The Preaching God is most likely to use

Hey everyone,
I am quite new to public preaching but its something which the Lord has put in my heart and it burns so strong. I have been thinking a lot lately about the type of preaching the Lord is most likely to use in His Power. Is it weakness and human inability He uses? Is having good oratory skills a hinderance. How much does emotion play a part in preaching?

Basically I am just interested in your thoughts. What do preachers have to do to 'get out the way' if you like, and allow God to be everything in the preaching? Any thoughts much appreciated.

Read the book "They Found the Secret" by V. Raymond Edman for your answer. The last profile is of one of your countrymen and should proof invaluable.

Wyatt

Thanks. I have just found it on amazon and I think i will buy it.

I'm also interested in peoples thoughts. I have recently started open air preaching at the university of Kentucky. God has been putting it on my heart for some time, but just this semester I started doing it. I always have no idea what to say and I argue with God that I don't have anything prepared and I don't want to do it. I tend to find convinent excuses to not go out, but they are always removed. The first time God told me to preach, I had nothing to say. I had known all summer that as soon as school started up God wanted me to start doing it. All I had was that morning in prayer he told me "today, you need to do it" so I complained and asked what I should say, and he told me to open to 1 john and he gave me a whole outline of what I needed to preach. When I got to the free speach area there was a construction crew using a jackhammer on some steps. I was so releived I almost cried because I thought "surely God doesn't want me to talk over [i]that[/i]" So then he just instructed me to go and sit down and pray. As soon as I started praying, the jackhammer stopped and I got up and preached. It was like listening to someone else talk.

After this experiance, I have been gaining more confidence, and I have seen some good fruit come from it. As I start to think about it more though, I start to think about other questions. Would it be apropriot for me to read books on homeletics? should I plan ahead for the time when I preach? Lots of people in my church have asked me to tell them before hand so that they can be praying or come out and help me. Should I prepare statements ahead of time or just let God talk? All these questions seems like perfectly reasonable things to do they simply are not how it happened for me the first time. Because it simply seems dissimilar it gives me a negative feeling.

I would very much like to hear for those of you who are older and have done a lot of this. I am only 19 and a sophmore, so I would love to hear the wisdom of some of the old warriors of the faith.

Brother, there is a great talk by Jesse Morrell on SI called 'Annointing in open air'. I really reccomend you listen to that if you havn't already. His others on preaching are aslo helpful.

It is great to hear of young men like yourself preaching the gospel! I am only 23 myself. Oh that God would raise up more young preachers and fill them with the Holy Ghost!

Also on the subject of preaching, and 'power in preaching'- I just listened to an excellent talk by Iain Murray aslo on SI called 'conditions for powerful preaching'. I would reccomend that any preacher or aspiring preacher listen to that talk.

It's not preachers we lack, to some degree it is not even preachers or preach truth who we lack (although these days they are few), it is preachers who's messages are filled with the ressurection power of Jesus Christ. That is what we lack, and there is no substitute for it.

One quote from that talk from Jeremiah Burrows says it all "The concern of ministers should be that Christ should preach in them".

I long for this. Do you?

I long for this. Do you?

A thousand "amens".

Be prepared to Preach.
Study, pray, ask God to have His Way.
Be willing to move out of the way, and let the Holy Spirit take over.
It is hard for us humans to get out of the way.
We always think God needs our help, when He just wants a willing vessel that He can flow through.
I praise Him for you.
I also pray that God will use you mightily in whatever way He chooses to use you.
It is an inspiration to me to hear of a Young man or anyone wanting to preach the Gospel.
God will lead you, and He will never leave you.
God Bless
Nellie

The message preached must be annointed by the Spirit of God.
First, we must deny ourselves, pick up our cross daily, and follow Him.
Spend time with God in the secret, hidden place...The vessel of honour must be made new for the new Wine ...
Trust and obey Christ Jesus...let Him prepare you for His service. He enables those He calls,
But remember, the body has different members...not all are mouths, or eyes, etc...to some He gives 10 talents, to some 5, etc. The Lord made us all different...Pray and ask God to give you wisdom and revelation concerning His will for your life. Be faithful in the little things as David was when he was a shepherdboy...trust God and hold fast to Him regardless of your situation, and learn to be led by the Spirit; for those that are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons and daughters of God.
May God bless you with Himself, and the knowledge of His will...
An undeserving servant,
richie

Here4Him
Quote "The concern of ministers should be that Christ should preach in them".

That is exactly the point in the book I recommended. The secret in "They Found the Secret" is Christ in you. He does the work. It is not inactivety on our part but Christ's activety through us. I would ammend the above quote to read ....that Christ should preach THROUGH them. It is not our cooperating with Him in preaching but it is His life animating our thoughts and His Word's pouring forth from our lips.

Wyatt
I hope you get the book, it has been a great blessing in my life and

will be in yours

"I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me"- Gal 2:20
"Are ye so foolish? having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh?"- Gal 3:3
"For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another."- Gal 5:13
Amen :-D God is love...and He calls men everwhere to repentance for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand! His mercies are new everyday, not wanting anyone to perish.
I believe "authentic" preachers first partake in Christ's death before they partake in Christ's resurrection; spiritually speaking of course.

richie

Here4Him wrote:
What do preachers have to do to 'get out the way' if you like, and allow God to be everything in the preaching? Any thoughts much appreciated.

But, let us first, again... "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it" - Matt 16:24-25
It has been said that even preaching can result in "dead works" :-o
God bless you with Himself, preparing you in hiddenness, as a Master Potter prepares His worthy vessel for His purpose...
richie

i "preached" for the first time out in the streets just today, i dont know what qualifies under that term preach , but i stood up i talked to some people there is only one name under heaven that we can be saved i talked about how god saved me..and what god says in his word he will do for everyone who calls upon him... i dont know what exept jesus crusified we should preach? i meen to the lost people... i think paul washer said it best... give me a man who will preach christ crusified until someone gets saved or until he gets stoned....

and i belive we can prepare whit prayer and reading the word, i have a fear of standing and talk in public i talk strange, i say wrong things and have to say it over again.. i get all sweety but i do it and i pray to god that he might draw men unto him, that he will get the glory from this...then i trust that even if i dont see the results of it, i belive we need to preach christ...why they need christ , and who christ is, what he did and what he will do... and then what they need to do,

I know D L Moody talked whit a "less then normal" talk. dont know the word for it but if he talked "funny" and still drew millions to christ...then we dont have to worri so much about if we say nice words...but if we have a gift in an oral way... god will use it i belive

i just told my wife ...what is the greatest thing a human can do? tell someone else about jesus... that is the most greatest thing we as humans ever can do... we cant do anything greater that i can think of!!! and we only have this little time to do it...so for rest of eternity we will never have the chanse to talk to an unbeliver again...

Thank you to everyone for your very helpful comments.

Nellie- you said:

"Be willing to move out of the way, and let the Holy Spirit take over.
It is hard for us humans to get out of the way.
We always think God needs our help, when He just wants a willing vessel that He can flow through."

It is so true- it is so hard to get out of the way. May the Lord teach me and all of you who preach, what it is to get out of the way and allow the Holy Spirit to speak through us, just as our Lord spoke so powerfully through Stephen in Acts 7.

I love the way that the book of Acts begins, :'The former account I wrote to you O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach. I know that that is the key. Every sermon and miracle in the book of Acts was a continuation of the teaching and 'doing' of Jesus Christ. Any sermon that God has ever greatly used has been the same.

It is easy to know this truth and easy to write it down, but it seems so few preachers ever get to this place. May God have mercy on us.