Charles Spurgeon (Died, January 31st, 1892)

On this day, January 31st of 1892, the great pastor and evangelical preacher Charles Spurgeon passed from this world and went into the presence of his Lord and King, Jesus Christ.

In honor of the anniversary of his death, here are a few links to some of our recent Charles Spurgeon articles from Whitefield's Prayer:

• "Unlikely Hero: The Man Who Converted Charles Spurgeon" (Article)

• Spurgeon: A New Biography by Arnold Dallimore (Book Review)

• In Defense of Calvinism, by Charles Spurgeon (Book Review)

• "The Dangers and Delights of Christian Biography" (Article)

Enjoy!

-Matthew Everhard is the Senior Pastor of Faith Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Brooksville, Florida. 

The Legacy of George Whitefield (Part Two)

(This post continues the three part series of the life and ministry of George Whitefield. See part one here.)

Early Life and Conversion

            George Whitefield was born on the 16^th of December in Gloucester England. Many of his relatives had gone to Oxford and become clergymen. His father owned the “Bell Inn” in Gloucester, the largest and finest establishment in town, and its main hall had two auditoriums, one of which was used to stage plays. When George was two, his father died. He attended school from the age of 12 in the local parish. He displayed skills as a gifted speaker from an early age, had a great memory, and often acted in the school plays. The thrill of acting never left him, although he grew to despise the ungodly theater. Obviously, this helped him later with his speech and his ability to project and control his voice.  By 16 he was proficient in Latin and could read New Testament Greek.[1]

            After the death of his father, his mother remarried and his stepdad almost lost the Inn; his stepdad eventually bailed on the family and left. George was forced drop out of school at age 15 and work at the Inn; it turned out to be a divine lesson, because it caused George be humbled many times and he could identify later with very poor both in England and in America.[2]

            Soon enough, he went to Oxford as a "servitor," at age 17. As a "servitor" (or domestic) he lived as a butler and maid to 3 or 4 highly placed students. He would wash their clothes, shine their shoes, and even do their homework. A servitor lived on whatever scraps of clothing or money they gave him. He had to wear a special gown marking his lowly state, and it was forbidden for students of a high rank to speak to him. Most servitors left rather than endure the humiliation.[3]

            It was there at Oxford that he met and befriended John and Charles Wesley and the other members of the so-called “Holy Club,” a group of young persons devoted to Bible study and acts of service and compassion in the city. Although he believed himself to be already religious, he was surprisingly and soundly converted reading The Life of God in the Soul of Man by Henry Scougal, given to him by John Wesley, and he experienced the power of the new life for the first time. (Wesley’s own conversion is a story worth reading in its own right!).

            Whitefield’s life was immediately revolutionized (no pun intended) as he discovered the life-changing power of free grace in the heart of the believer; no longer did he have to work for his salvation, striving to please God with asceticism and religious devotion, God had given all of His righteousness to him through the justification that comes only through faith in Jesus Christ.

Calling to Ministry

            In his early twenties, Whitefield began to preach in earnest. Ordained as a deacon in the Church of England in 1736,[4] he began to display incredible powers of oratory as he guest preached in local churches. His first sermon is said to have “driven fifteen people mad.”[5] Fully utilizing the powers of his dramatic skills as a thespian and former lover of the stage, Whitefield was able to use in incomparable natural-born voice and dramatic flair to hold audiences spellbound. J.C. Ryle said, “You must listen whether you like it or not. There was a holy violence about him. Your attention was taken by storm. You were fairly carried off your legs by his energy before you had time to consider what you would do.”[6]

            “Tremendous congregations flooded”[7] the churches that did allow him to preach, although his open air campaigns soon became his modus operandi. Often castigated by the jealousy of his Church of England clergymen, he found himself unwelcomed in many pulpits due to the incredible affect he had emotionally on the audience. He was often criticized as a “showman” and an “enthusiast” in an age in which most ministers wrote out in long hand and read their sermons to the congregation with an academic tone. “The vast majority of sermons [in those days] were miserable moral essays, utterly devoid of any thing calculated to awaken, convert, save, or sanctify souls.”[8]

            Contrarily, Whitefield often paced dramatically on his wooden platform which he brought out of doors to compensate for the growing number of pulpits locked to the “enthusiast,” and he used the full range of his vocal inflection in order to command the attention of his audience as well as utilizing dramatic hand-gestures. Hardly a sermon went by that he did not break into weeping and tears, often pausing dramatically to regain his composure.

            Although many critiqued his then-controversial preaching methods, John Piper makes a great point in his essay when he makes this distinction between preaching and the stage: “There are three ways to speak. First, you can speak of an unreal, imaginary world as if it were real—that is what actors do in a play. Second, you can speak about a real world as if it were unreal—that is what half-hearted pastors do when they preach about glorious things in a way that says they are not as terrifying and wonderful as they are. And third is: You can speak about a real spiritual world as if it were wonderfully, terrifyingly, magnificently real (because it is).”[9]

            Historian Mark Noll says that his "spontaneous [style of] preaching affected virtually every aspect of Christian worship and practice in the region."[10]

His Message: Conversion

            Whitefield was not an academic theologian, but that is not to say that his sermons were simple, or populist, or watered-down. He did, however, consistently speak on one major theme: conversion. He constantly and relentlessly implored his hearers to be born again and to turn to God in repentant faith. The modern day phenomenon of Billy Graham and his Evangelistic Association is perhaps the best recent parallel. While Whitefield addressed many topics both practical and moral, he consistently beat one drum: “You must be born again!” (John 3:3).

            It is written of Whitefield, “His ministry presents an unparalleled example of declaring the sovereignty of God combined with the free offer of salvation to all who would believe on Christ.”[11]

Theology: Calvinism

            Whitefield’s theology was distinctly Calvinistic as was that of the majority of the earliest pilgrims, settlers, and colonists in New England, tracing their theological heritage directly back through the Puritans of England and the Magisterial Reformers on the Continent before that, all the way back (as the name suggests) to John Calvin the Genevan Reformer.

            Yet as any good Calvinist will tell you, the system of “Reformation Doctrine” is nothing more and nothing less than the Biblical theology of the New Testament in general, and the Apostle Paul in particular! (As a basic primer, Calvinism sees the full work of salvation in the soul as a divine work of God’s transforming grace—from predestination, to calling, to regeneration, to faith, to justification, to sanctification, to glorification—it is all of God; whereas the Arminian theology of the Wesley Brothers emphasized human free will). In fact the Calvinism/Arminianism debate was one bone of contention between George Whitefield and the Wesley Brothers that they were never able to resolve and repair. They agreed to disagree and broke fellowship.  

Preaching in the Americas

            Whitefield’s greatest love was open field preaching in the American colonies. He once confessed excitedly, "America is to be my chief scene of action!"[12] He made some 7 preaching tours across the New World[13] and made 13 voyages across the Atlantic Ocean in total. In another place, he happily professed, "America, in my opinion, is an excellent school to learn Christ!"[14]

            For him, the colonies were adventuresome, wild, and filled with massive potential for the Kingdom of God. His humble beginnings as the son of an Inn Keeper came to fruition as Whitefield preached among the commoners and the poor, with particular attention to peasants, coalminers, and slaves.  Historian Mark Noll notes that Whitefield made his special contribution to evangelism and missions by "directing the message of salvation to common people neglected by the established churches."[15]

Death

            In his last sermon before his death, just five years before the Revolutionary War, Whitefield cried out almost prophetically hours before meeting the Savior He served for decades,

"I go! I go to rest prepared. My sun has arisen and by the aid of heaven has given light to many. It is now about to set... No! It is about to rise to the zenith of immortal glory.”  O thought divine! I shall soon be in a world where time, age, pain, and sorrow are unknown. My body fails, my spirit expands. How willingly I would ever live to preach Christ! But I die to be with Him!"[16]

           

            George Whitefield died here in America in 1770, and his body was buried in the basement of Old South Presbyterian Church in Newburyport Massachusetts. As a matter of historical curiosity, his corpse can still be viewed today by request in a crypt underneath the church! John Wesley—his longtime friend and theological rival—preached his funeral sermon at Whitefield’s request.

            Of all of the quotes about Whitefield, my favorite has to be one of his own, “Let the name of Whitefield perish, but Christ be glorified!”[17]  

--Matthew Everhard is the Senior Pastor of Faith Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Brooksville, Florida.

---

[1] Rev. David Franklin, “George Whitefield” in Passages that Changed Lives, a Wednesday Night sermon series, (Brooksville, FL: Faith Evangelical Presbyterian Church), 2012.

[2] Rev. David Franklin, “George Whitefield” in Passages that Changed Lives, a Wednesday Night sermon series, (Brooksville, FL: Faith Evangelical Presbyterian Church), 2012.

[3] Rev. David Franklin, “George Whitefield” in Passages that Changed Lives, a Wednesday Night sermon series, (Brooksville, FL: Faith Evangelical Presbyterian Church), 2012.

[4] “George Whitefield” in Dictionary of Christian Biography ed. Michael Walsh (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 2001), 1139. 

[5] “George Whitefield” in The New Dictionary of Theology: A Concise and Authoritative Resource, eds. Sinclair B. Ferguson, et. al. (Downer’s Grove, IL: IVP, 1998), 721.

[6] J.C. Ryle, A Sketch of the Life and Labors of George Whitefield. Electronic Edition, (New York, NY: Anson D. Randolph Publications, 1854), location # 338.

[7] “George Whitefield” in The New Dictionary of Theology: A Concise and Authoritative Resource, eds. Sinclair B. Ferguson, et. al. (Downer’s Grove, IL: IVP, 1998), 721.

[8] J.C. Ryle, A Sketch of the Life and Labors of George Whitefield. Electronic Edition, (New York, NY: Anson D. Randolph Publications, 1854), location # 40.

[9] John Piper, “I Will Not Be a Velvet-Mouthed Preacher.”

[10] Mark Noll, A History of Christianity in the United States and Canada (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1992), 48.

[11] “George Whitefield” in The New Dictionary of Theology: A Concise and Authoritative Resource, eds. Sinclair B. Ferguson, et. al. (Downer’s Grove, IL: IVP, 1998), 721.

[12] Stephen Mansfield, Forgotten Founding Father: The Heroic Legacy of George Whitefield, (Nashville, TN, 2001), 240.

[13] “George Whitefield” in The New Dictionary of Theology: A Concise and Authoritative Resource, eds. Sinclair B. Ferguson, et. al. (Downer’s Grove, IL: IVP, 1998), 721.

[14] Stephen Mansfield, Forgotten Founding Father: The Heroic Legacy of George Whitefield, (Nashville, TN, 2001), 239.

[15] Mark Noll, A History of Christianity in the United States and Canada (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1992), 91.

[16] Rev. David Franklin, “George Whitefield” in Passages that Changed Lives, a Wednesday Night sermon series, (Brooksville, FL: Faith Evangelical Presbyterian Church), 2012.

[17] “George Whitefield” in The New Dictionary of Theology: A Concise and Authoritative Resource, eds. Sinclair B. Ferguson, et. al. (Downer’s Grove, IL: IVP, 1998), 721.

A Call to Family Worship

Perhaps few neglect the call on their lives as much as they do in disobedience to gather and lead in family worship. George Whitefield says as much in one of his great sermons, The Great Duty of Family-Religion. In typical Whitefield fashion he employs his exegetical skills to exposit a single verse to make countless heads turn as they wonder in his ability to unfold the Scriptures. 

Family worship is for Whitefield a divine privilege and calling according to Joshua 24:15, As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. Yet Whitefield pines and laments that this is not the case among many in his day:

"Out of those many households that call themselves Christians there are but few that serve God in their respective families as they ought. It is true indeed, visit our churches, and you may perhaps see something of the form of godliness still subsisting among us. But even that is scarcely to be met with in private houses" (97).

While standing in the pulpit at St. Vedast in the heart of London, Whitefield then began to show the high calling of leading a family into worship of the Lord as encouraged in Joshua 24. Perhaps my favorite line in his sermon serves to call husbands and wives, fathers and mothers to a high privilege of opening the eternal things of God to one another: "For every house is as it were a little parish, every governor...a priest, every family a flock. And if any of them perish through the governors neglect, their blood will God require at their hands" (98).

How then ought one to lead his family to serve the Lord? Whitefield highlights three ways in particular and I commend them to you this day as you ponder how you can lead your spouse and your children to serve and glory in the Lord.

1. First, Whitefield calls all to lead their families in reading God's Word. He references Deut. 6:6-7 which commands that God's words be stored up in their hearts and taught diligently to their children.
2. Second, he calls each family to gather regularly for Family prayer. His words of necessity are strong and neglect terrifying. May we lead our families in prayer, bringing them forward as the priests of old into the presence of the Lord and His care.
3. Thirdly, Whitefield highlights the importance of family instruction or catechism. Instruction in the realities of Christ are an essential matter and not to be neglected. For if we believe that regeneration in Christ is a life or death issue, might we then with all haste instruct those whom we love the most in this awesome reality?

After having addressed the "how" of family worship, Whitefield then turns, as any good preacher should, to a closing section on the "motivations" for family worship. If the three ways in which we can worship as a family were not sufficient reason for why one should do so, he now spells it out plainly and convincingly.

1. We should lead our family to serve the Lord out of gratitude for God's blessings.
2. We should lead our family to serve the Lord out of love for our family.
3. We should lead our family to serve the Lord out of honesty and justice for our family's well-being.
4. We should lead our family to serve the Lord out of self-interest, since a godly family will bring much joy to oneself.
5. We should lead our family to serve the Lord out of a reverent fear of the Lord should we lead them in any direction other than to the Lord. We will account for how we have lead.

May we heed the call from Joshua and Whitefield to serve the Lord with our families. I leave you with these words from the great preacher himself:

"For every house is as it were a parish and every master is concerned to secure, as much as in him lies, the spiritual prosperity of everyone under his roof, as any minister whatever is obliged to look to the spiritual welfare of every individual person under his charge" (99).

*     *     *
Sermon referenced in Lee Gatiss ed., The Sermons of George Whitefield (Wheaton: Crossway, 2012). 

JT Holderman is Assistant Pastor of Bellevue Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Gap, PA.

The Legacy of George Whitefield (Part One)

(The following multi-part series is from a lecture the author gave to the Annuttaliga Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, January 20, 2014, in which I was asked to speak on the topic of "Religion at the Time of the American Revolution"). 

My Own Admiration for George Whitefield

            Let me admit rather candidly at the outset that I am an enthusiastic admirer of the man about whom I am going to speak today. Thus, I cannot even pretend to be unbiased in this presentation His legacy and writing have influenced this small town local church pastor greatly, even though Whitefield’s ministry and my own could not be more different. He was an Anglican (Church of England) ordained priest and international itinerant evangelist, and I am a Presbyterian, largely duty-bound to my local church, in small town Brooksville which I love. 

Impossible to Understand the Religious Landscape at the Time of the Revolution without Whitefield 

At the same time, I believe I have chosen my subject matter well for a discussion on religion at the time of the Revolution: George Whitefield was simply the most significant figure during this era, by far—on either sides of the Atlantic—and let me add that he was a contemporary of both Jonathan Edwards in America (considered America’s greatest theologian) and John and Charles Wesley in England (the founders of the Methodist and Wesleyan denominations). And yet I will hold firmly that Whitefield was more influential than all three! Let me share why I believe this to be so.  

The Astonishing Reports and Facts

 First, it is estimated that George Whitefield preached to 80% of the population of the American Colonies during the mid 1700’s in live audience. This is absolutely astonishing in a day that did not enjoy any of the modern communication equipment we have today (microphones, TV, radio, or internet). This means that Whitefield spoke live—in person—to four-fifths of the entire population alive in America in his day! Unfathomable! In his evangelistic travels, Whitefield preached at every major city on the Atlantic Seaboard, and all this in an age when most major land travel was done by horse and carriage. No person could possibly rival George Whitefield as the single most dominant religious figure in the mid 1700’s, because no one else was as heard as often and broadly as he.

            Whitefield preached some 18,000 sermons during his lifetime of 34 years of itinerant evangelism (only 57 sermons are extant). One thousand sermons per year, some years! This would result in 20 sermons per week! (By comparison, I give two or three). John Piper says that he preached some weeks for 40 – 60 hours, and was literally preaching to audiences more than he slept![1]

            Because of his incredible fame—he is said to be America’s first true celebrity—Whitefield often spoke to thousands of persons at a time. A crowd of 8-12 thousand gathered in the open fields was not uncommon. At least once, 20,000 persons were gathered to hear him speak in an open air setting.  

            Benjamin Franklin, scoffing at those numbers, went to hear him himself and concluded that his vocal projection could easily encompass as many as 30,000 persons, even more than reported![2]

            Piper gives this instance, “In Philadelphia … on Wednesday, April 6, he preached on Society Hill twice in the morning to about 6,000, and in the evening to near 8,000. On Thursday, he spoke to ‘upwards of ten thousand,’ and it was reported at one of these events the words, “‘He opened His mouth and taught them saying,’ were distinctly heard at Gloucester point, a distance of two miles by water down the Delaware River.”[3] He was, we might say, a human boom box!

            In order to perform these incredible feats that press the human imagination, God must have given him an extraordinary power of human voice projection and control as well as his powers of persuasive rhetoric (more on that later). Thousands of persons would have traced their spiritual lineage to him as multitudes were converted under his preaching. Whitefield, however, would have always credited God with every conversion as he believed it was impossible for any man to convert anyone. Along with the aforementioned Edwards and the Wesley brothers, it was Whitefield who was principally the driving force (from a mortal perspective) behind the revivals that today are known as the First Great Awakening.

What Has Been Said about Rev. Whitefield

Allow me to share some quotes from his contemporaries as well as his biographers: Probably the most accurate summary of his life was quipped by one of his biographers, Arnold Dallimore, “His whole life may be said to have been consumed in the delivery of one continuous, or scarcely interrupted sermon.”[4] He was quite literally almost always preaching!

            John Piper, in his memorable lecture to the 2009 Desiring God Conference for Pastors said, “[Whitefield] was a phenomenon not just of his age, but in the entire 2000-year history of Christian preaching. There has been nothing like the combination of his preaching pace and geographic extent and auditory scope and attention-holding effect and converting power.”[5]

            Biographer J.C. Ryle said, “I believe that the direct good which he did to immortal souls was enormous. I will go further—I believe it is incalculable. Credible witnesses in England, Scotland, and America have placed on record their conviction that he was the means of converting thousands of people.”[6]

            Benjamin Franklin, who cannot in any way be described as sharing the evangelical convictions of Whitefield, nevertheless greatly enjoyed his preaching. “Every accent, every emphasis, every modulation of voice, was so perfectly well turned, and well-placed, that without being interested in the subject, one could not help being pleased with the discourse: a pleasure of much the same kind with that received from an excellent piece of music.”[7] At first a skeptic, Ben Franklin later confessed, "There is hardly another minister of the Gospel alive who can so bring to life the truth and relevancy of the Scriptures." He added on another occasion, "Almost he persuadeth me to believe!"[8]

            Sarah Edwards, whose own husband Jonathan was also a pastor and instrumental in the Great Awakening said of Whitefield without any apparent jealousy, “He is a born orator. You have already heard of his deep-toned, yet clear and melodious voice. O it is perfect music to listen to that alone! . . . You remember that David Hume thought it worth going 20 miles to hear him speak; and Garrick [an actor who envied Whitefield’s gifts] said, ‘He could move men to tears . . . in pronouncing the word Mesopotamia.’.”[9]

-Matthew Everhard is the Senior Pastor of Faith Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Brooksville Fl, and is the author of several books including, Hold Fast the Faith: A Devotional Commentary on the Westminster Confession of 1647. 

---

[1] John Piper, “I Will Not be a Velvet-Mouthed Preacher: The Life and Ministry of George Whitefield” (Desiring God 2009 Conference for Pastors). Cited from, http://www.desiringgod.org/resource-library/biographies/i-will-not-be-a-velvet-mouthed-preacher (accessed December 17, 2013).

[2] Mark Noll, A History of Christianity in the United States and Canada (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1992), 93.

[3] John Piper, “I Will Not Be a Velvet-Mouthed Preacher.”

 

[4] John Piper, “I Will Not Be a Velvet-Mouthed Preacher.”

[5] John Piper, “I Will Not Be a Velvet-Mouthed Preacher.”

[6] Quoted in, John Piper, “I Will Not Be a Velvet-Mouthed Preacher.”

[7] Quoted in, John Piper, “I Will Not Be a Velvet-Mouthed Preacher.”

[8] Stephen Mansfield, Forgotten Founding Father: The Heroic Legacy of George Whitefield, (Nashville, TN, 2001), 253.

[9] Quoted in, John Piper, “I Will Not Be a Velvet-Mouthed Preacher.”

Natural Selection? Darwin's Subversive Subtitle

I am writing this piece on the 41st Anniversary of Roe vs. Wade. As you all know, this is the act which made abortion on demand accessible by law, simply stated. This has to be one of the most distressing actions of government in the last century.  Do you know where it began?

Story begins with Charles Darwin. He was a supposed scientist and as such propounded the theory of evolution. This is the theory that has infected many areas of responsible thought – the origin of mankind and the natural selection of the species. Can you recall the title of his major work? … “On the Origin of the Species by Means of Natural Selection or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life.”

I understand that most of us are familiar with “The Origin of the Species” but most of us overlook the second part, the dangerous part of the title. What it suggests is that there are favored species of mankind … superior and inferior people. With that idea is the logical conclusion that the inferior are to be utilized by the superior. The abuse of the inferior, or even their elimination, is not inconsistent with Darwin. On the contrary, his philosophy led him to speculate that upon entering a territory in which there were “inferior” people, a colonial power had a perfect right to utilize, abuse, or eliminate them as he might choose.

It is no surprise that the Christian faith and the Church in particular was an irritation to Darwin and even now to his protractors, for Christians cherish all of life, count all people as equal, and precious in the sight of God. The idea of “favored races” is repugnant to us. This is the situation that lies beneath the thinking of those who view the life of an unborn child as irrelevant. The unborn fit the category of “inferior” and are conveniently described variously as “blobs of tissue” or in more sophisticated terms “not a person until birth.” Whatever the descriptor may be, it is less of a trouble for conscience if an infant in the womb is known as a “fetus” and not a “baby”. Babies are people.

What Darwin never understood, and what his protractors refuse to entertain, is the truth of the Word of God that insists that God Himself is the Lord, the Giver of Life. This means that He purposes life. He is the only one who can call it into being, and it is therefore an offense to the Lord of the Universe when man interferes with and destroys what God intends. This is not “Natural Selection”, it is a deliberate and intentional violation of “thou shalt do no murder.”

Before we engage in the defense of the unborn, which we must, let us remember that in doing so, we are engaging in the defense of the honor of our Creator… “in Him we live and move and have our being!”

 

-Wilfred Bellamy, PH.D is an ordained pastor in the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church (ARP) as well as a former long-serving missionary to Nigeria.

 

 

The Local Church Pastor as Resident Theologian

It is practically impossible to be a pastor today.

At once, it is expected of a man to be a preacher, a psychologist, a marriage and family therapist, a community organizer, and a church activities coordinator. Added to those titles we might suggest also: social media expert, financial administrator, organizational manager, and head of staff.

Among all those just listed, the role of preacher is the only one I can defend aptly in Scripture (2 Timothy 4:1-2). The other duties, while seemingly necessary from time to time, (and certainly expected from our people) are tangential at best to our calling as local church pastors.

It's time we return to our biblical mandate.

Nevertheless, I want to add an important duty to those given above to the job description of the pastor. One often neglected by evangelical church leadership today: that of resident theologian. The Apostles of the New Testament--and especially Paul in the Pastoral Epistles--are jealous to see local church pastors (or elders) steeped in the richness of Biblical doctrine, functioning in their local churches as healthy and robust theologians.

Consider some words of exhortation from Paul,

If you put these things before the brothers, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, being trained in the words of the faith and of the good doctrine that you have followed (1 Timothy 4:6). 

He must hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it (Titus 1:9).

 But as for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine (Titus 2:1). 

Notice Paul's emphasis on doctrine. Never more than today should the weighty role of "resident theologian" be necessarily placed back upon the shoulders of local church pastors. Never more than today is it incumbent upon us to return our people to the depths of truth contained in Christian orthodoxy!

I see at least three reasons for this:

1) We live in an age of biblical illiteracy. Like it our not, many of our people (not all) are simply not drinking deeply enough from the Scriptures anymore. If some of the folks in the pews today are even doing daily devotions at all, it likely comes from the "self-help" or self-esteem oriented formats so dreadfully common among Christian publishers today.

Most devotional material is presented as "life application" or "principles for better living." Rarely are the laity mining the Bible for the richer truths of the Christian faith. Christology, pneumatology, soteriology--these are foreign concepts to most of the popular devotional materials in today's Christian literature.

2) Many of our people today (again, not all) are largely disconnected from the theological treasures of the Christian heritage that we have inherited from our forefathers. Not only are many Christians not reading their Bibles, but they struggle mightily to comb through even a page of Augustine, Luther, Calvin, or Edwards.

Although the refreshing waters of biblical theology from previous generations are more available today through electronic, digital, and other means, they are unfortunately more neglected than ever before as well. The pastor serves--functionally speaking--as the local church's sole bridge to the abundant blessings of Christian history.

(I don't mean to be unnecessarily negative about all lay people; many are more diligent in their studies than their pastors! I am, however, concerned with the general direction of the evangelical church today). 

3) Finally, the questions that our people are asking are not going away. The people in our pews are still asking deep questions regarding the purpose of our existence, the mysteries of God's being, and the meaning in our sin and suffering. These perplexities have not dissipated.

The nature of mankind, the inner disturbances of the soul, our wranglings about guilt (especially in the area of sexual ethics) are not easily answered apart from a robust biblical doctrine. Our people will eventually go somewhere when the deeper questions of the human experience arise. Let us hope that they can come to us rather than to the secular culture to have those questions answered.

Pastors, we have an incredible job description before us. Humanly speaking, the expectations upon us are massively unrealistic. We will simply never be able to accomplish all that is expected from us. To be all that people want us to be.

But please--don't neglect your role--as resident theologian.


--Matthew Everhard is the Senior Pastor of Faith Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Brooksville, Florida. He is the author of Hold Fast the Faith: A Devotional Commentary on the Westminster Confession of 1647.