be hard things to work through I treat with respect and dignity and love as I would treat Christ my brother because the imperative is based on the indicative and the order is not reversible if it changes relationships if it changes imperatives the reason we do them how we do them then you begin to recognize that this this grace is not just print on a page it's not just an interpretive methodology this is the fuel for the gospel in terms of what we believe about ourselves and what we believe about other people and how it changes and transforms the Christian life to actually understand the the purpose of christ-centered interpretation you have to actually get into your own theology of change what what do you believe changes people what is your theology of transformation what do you actually believe is the source of power in the Christian life and if you're thinking about this power of sanctification there are certain things that will be obvious that we can't deny what what is the source of power and the Christian life certainly one aspect of power is knowledge I mean if you don't know what God requires of you you can't do it and so we have to know what God requires of us and what blesses us in kind of standard terminology that means preaching includes explanation of duty and doctrine the fact that we are talking about grace does not remove from the fact that people need to know what does God require of you but to act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God that doesn't change to be able to serve God you need to know what he requires but you need to know more than that as necessary as it is it is not sufficient simply the fact that you know what to do does not transform you the fact that you know what to do does not mean that you will do it how do you know that Christian because you're in a seminary and you know what to do and you don't always do it necessary but not sufficient simply knowledge of what to do what else is needed you need to know who you are to have power in the Christian life you need to know who you are now start very simply what what does that mean you need to know among other things that you are remarkably irretrievably inexorably human you need to know you are human and therefore 1st Corinthians 10:13 there is no temptation taken you but such as is common to men you are more vulnerable than you can possibly imagine to sin you believe you are impervious and you are actually setting yourself up for a fall you need to know how vulnerable you are or you are in great danger there's no temptation taken you but such as is common that does not just mean that you struggle with something and somebody out there probably shares it no there's no temptation taken you but such as is common shared there is nothing that goes on out there the seeds of which are not already in here every one of us we we point and we accuse and we blame is that way who are you there's no temptation taking them but such as is common how do I know that because the brother of Jesus named James said what if you broken one commandment how many of you actually broken all of them there is no sin of which the seeds of which are not already in us and to which we are very very vulnerable and if you don't know that you will not take proper precaution because you're human now because you're human not only are you vulnerable you can be helped by practical advice because you're human and practical advice helps human and that means in our preaching we not only remind people that they are vulnerable we give them practical helps now a number of you are already leaders and you maybe in positions where you have said things to young people or to older people such as I do and have you may say to somebody in and you listen to me when you get off work today don't you dare take that road home because if you take that road home you're gonna stop by that place or that person and you're gonna be in trouble so you go another way home now you may not know it but you're just summarizing proverbs 4 don't put your foot on the path of the wicked don't go near the path of the wicked instead turn and go the other direction why because that's just practical advice and because we are human we are helped by practical advice and just as our preaching includes duty and doctrine our preaching has to include vulnerability and practicality it's all necessary and insufficient God's people need to know something else not only are they human if they are children of God regenerated by the Holy Spirit they are redeemed they are fundamentally different than they were prior to the work of God by His Holy Spirit in their lives what does it mean for them to be redeemed they are loved by the father United to Christ and indwelt by the Holy Spirit did you catch those they are loved by the father United to Christ and indwelt by the Holy Spirit and when the Apostle Paul summarizes all of those things in 2nd Corinthians 5:17 he says what therefore in Christ you are a new creation a new creature in Christ Jesus now let me tell you this even in the Church of Jesus Christ when you tell people you are a new creation they go that is wonderful still looks like me it still sounds like me still weighs about the same what do you mean I am a new creation in Christ Jesus we can go back to essential statements in church history to clarify our understanding when you were unregenerate said Agustin you were our unregenerate nature you were none Posay known the car eh you were not able not to sin I'm not saying you murdered somebody every day I am saying actually nothing you did was for the glory of got nothing you were not able not descent that is the definition of what it means to be unregenerate to not have the living spirit within you that that is what it means to have an old nature that's not a new creature you were not able not to sin but you are not that anymore you are redeemed you are loved by the father United to Christ indwelt by the Holy Spirit and you have a fundamentally different spiritual nature and what is that fundamental different new nature that you have you are now what able not to sin we are not talking about perfectionism we are talking about power greater is he and you than what he that is in the world you were once not able not to sin that is not you anymore you are made no greater is He that's in the world that's in you than he that's in the world I am crucified with Christ I don't live any longer it's not my strength it's not my abilities not status but Christ lives where in me and the life that I live in this flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me he died he went to the grave but he lives where does live in me the same power that raised Jesus from the dead in dwells me so the Apostle says what he is given life to my mortal body I have power such as I did not previously have to understand and obey my Redeemer because I'm redeemed because I am made no and and what the Apostle Paul says about that we sing about it with joy but we don't recognize the strength of it is you are no longer a slave Romans 6:6 and 6:14 sin shall no longer have dominion over you what does that mean it means change is possible hope is real tomorrow doesn't have to be like yesterday Satan will sit right there on your shoulder and he will say you cannot be fixed you cannot be helped there is no way that you're gonna change you've struggled with this for years it's in your background it's in your family life can be no different you're a mess and you can't be fixed and we with the authority of the word of God and the truth of the gospel you say that is a lie I'm a new creation I have been made able greater is He that's in me than he that's in the world I have hope again I have power because listen to me if you do not believe you can win the battle you've already lost and so God is saying by his word with the truths of the gospel you are new and there is power that is yours and you are no longer a slave now as wonderful as that truth is it sets up a terrible question because if you are no longer a slave and sin no longer has dominion over you then why do you still sin and the biblical answer that we hate is we sin because we love it it's not that it has greater power than the gospel it's not that it has greater power than the Spirit we give it power by loving it we love the lust we love the bitterness we love the ambition we love the reputation we love the sin let no man say said James when he's tempted that he is tempted of God God cannot be tempted and he tempts no man but we are tempted when we are drawn away by our own lust and desires Christ came into the world as light into darkness but what did men do they loved the darkness more than the light sin does not have power in our lives because we could not have victory sin has power in our lives because we love it now if love for sin is what gives it power how are you going to displace love for sin hear it if our if our sin has power because we love the sin how are you going to displace love for sin with a greater love with a surpassing love Thomas Chalmers famous sermon of over a century ago the explosive power of a new affection which ultimately means that power in the Christian life is not simply a consequence of knowledge but it is a consequence of love I don't mean to be schmaltzy I don't mean to be sentimental but I need to be real with you why do we say that the Gospels power comes from our love for the Savior that displaces love for the sin it is purely for this reason there is no more powerful human motivation than love greed is not more powerful intimidation is not more powerful fear is not more powerful guilt is not more powerful what is the most powerful human motivation it is love what drives the mother back into the burning building it is love against all self advantage self gain it is love for another it is a surpassing love and when you begin to understand that you begin to say what what is the source of the love that is compelling and constraining the Christian life you already know it first John 4:19 we love because He first loved us now right at this moment I hope a penny is dropping why are we excavating the grace of God from all the Scriptures so that we just have another obligation in our biblical interpretation so that yet yet another burden of having gone to seminary no it's because we recognize we love because He first loved us and when I began to understand by the by the right teaching of the gospel thread that is moving all through scriptures I say look how look how unrelenting look how powerful look how unwavering is his love for me if he has loved me so how my heart wants to love him and as much as there are people who will say you can't keep talking about the grace of God because if you talk about the grace of God people will take advantage of God's love for them I will say is that possible of course it's possible but not when Christ's love has replaced all other loves not when it is the supreme love after all what is the greatest commandment in the Bible the greatest commandment is what love the Lord God with all your heart soul mind and strength why is that the greatest commit it's the foundation of all the others it's it's that it's that fuel as well as the obedience that's being required it's it's recognizing when this is the most profound and significant compelling love of my life it will drive all other loves away and and I am so human that what is true everybody else is true of me as a human I will do precisely what I love the most every human will so if I love Christ above all other then I began to recognize that that source of his love for me is developing in me a compelling love for him an overwhelming love for him John Bunyan's as some of you know this John John Bunyan the writer of pilgrims progress he was actually one of those people that you were so proud you learned to identify who they were and could spell it in third grade remember when you learned to spell the English language longest word antidisestablishmentarianism remember and believe it or not John Bunyan was an antidisestablishmentarianism form Baptist and he's thrown into prison now he's not the only one thrown into prison they're the Anabaptist the semi Pelagians and they also are antidisestablishmentarianism but you know if reformed Baptists are kind of way over here on the Calvinistic scale where the Anabaptist whoa they're way over there so here you've got Bunyan and the Anabaptist you know in prison at night not even knowing if they're gonna survive the next day so what did these fellow believers do together at night well they debate theology of course and and the Anabaptist would say to Bunyan you you can't keep assuring people of God's love if you keep assuring people of God's love they'll do whatever they want and bunions famous answer was no if you keep assuring God's people of God's love they will do whatever he wants what if Paul the Apostles say the love of God does what constrains us against all our self-preservation against all our personal good the love of God constrains us compels us in this Ministry of reconciliation this living for our Savior it's it's love for him that's more powerful than any other love because after all if you said if the source of love is his love for us what will become the effect of that love holiness jesus said if you love me you'll do what keep my commands john 14:15 if you love me you'll keep mike if if yours is a surpassing love for me you'll want to honor me you'll want to walk with me when I began pastoring as we were talking I was in seminary and preaching on Sundays a little bitty country church an hour and a half away from the school I would drive to and I would preach on Sunday mornings little little country church a good Easter might be 15 people you know but I learned to preach both poor people listening but one Sunday I as the single pastor drove over and a elder took pity on me and and he said after the service would you like to go on a picnic with my family now I'm single and food is being offered what did I say I said you bet and so we drove in that part of the country up with his known as the Great River Road where the Mississippi rivers over a mile wide it was a beautiful fall day the sky was blue the sun was shining the leaves to be these brilliant colors of of gold and scarlet and we we had this wonderful picnic and at the end of the picnic the twenty-something year old daughter of the elder said to me would you like to take a walk with me now the sky is blue the sun is shining she's got blond hair green eyes red sweater and she says would you like to take a walk with me what did I say I said you bet and I've been walking with her for about 40 years now why because she's beautiful why wouldn't I want to walk with her why do we unfold the grace of God in all the scriptures so that our hearts will say if his love is that beautiful then I want to walk with him and I will give myself to and for him if he has loved me so I will love him back and that does not just become holiness that becomes service because jesus said in as much as you love me you will love the least of these my brothers you will love those who are the outcast if you really love Christ who will you also love the ones that he loves the unlovely and the outcast and the widow and the orphan and distress there are people who say if you concentrate too much on the grace of God it will just becomes consumeristic EU istic religion just all about you and Jesus and I have to kindly say that is impossible if you are overwhelmed with love for Christ your heart will have his loves the very things that are his priorities will be your priorities not because you are earning his love because he has loved you so in all of your undeserving 'us in all of your poverty and all of your overwhelming evil he still loved you and when you know that you will recognize people all around you who are as unlovely but loved by Christ and because you love him his loves will become your own loves as well the question we have to ask as well as if if holiness and service are the effect of his love entering and overwhelming my heart so that his love is a surpassing love of my own heart how do i fuel that love how do i how do I enable it to be a full tank in my own heart which is basically answering the question of what is the fuel of love in the Christian life and as odd as it may seem in a message we're trying so much to emphasize the importance of the grace of God the fuel of that love for Christ is the means of grace now it's kind of seminary language for things like prayer and Bible reading and communing with God's people but the difficulty is for most people even in the church they do not believe in the means of grace they believe in the means to grace I'll read my Bible I'll do this awful thing I'll get up early and read my Bible so the ogor in the sky won't be mean to me now if you think that's not their theology you listen all I knew it was gonna be a bad day I didn't have a long enough quiet time what did you just say the ogre in the sky did not get enough filthy rags from me today so now because he's mad at me I had a bad day listen our a reading of Scripture our prayer our communing with God's people are not bribes for the ogre in the sky they are the bread of life they are the nutrients of the gospel as we are by reading the scriptures reminding ourselves how pervasive and overwhelming and unwavering was the love of God for us that's why I'm reading the scriptures I'm not trying to get brownie points with God to check off the box for today I'm saying God fill my heart again teach me your ways that I may love you as you have loved me when I pray to God I say oh no you know I got a bow down so he'll be know I get to commune with the creator of the universe I I get I get to have conversation with the with the God who gave His Son for me that I might be with him forever this is the beginning of the walk that will go on eternally and I get to have it in private with my God in this day in this moment in this very place and to commune with God's people not only to receive from them the gifts of the Spirit as they are communing with me but my having the ability to help them as well in this process that God has privileged me to be a cold laborer with Christ in every walk of life and when I am perceiving that then these means of grace are not bribes they are the bread that not only draws my heart to Christ but fills my heart with Christ so that love is being reinforced over and over again by the preaching of the word by prayer by Bible reading by the communing with God's people those are the ways in which God is witnessing to me his love so that my love for him will continue to grow and grow and be stronger and stronger and the consequences I am made stronger as is every child of God my family is divided into kind of two sets we have what we call the big kids the older kids and then we have our our caboose that came along a lot later that's what we call our Mack baby you know what a Mack baby is middle aged crazy we recognize at some point that our kids were getting older and we loved having kids so we had another but I will tell you as she got into her teen years I would I would say to my wife at times I can't keep up with this gal I mean she is strong and active and beautiful involved in somebody I just kept I'm getting old and I can't keep up with her and my wife's phrase was as much as we poured ourselves into the older kids we got to keep pouring into this kid too and what that meant for me because my job has always involved a great deal of travel is whenever I was home no matter how early in the day Katie's high school activities started I would get up and I would fix her breakfast just cereal but I would call it breakfast and and as I was filling up her cereal bowl with milk I would I would think to myself what what is my duty my obligation my love as the father of this young Christian woman and I would think you know even as our filling I'm filling up her cereal bowl with milk my my job is to fill up her heart with love for Christ why because at 18 you and I know there are trials and there are temptations ahead but if her heart is full of love for Christ she cannot be more safe or more strong and that is not just true of my child that is true of every child of God if their hearts are full of love for Christ they cannot be more safe or more strong and the reason that we excavate the grace of God from all the Scriptures is we don't just want to have the right interpretation we want to have God's people empowered by the love for Christ that is their joy and the joy of the Lord we know will become their strength there was a time in my life I must tell you I believe the job of the pastor was to get people to do what they don't want to do do you mind my telling you that is a horrible job I don't believe that anymore I believe that my job is to enable God's people in every message I preach to love Christ more they won't be more strong or more safe in fact the joy of the Lord will be their strength and that my friends is a wonderful job teach them of Jesus see it is your duty your joy your privilege to enable them to love Christ more it is a great job to which I commend you in Jesus name father will you so bless my brothers and sisters that they having perceived how wonders his Christ's love for them might fountain it to others and not only be strengthened by his love for them but strengthen others by that grace that they share from him may the joy of the Lord be our strength and those to whom we minister this we pray in Jesus name Amen

Channel: Southeastern Seminary

Views: 21,990

Keywords: Southeastern, Baptist, Theological, Seminary, Chapel, Message, Jesus, Preaching, God, Book, North Carolina, Wake Forest, Gospel, False Teaching, False spirits, Spirit, Danny, expository, Great Commission, Truth, Grace, Love, Discerning, Training, Education

Id: DFHW1zHnnh0

Length: 46min 35sec (2795 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 14 2019