Taking Stock of My Preaching

It was a great joy to share Joshua 8:30-35 with our body this week. As we discussed burnt offerings and peace offerings, we naturally found ourselves in Hebrews 10:1-25, where the author discusses the intent of the offerings. In the midst, we stopped at verse 14 to discuss the author's use of the word sanctification.

Unfortunately, sanctification is largely misunderstood by the church today. We fear teaching a "works righteousness" (becoming justified by my deeds) so much that the church has quit expecting the righteous to do works (Ephesians 2:8-10). However, the Scriptures articulate that God will sanctify those whom He has justified. In fact, in moments of personal doubt, the Scriptures tell us to examine our lives and look for sanctification. It's not about looking back to see if you prayed a prayer one day, or looking for a particular date in your Bible where you came forward at church (neither element is remotely described in Scripture), but rather taking yourself through a simple test:

Since the time that I have come to understand the gospel, do I see more of Christ evident in my life than before?

Now, some people panic over this question. If they've had a bad day, week or month, they panic that they must not be saved. Sanctification is not like that. It does not mean perfection (that is called glorification). Sanctification does not mean each day must be better than the day before. However, it does mean you need to be able to see evidence that God is doing a work within you (Philippians 1:6).

In our first service, I used the stock market to illustrate this point. It may go up and down. It may even seem a bit volitale to you. But when you step back and observe the bigger picture, you see growth. I thought it was a pretty good illustration.However, as I was sharing about the market, nearly every person I made eye contact with looked a little troubled. Even as I'm sharing, I begin to wonder, Oh no. Is this a bad illustration? Are there elements about the market I don't understand that are actually making a point to the contrary? Am I misinformed about the market, or worse yet, about sanctification? Am I bordering on something heretical???? The beauty of preaching two services, is that I had the opportunity to chuck the illustration for the second group (and I think that's the one we recorded).
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Then we enjoyed a New Member's Class that evening. One man, who sat through both services approached me before we began. He was very complimentary about the message (Side note: There are few things better than hearing the Lord used His Word to encourage, grow, strengthen and challenge a brother) but then stated, "You gave a really good illustration in first service and then you didn't use it in the second. Why didn't you mention the stock market again?"

Doh! I hope preaching is like sanctification. You don't nail it everytime, but over time, hopefully it is getting better.