Open Air Preaching

I have been watching videos on youtube on open air preaching. For the majority of the videos I see preachers yelling at sinners to stop sinning, which I think is a oxymoron. I hear alot of I's, such as I repented, I stopped sinning, and they appear to be self righteous, like the reason that they are a Christian is because they are stronger mentally to overcome sin and live in holiness. They fail to mention the grace of God, I can tell you personally when I was in my unregenerate state I tried to stop sinning, but within a few days went back to my habitual sin. When I was born again it was the Holy Spirit convicting me of my sin not some preacher bring condemnation on me. I also do not hear the love of Christ in their voice or rather pleading with men. It should be all about Christ when preaching, he is the one who regenerates us and give us newness of life, transforming us from the kingdom of darkness to light. When preaching, the seriousness of sin needs to be brought up, like its a crime against God to sin and that God is holy and will one day judge the world in righteous. What is your opinion?

I was in Ybor City, one evening, when I came across someone who was trying to preach. He was very green and was reading the bible and really doing a bad job of it. I had the notion to take the bible out of his hand and read it like he meant it.

On the other hand, I never understand why many open air preachers preacher with anger. I can tell you that many preach out of their flesh and those who hear their noise walk away because to them it is as if mom and dad and trying to discipline them but in a wrong kind of way.

I have mixed emotions about open air preaching. On one hand, I really admire those who do it because quite frankly I am too chicken to do so.

On the other hand I am not sure how effective it is. I am not sure there is clear precedent in scripture- perhaps Jeremiah and Ezekiel..

but in the NT John the Baptist was in the wilderness and people went out to him to hear; the crowds came to Jesus, or he was in a synagogue where people already were expecting to hear something from someone. Peter's sermon in Acts 2 may have been open air; but people were coming around due to the phenomonen they were seeing/hearing. Paul generally went to the synagogues.

Sometimes open air preaching makes ME feel uncomfortable so I can imagine how it must make unbelievers feel. If they were made to feel uncomfortable out of conviction, well that is the goal, but I think that is rarely the case.

Greg- I appreciate you posting the video because I appreciate your spirit and style and I didnt sense any anger or judgmentalism.

Out of the abundance of the heart a man speaks. If a preacher indoors or out does almost nothing but preach about sin it is because their heart is full of it.

Peter said we are called to proclaim the excellencies of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Let's do that. Or let's go home.

Agree with others here that the spirit in which we preach is vitally important. As to whether or not it is biblical for today, here are parts of a short article I wrote a while back on the topic:

Old Testament:

Proverbs 1:20-21 declares, “Wisdom shouts in the street, She lifts her voice in the square; At the head of the noisy streets she cries out; At the entrance of the gates in the city she utters her sayings”

Isaiah was an open air/street preacher.
In Isaiah 58:1 the Lord says to Isaiah, “Cry aloud; do not hold back; lift up your voice like a trumpet; declare to my people their transgression, to the house of Jacob their sins.”

Jeremiah was an open air/street preacher.
In Jeremiah 11:6-7 the Lord says to Jeremiah, “Proclaim all these words in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem; hear the words of this covenant and do them.”

Jonah was an open air/street preacher.
In Jonah 3:1-4 we read: “Now the word of the LORD came to Jonah the second time, saying, "Arise, go to Nineveh the great city and proclaim to it the proclamation which I am going to tell you." So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh according to the word of the LORD. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, a three days' walk. Then Jonah began to go through the city one day's walk; and he cried out and said, "Yet forty days and Nineveh will be overthrown." Then the people of Nineveh believed in God; and they called a fast and put on sackcloth from the greatest to the least of them.”

New Testament:

John the Baptist was an open air/street preacher.
Matthew 3:1-2 says, “Now in those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the wilderness of Judea, saying, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand

The Lord Jesus Christ Himself was the greatest open air/street preacher.
Matthew 5:1 tells us, “When Jesus saw the crowds, He went up on the mountain; and after He sat down, His disciples came to Him. He opened His mouth and began to teach them…..” And He went on to preach that famous Sermon on the Mount. There are many other accounts of our Lord preaching to crowds in the outdoors.

The Twelve Apostles were open air/street preachers.
Luke 9:1,6 says, “And He called the twelve together, and gave them power and authority over all the demons and to heal diseases….Departing, they began going throughout the villages, preaching the gospel and healing everywhere.”

Philip the evangelist was an open air/street preacher.
Acts 8:5-8 declares, “Philip went down to the city of Samaria and began proclaiming Christ to them. The crowds with one accord were giving attention to what was said by Philip, as they heard and saw the signs which he was performing. For in the case of many who had unclean spirits, they were coming out of them shouting with a loud voice; and many who had been paralyzed and lame were healed. So there was much rejoicing in that city.”

Charles Spurgeon said, “Where would the reformation have been if its great preachers had confined themselves to churches and cathedrals? How would the common people have become indoctrinated with the Gospel had it not for those far-wandering evangelists….and those daring innovators who found a pulpit on every heap of stones, and an audience chamber in every open space near the abodes of men?”

An article I came across states, "After the reformation other great movements were started by street preachers. The Methodist Church, co-founded by George Whitfield and John Wesley, is an example of this period. These two were Anglicans, but being banned from speaking in churches since they were not licensed, they took to ‘field preaching’, boldly proclaiming God’s Word to large crowd in streets and markets. They traveled throughout England and the American colonies and were instrumental in the Great Awakening… The Methodist Church was started by street preachers.”

And there are many more examples, even in modern times, of how God has greatly used this method of open air/street preaching.

But in many cases in the NT the crowds were submitting themselves for preaching. John the Baptist was in the wilderness and people went out to hear him. The crowds followed Jesus around-- he always had an audience if he wanted to speak. The fact that he worked miracles obviously helped.

Of course I am not saying that there was no cases of true open air preaching in the NT-- but in most cases there seemed to be a willing audience-- although admittedly sometimes they were only willing to listen in order to accuse the speaker.

Amen thingsabove! Thanks for the encouragement.

QUOTE: "I have been watching videos on youtube on open air preaching. For the majority of the videos I see preachers yelling at sinners to stop sinning, which I think is a oxymoron. I hear alot of I's, such as I repented, I stopped sinning, and they appear to be self righteous, like the reason that they are a Christian is because they are stronger mentally to overcome sin and live in holiness."==ALD0025

Yea, this is common and brings back memories of when i was in college (secular, liberal arts) and a group of "Christians", led by a grown man, came from somewhere and decided to open air preach on our campus. The only thing they succeeded in doing was to offend people because they criticized female students for the way they were dressed, calling them "whores"; they said they were whores for the way they were dressed. They yelled and they shouted and they argued with the students. Nothing at all Christlike. Did Christ yell? Did Christ shout? Did Christ engage in arguing? Did Christ call the woman at the well a Whore? Did he call Mary Mag a Whore? Did he call the woman caught in adultery in John Chapter 8 a Whore? Anyway, last time i checked, a whore is someone who gets PAID for their services and if someone is going to be called one they should be getting paid. There was no love nor grace in their tone or their words or their teachings. They were finally ordered to leave the campus and all they left behind was a bad impression. Nothing they said or did brought glory to God. It was positively shameful.

It is interesting to note that the apostles did not make the sins of their hearers their main topic in the book of Acts. They preached so as to inspire saving faith in a risen Christ. For you can convince a man he is a sinner and he will still die and go to hell. But if you persuade a man that Jesus is Lord and that God raised him from the dead, that sort of faith will change his eternal destiny.

Brothers, we must not throw out the baby with the bath water. Just because there are many bad examples of street preachers doesn't mean we should do away with it altogether. Scripture is full of examples of that kind of preaching, from the prophets, our Lord Jesus, the apostles and disciples. It was the most prominent way by which God communicated His Word to the people.

edit for grammar.

I agree with everything said here. You could copy and paste those exact people, with the exact impressions, for my campus. I am a senior in college, and am ashamed at what open-air preachers do on my campus. People argue with them, throw things at them, play loud music next to them, it's really horrible. Don't cast your pearls before pigs, ya know?
Anyways, in my Christian walk, I have never met a soul who was saved from open air street preaching. I whole-heartedly agree with the approach, though. I have nothing against street-preaching. My encounters with open air preachers have just been negative. I tell you though, if Greg Gordon showed up on my campus, I'd stop and listen. Never have encountered street preaching like that.
When witnessing to a non-believer, you don't open with "You're going to Hell, you're against God, etc." They know their situation, but I just don't find it polite calling out people like that. Kind of like those bumper stickers that say "Try Jesus, if you don't like Him the Devil will always take you back!" ...My heart breaks at that because you get the same result as all the college students I saw turn away with disgust.
I was walking by a street preacher one day and he looked at me and said "Sinner! Repent before you go to Hell!" I just walked by and thought, "You know, he has no idea I'm called to be a missionary."

that is some exelent advice amen things above

Would not Billy Graham qualify as an open air preacher?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIQ60AdL5AU

QUOTE: "I would also add that we do not limit the points God wants us to proclaim to sinners just to the book of Acts. The whole of the New Testament as well as the old testament declares that rebuking people and calling them to repent of their sins is part and parcel of “all the counsel of God.”==THINGSABOVE

Well said; i agree. To say that a person should never preach about sin while street preaching is totally false. One must be careful of the spirit one speaks with however, and "speak the truth in love". One must speak with humility and compassion, remembering one's OWN sins and faults first, and not speak in a self-righteous, critical or judgmental manner. Jesus never did so. And the only ones he REBUKED were the self-righteous religious crowd.

Of course we must preach about sin and hell. But if we use Isaiah 6 as an example, should men get a revelation of the majesty of Christ, they will see how sinful they are without going through a laundry list of their sins. Or like Peter who saw the Lord and declared he was a sinner, and tossed himself into the sea.

A poor man doesn't need somebody to remind him he is poor when he is the dinner guest at a rich man's house.

Thingsabove wrote: "Our Lord and savior as well as the apostles were street preachers."

I guess it depends how you define "street preachers" I agree that they were "open air" preachers because they preached outside.

I define a street preacher as a person standing uninvited and perhaps intrusively on a busy street corner or the middle of a college campus who begins preaching to people passing by, 99% of whom have no interest at best or are totally turned off at worst.

I still assert that there is very little of this in the NT. Jesus always had a WILLING audience-- and it seems for the most part that the apostles did as well. Perhaps not in every instance, but on most instances. LIke I said-- they were indeed "open air" preaching because they were outside. But that doesnt change the fact that in most cases people there were there because they wanted to be.

That being said, and like I said at tmy first post, I admire unsolcited street preachers (if they do it the right way) and I believe there is a place for it. But as others have observed, I do not believe it is very effective.

It is simply not a fair portrayal of NT preaching in the open air to compare it to street preachers standing in the middle of a busy campus or city street corner giving unsolcited messages. Two different animals. A much better comparison can be made to the OT prophets. They were often ignored as well.