Categories
Sermons

SERMON: Different, Week 3 | Jon Bell

SERMON VIDEO:

(Can’t view the video? Click here.)


Jon Bell Impact Wesleyan ChurchJon Bell is the Community Life Pastor at Impact Church in Lowell, MI. Impact Church wants their people take that one “next step in their relationship with Jesus,” and Pastor Jon’s preaching is a mirror reflection of this shepherding mentality. The following are three aspects we noted about Jon’s preaching that are worth emulating.


 

  1. Unveil dissonance.

Stop doing all of the work of creating dissonance– we all experience dissonance in our attempts to live the Gospel (through our failures) and in our relationships with others (through our flaws and fights). Preachers don’t need to create dissonance. We do, however, need to name it and explore it. The problem is not always knowing what Scripture says. Though at times, in our increasingly secular society that is a challenge for preachers. Christians’ problem more often is knowing how to know what scriptures meant in context, correctly discern God’s character through them, and as faithfully as we can in our own context. Dissonance is already present– the question is where.

It is twice as important to unveil dissonance when your text centers on a conflict. An outsider listener might not understand why Jon took the time to lead the congregation in his ‘This or That’ game. As you listen you might wonder where it is going as well. Chocolate or vanilla? Film or book? Coke or Pepsi? It all seemed pretty frivolous. Then the weight of the conflict hit us with significant force. It was a strong contrast with the lighthearted beginning as pastor John asks:

“Democrat or Republican?”

  1. Zoom out. — “When I look at this text and I read, ‘sometime later Paul said to Barnabas,’ I immediately ask myself the question: Who is Paul and who is Barnabas? What’s their story?”

In week-to-week preparation of messages, preachers can run the risk of a smudged nose. We have put our faces so close to the immediate biblical passage that we have lost what is happening in the larger narrative. We can parse Hebrew or Greek verbs, talk about the movement of action within those few verses, draw word pictures about the characters—all of these are helpful study tools. Still, if we focus on exegetical details to the detriment of the big picture, then the listener is missing out on something the preacher assumes. Doing so also increases the risk of moralistic preaching— boiling down Scripture to concentrated shoulds and ought tos. Scripture can and does teach us about how to be moral people. Yet the Word also demands we pay attention to the larger God story happening in the surrounding chapters and in the rest of the book. The primary aim of scripture is always theological. The anthropological emerges from the theological. What we discern about the larger picture of God’s character, God’s actions, God’s intentions, and God’s motivations is necessary for us to talk about our own motivation, intention, action, and character.

Jon zooms out by telling us the story of Barnabas and Paul. In the process he tells us where their relationship started, how it progressed, and the circumstances from which their conflict stemmed (their disagreement about Mark). A message that could have ended with a simple ‘how-to’ list of principles regarding conflict instead grew into a message that captivated our intellect, emotions, and will into the result. While Jon did offer practical advice on dealing with conflict, we were far better placed to understand and engage conflict based on the context he provided.

  1. Healthy Vulnerability. “What we were fighting for with harmony really landed us in … artificial harmony.”

Vulnerability is difficult to balance as a life discipline, and even more difficult to master as a preaching practice. Pastor Jon volunteers a healthy amount of vulnerability. He provides concrete examples of his own struggles with conflict (even within his marriage) without stepping over the line into over-sharing. Congregations need to know that their preachers are people, too. Vulnerability is a useful tool for kicking off a positive cycle of healthy sharing and receiving. It needs to have proper boundaries and healthy balance. If people know that you, the preacher, have shortcomings, perhaps they will be more freely share their own struggles and vices. If the preacher seems to have too many failings, or share too many personal details, the listener feels the pastor needs cared for, tended to, or at times ‘fixed.’

Shame and vulnerability researcher Brene Brown writes in her book, Daring Greatly, “Vulnerability is not weakness, and the uncertainty, risk, and emotional exposure we face every day are not optional. Our only choice is a question of engagement. … The level to which we protect ourselves from being vulnerable is a measure of our fear and disconnection.” We should not offer the same amount of vulnerability in a public preaching setting as we can with our closest friends and confidantes. That would be unwise and would promote unhealthy levels of vulnerability in all parties involved. However, to avoid vulnerability in the pulpit is a price we cannot afford to pay. It distances the preacher, alienates the listener, and cuts down powerful avenues for the spirit to make power perfect in weakness.

How can we put into practice what we learn from Pastor Jon?

  1. Ask yourself: where does the dissonance already exist? You don’t need to create it— it is already there. Sometimes the dissonance is right there in the text and sometimes it occurs later in our attempts to practice and live the truth. When you discover where the dissonance (that may take some time), ask yourself how you can unveil it in such a way so that the room can feel that weight. What is difficult to understand? What is difficult to believe? Why if we understand and believe, is it difficult to live? How can the gospel in this biblical passage free us to live faithfully?
  2. Read the whole book all at once, out loud, no stops. This is not something a pastor can do every week, even perhaps every month. It is something many seminaries and bible colleges suggest to their students for very good reason. Reading the entire book anchors your text verbally in your mind. Scriptures were meant to be read aloud. It also gives you a much greater sense of the book’s themes, overall movement, tone, and context. You’ll see things you have not before with piecemeal readings of a chapter at a time. There is nothing wrong with reading books this way, but to achieve a sense of the whole book, to be able to zoom our from your text and grasp what the author is getting at through the whole book is an opportunity you won’t be able to turn down once you’ve done it. Especially when you do a preaching series on a biblical book, read the entire book out loud if you can. If it’s Isaiah or other such long books, break it down into as large a portion as you feel you can handle.
  3. Practice outside the pulpit. The ability to have healthy vulnerability in the pulpit starts first in our interpersonal relationships. Your capacity for healthy vulnerability can only increase as you are willing to experience openness in your relationships with spouse, friends, family, mentors, etc. Be willing to share your struggles, questions, and sins with those you trust. Have good boundaries, of course, but by all means do share your self. Who is the safest person in your life? What face comes to mind? Open a text message or email right now and ask them for coffee or breakfast. Determine to take one small step forward in vulnerability with them this week.

~ Dave Ward with Elyse Garverick