PUBLISHING
Preaching Christ: Comment, Caution, Counsel Sinclair Ferguson Preaching Christ is undoubtedly
the present day. That is but a fraction
preaching Christ also stress the
a subject that merits book-length
of books on preaching published in
importance of the blessed Trinity?’
treatment.
this period. But to a contemporary eye
But that aside, in any discipline a
there is a surprising common feature
statistical ‘spike’ or ‘cluster’ of this
There is more in those last three
in the books I own published between
nature (e.g. a particular disease),
words than meets the eye, but to that
William Perkins’ Puritan classic, The
leads students of the discipline to
we will return momentarily.
Arte of Prophecying (English, 1606)
seek a specific cause for it.
and the two classics of the modern Our responsibility to ‘preach Christ’
era, D. M. Lloyd-Jones’ Preaching and
So, what explains this ‘cluster’
lies on the surface of the New
Preachers (1971) and J. R. W. Stott’s I
of interest and emphasis in
Testament. He is the heart of the
Believe in Preaching (1981, USA title
preaching?
gospel (Rom. 1:1-6), although it
Between Two Worlds).
should always be remembered that
Perhaps in fifty years or so
he is not the whole of the gospel (it
The common feature? Only one of
someone will provide a magisterial
is ‘the gospel of God, 1 Thess. 2:8).
my hundred volumes has Preaching
analysis and interpretation. My own
Christ himself taught his apostles to
Christ as (or in) its title — a single
guess, for what it is worth, is that
preach him (Lk. 24:46) and to teach
address by the admirable American
part of the answer is found in one
others to do likewise (Matt. 28:18-
Episcopalian Bishop Charles P.
word: Hermeneutics. Its coming
20). Thus, from the Day of Pentecost
McIlvaine, a brilliant fellow-student
to prominence brought with it a
onwards, Jesus Christ was preached
and friend of Charles Hodge (and as
new interest in the (actually old,
(Acts 2:22-36; 3:11-26; 8:4-5 etc.). It
far as I know the only American ever
but much neglected) discipline of
is particularly clear that Paul saw this
to lie in state in Westminster Abbey!).
biblical theology.
1 Cor. 1:23; 2:1-2; 2 Cor. 1:19; 5:18-
More striking still, none of these books
I remember as a teenager reading
21; Gal. 3:1; Eph. 2:13; Phil. 1:15-18;
contains a chapter on preaching
that the ‘conference joke’ at the
Col. 1:28).
Christ – not C. H. Spurgeon (Lectures
first Keele Congress of Anglican
to My Students), not Dr. Martyn
evangelicals (1967) was that
In this context, however, we encounter
Lloyd-Jones, not Dr. John Stott. But
‘Hermeneutic’ was a German
a curiosity-arousing fact about book-
in more recently published books
professor of theology (Herr
length treatments of preaching which
it has become de rigueur to focus
Meneutic!). A discipline involved in
is worthy of comment:
on preaching Christ. It might not be
the interpretation of any literary field
too strong to say that any book on
was now being applied in a much
preaching that failed to do this would
more detailed and self-conscious
in many circles today be regarded as
technical manner to the reading of
profoundly inadequate.
the Bible.
hundred volumes large and small,
Now, it might be asked by way of
In turn this raised the profile of
dating from the Reformation period to
a tu quoque, ‘How many books on
biblical theology. Heretofore to most
as central to his task (Rom. 10:13-17;
Comment The ‘preaching section’ of my bookcases contains perhaps a
W W W.T H E O LO.G Y
