Expository Preaching under attack

Just in case one did not think that an altar based liturgy and a pulpit based one do not conflict with each other, witness the recent attack on expository preaching. It begins at Reformed Catholicism where Kevin Johnson extols ‘kergymatic preaching’ which he defines as follows:

[kergymatic preaching] brings the acts of God to fore in the proclamation of God’s Word so that both in word and in deed (communion, the Lord’s Supper, weekly if possible), the covenant community is brought ever more forward into a unity with God through Christ and by His Spirit.

He makes clear it is not:

"micro-exegetical" line by line word by word expository preaching through books in order. That should have passed with the Puritans.

This shot at the line by line preaching straight through a book done by the Reformers was then heralded by The Boar’s Head Tavern, and the Restless Reformer, who rightly calls it ‘Christian Storytelling’. The Restless Reformer goes on to connect this problem to Systematic Theology, noting that Christology is usually the third course or topic in Systematics. Nielson’s Nook makes the jump from the original attack on expository preaching to the Lord’s Supper seemingly linking believing propositions from sermons to a misuse of the sacraments. What is clear is his desire to have a more liturgical way of propounding the gospel, which for him seems to include weekly communion and less expository preaching.

Which brings us full circle to the original post by Kevin Johnson. Notice the comments. Comment #2 by Mike Spreng states the following after relating a story about Roman Catholic sermons:

I think good preaching certainly can and should be done with the help of the scriptures, but yes, wrangling with the text and expecting the people to take out there notebooks does not seem to emphasize the centrality of the ceremony and even the gospel itself. That is better done in an academic context

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Kevin responds in comment #3:

I have found nine times out of ten when I’ve been at a Roman Mass that the preaching was actually very much gospel-oriented and in line with what I’ve written above. The fact that the Western liturgical tradition in large part sees the sermon as part of the liturgy rather than the climax helps this aspect of it, imho

This shocking bit of information cannot be passed over. The preaching of the Romanist church was ‘gospel-oriented’? The church that denies one is saved by faith alone and requires work and sacraments to achieve salvation had a ‘gospel-oriented’ sermon? Has this attack on exegetical preaching changed the definition of gospel or at least the message of the gospel?

I believe it has, and I believe it does. I want to be clear there are those that should be legitimately criticized for preaching badly and some who may even leave Christ out of the sermon. However, this is a failure of the preacher not the method. These gentlemen are advocating a return to pre-reformational ways of preaching and pre-reformational messages that those ways are meant to communicate. They are extolling the centrality of the service, the centrality of the ritual, the Supper and the altar. This is exactly why the Reformers changed the service from an altar based one to a pulpit based service. The words of Christ are life (John 6:68). We should cling to them line by line. We should usually go straight through books so we can see the ‘story’ develop before us. So we can see his truth, and receive the gospel of eternal life. Kergymatic preaching that elevates the story above the words, and is designed only to make the focal point the altar and not the words, is not emphasizing Christ, it de-emphasizes him. It de-emphasizes his gospel words and returns us to the yoke of works as the Roman system openly admits.

Exegetical preaching should always present the call to Christ. But is does this through line by line exposition of his words. The preacher must be aware of applying it to the lives the believers and showing them Christ in every story, in every message. These posts come dangerously close to advocating a giving of the gospel without the words of the gospel. ‘Christian Storytelling’ is nice, but it is not preaching. Preaching is an explaining of the Scripture, which cannot be done by simply finding its ‘kergyma’. Jesus fulfilled every ‘jot and tittle’ of the Scripture, not just the main points or central thrust (kergyma) of it. We must not return to the methods of an age that denied the gospel and replaced it with sacerdotal system unless we desire to return to that same gospel denying sacerdotal system.