Archive for the ‘Preaching’ Category

Posted on November 12, 2009 - by Stephen Murray

The Gospel Works

This last Sunday morning I taught Colossians 1:1-8 at St Stephen’s Church in Claremont, Cape Town. I used Paul’s well-known triad of ‘faith, love & hope’ to explore a very real existential question that exists for many of us in the Christian faith, and that is: Does the Gospel really work?

You can download the full audio here.

Posted on August 21, 2009 - by Stephen Murray

Ruth Sermons Online

The four sermons I preached on the fantastic little Old Testament book of Ruth are now available online. I preached them all at St Stephen’s Bible Church in Claremont, Cape Town (finished the last one this last Sunday evening) . You can get them here:

Ruth 1: The Return Journey

Ruth 2: The Outsider

Ruth 3: Rest

Ruth 4: Redemption Accomplished and Applied

Or you can download them from the St Stephen’s audio library.

Posted on August 19, 2009 - by Stephen Murray

Revive 09

No it’s not a major worship conference happening in Cape Town anytime soon – it’s an attempt to re-launch my sorry efforts at blogging this year. I know you’re tired of reading sob stories on blogs with pseudo-bloggers crying over their failed attempts to write consistently or find the time in their busy schedules to actually blog. Well I hope 3 years of consistent blogging is enough of a track record so that you take my “I’m gonna make a go of it” seriously. Yes this year has been a blip, but things happen (i.e. marriage, new job, church plant etc.)

Here’s my plan for the next few weeks:

I hope to post a bit about the build up to Robin and I heading to Redeemer Church Planting Center for most of September and October (I’ll be covering the trip with some detail on this blog when I’m over there).

I hope to finally post my review of Michael Jensen’s great little book ‘You‘. (Michael – Yes I feel like a Dog!)

I hope to give you a bit of run down in terms of what I’ve been preaching on lately and links to some of the audio.

And I hope to fill your time with a bunch of other interesting (although sometimes random) things I’m learning about church planting this year.

Here’s to this blog being revived while it’s still 2009.

Posted on May 29, 2009 - by Stephen Murray

Preaching to the Heart

Acts 29 Quarterly: Preaching to the Heart

Tuesday, June 02, 2009, 11:00 AM – 1:00 PM

Host
JD Senkbile

Location
Jubilee Community Church

Jubilee Community Church Jubilee Centre 21 Nelson Road Observatory 7925 Cape Town, South Africa Cape Town Other

Phone: 082 818 1222

Purpose

To advance church planting in the Western Cape, through bringing church planters,pastors and leaders together for shared encouragement and learning from each other.

Format

We will meet from 11 am to 1pm. The first hour will be content and round table discussion. The second hour will be lunch and fellowship.

Content

Preaching to the Heart

Al Barth, from Redeemer Church Planting Center, will be coming to share with us about communicating the gospel in a way that transforms peoples hearts.

Who should attend?

All pastors, current or potential church planters, and other leaders interested in initiating a gospel-centered, missional movement in their area. You are free to bring your team or other leaders.

Cost

R35 – R50 for lunch.

Directions

PLEASE RSVP JD Senkbile (ASAP) jd@acts29network.org

Posted on March 5, 2009 - by Stephen Murray

Andy Stanley on Expository Preaching

Guys that preach verse-by-verse through books of the Bible– that is just cheating. It’s cheating because that would be easy, first of all. That isn’t how you grow people. No one in the Scripture modeled that. There’s not one example of that. (read the rest and the context of his comment here)

Andy Stanley is an extremely gifted communicator and God has used him in a big way but I’m afraid I don’t see eye to eye with him on this one. The reason I’m primarily an  expository preacher is theological not methodological nor for any other reason. I’m simply convinced that I am a fallible instrument through which God chooses to make his word known. One of the ways I can compensate for my fallibility and falleness is to allow the Scripture to set the agenda of my messages as opposed to me ultimately deciding which way to present Scriptural truths. It is not easy nor is it cheating – it’s a theological statement and a long list of expository preachers from church history would suggest that actually people do grow through it.

Posted on January 4, 2009 - by Stephen Murray

If Every Preacher Would Read This…

If only we could rid our preaching of these habits - spot on Michael.

Posted on November 26, 2008 - by Stephen Murray

Tim Keller Preaching to the Heart

You can now get hold of two lectures that Tim Keller gave recently at Oak Hill on the subject of ‘Preaching to the Heart’. (HT – Reformissionary)

Posted on September 6, 2008 - by Stephen Murray

Three Way Exegesis

When Josh Harris posted Tim Keller’s preaching notes a few days ago he also included an introduction to Keller’s preaching by Tullian Tchividjian, pastor of New City Presbyterian Church. I thought these two paragraphs were especially insightful:

“To be a great preacher, one needs to be tri-perspectival in their exegesis. That is, they need to be committed to the exegesis of the Bible, the exegesis of our culture, and the exegesis of the human heart. Some preachers claim that if you exegete the Bible properly, you don’t need to bother yourself with the exegesis of our culture or the human heart. The problem with this view, however, is that the Bible itself exhorts us to apply Biblical norms to both our lives and to our world.

As a preacher myself, I benefit greatly from listening to a wide variety of preachers. In some cases I learn what to do, and in other cases I learn what not to do. But in every case, I learn something. Some preachers teach me how to be a better exegete of the Bible. Others teach me how to be a better exegete of our culture. And still others teach me how to be a better exegete of the human heart. But no preacher has consistently taught me how to do all three in the context of every sermon more so than Tim Keller. His balanced attention to all three forms of exegesis makes him very unique, in my opinion.”

Read the rest here.

Posted on September 2, 2008 - by Stephen Murray

Tim Keller’s Preaching Notes

Tim Keller must have been Jason Bourne in a previous life or something because his preaching notes read like an encoded top secret message. Take a look at them for yourself. With a manuscript like that its no wonder that there’s no one who preaches quite like he does. Keller’s teaching and thinking has influenced me a stack load in recent years – but by the looks of this the one place he won’t be influencing me is on how to write out my sermon notes.

(HT – JT)

Posted on July 19, 2008 - by Stephen Murray

…and after the reading the Bible will be taught…

Michael Jensen has an interesting question about the use of the terms ‘Bible teaching’ and ‘preaching’ and whether or not we might have done the body a disservice by making them synonymous.