Maturing in Preaching

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the Divine Trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth.

Rainbow Flags, Church Identity, and the Show’s Opening Banter

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry. I�m finally getting used to these new headphones, Pastor Steve. I don�t want to like them. And how�s that going? They�re going back. I�m sending them back. Okay.

It�s this kind of rainbow flag on there that I�m really bothered about.

Kind of impacts your listening, doesn�t it, to tense it.

Well, we here at the church, Bethlehem Bible Church, we�re redeeming the rainbow because if you walk into the nursery, preschool area, it�s got, you know, the curtains are all these rainbow colors, and it looks beautiful.

God�s promise. I like the rainbow.

You know, the unicorns, I�m not so crazy about, but the rainbow, I do like. Well, we�ve been naming the rooms.

Sometimes people will say, �It�s the Calvin room, the Luther room. Well, we�re just a little off here in Central Mass, so we have the unicorn room, we have the rainbow room, we have the Santa room.

Santa room. Abominable snowman, right? Bigfoot. Yeti, yeah. Yeti. Tasmanian devil. You put the disobedient kids in there.

Uh-oh. Uh-oh. Yeah. Are we having to pay for all those trademarks and all that stuff?

Are we supposed to pay for trademarks of, like, songs, intros to No Compromise Radio? Who knows what we�re supposed to do?

I guess we call the lawyers. Well, actually, that�s been settled. You know, you can use little snippets. It�s called fair use.

Okay, perfect. Pastor Steve, at TheTuesdayGuy on Twitter and Facebook is what? Steve Cooley. Steve Cooley, okay. And if you want to listen to sermons, you go to bbcchurch .org and you can listen to Steve�s Sunday school classes.

You can listen to him preach. What are you teaching in Sunday school these days?

Amazingly enough, the sovereignty of God and salvation. Wow. That never grows old. No, it doesn�t. I mean, you know, I had something and I thought, �Oh, this is going to last a week. And so far, I think it�s been, like, three weeks and I�m not anywhere near done with it.

Well, this next weekend, I go out of town to visit my friend John Tucker, John A. Tucker, and I�m going to preach there, and you�ll be preaching for me. So I�m just going to, on the radio, do something I�ve never done before.

I�m doubly-dogging-daring you, double-dog-dare you, to preach Romans 9 when I�m gone. Okay, well, it�s on then. It�s on. Double-dog-dare you. Where did that come from, double-dog-dare?

Probably from, you know, some nursery school or something. Hey, double-dog-dare you.

What was the cartoon when we were growing up and it was Schneidly and Whiplash, or Boris and that one lady? Natasha. Yeah. What was that?

Bullwinkle? Yeah. Rocky and Bullwinkle. Rocky and Bullwinkle, one of my faves. I used to watch it all the time. Because it had all the Cold War kind of jokes in it, you know.

I bet you if we went back and watched it, we would think, �Oh, now we see those things or maybe it would make us think of the future.

Oh, I think it�s like a hundred times better now than it was then.

Do you think this is completely different than our topic today, but what if you were a Russian living in the U .S. and you�re a born-again Christian and you�re at a church? Should you feel bad in attending?

Should you feel welcomed? What do you think goes through people�s mind? And I ask that question because, Steve, there�s so much cancel stuff. Hey, if you�re a Russian, you can�t do this unless here in America you say something bad about Putin or something like that.

What�s going on with all that?

Man, I don�t want to sound like a Pelagian, but I don�t you know, because this is going to sound I guess this is I�m anti-Putinian. I don�t think the sins of Putin should be, you know, imputed to anybody else.

I mean, certainly if you�re in the Russian army and you�re indiscriminately killing civilians and whatnot, then, you know, that�s a whole other matter, and you�ll have to answer for that. But I think if you�re in the United States and you�re in a church, you shouldn�t have the idea, �Oh, this is an American church

You know, we shouldn�t open up with the battle hymn of the republic and close with the national anthem or, you know, we�re not you know, say the Pledge of Allegiance instead of reading scripture or, you know.

There goes my July 4th sermon. Sorry.

I apologize. Well, as it�s kind of back to the flags again, if you have the flag up on the platform slash stage, okay, I�m not against flags, but just have every flag. Yeah. Right? You can have a Turkish flag, an Israeli flag, the United States flag.

200 flags up on the Right. And it�s all revelation, you know, every tribe, tongue, nation, et cetera.

Yeah. Yeah. But then you have to have the United States flag in just the right place. Otherwise, everybody�s going to be up in arms.

As a matter of fact, maybe we should just drape the pulpit in the flag. Hmm. You�ve just seen Steve�s face. Well, Steve and I have been ministering together for a long time, and we have both grown in our preaching, Lord willing.

I think that�s I think that we have. I want to talk today about preaching and just ask Steve in particular what he thinks he�s changed in his preaching, his style, suggestions to young preachers, how to listen to sermons today if you�re not a preacher.

So we�re just going to talk about preaching in general. It�s important for everybody. If you are a preacher or a teacher, this is an important conversation. And if you listen to preaching, it�s important too.

Patience With New Pastors and the Limits of Long Sermons

I agree. Because you�ve got a lot of people let�s start off with this. We have a lot of people who have new pastors, and by definition, those new pastors aren�t seasoned, right? They�re not great preachers yet because they�re new.

Right. And aren�t we glad that the congregations are patient with us when we�re preaching every week, but especially when we�re newer preachers? I sure am.

I mean, you know, yeah, because we do grow in the pulpit, and I think there are a lot of reasons for that. You know, I mean, you just kind of get I�ll just spoiler alert you know, I think one of the worst things that we do and we learn in seminary is we learn to just value data.

And so, you know, it�s like, how do I get the maximum amount of data out in my 45 minutes or whatever I�m allotted? You know, and that�s why I think some guys feel like they�re compelled to preach an hour and 10 minutes because they�re like, �I can�t leave any of this out.

This is too good. Everybody needs to know this. And usually it�s not too good, and no, everybody does need to know it, so.

And newer guys can�t carry the congregation? No. That long. Remember the congregation? They�ve stayed up all night. They�re tired. Their kid was sick. They work the late shift. How do you sit and listen to somebody just talk all day when you�re used to different camera angles every two seconds changing on television and commercials, et cetera, and now you have to sit and listen?

So I think it�s good for a pastor to say, �Well, I�m gonna just preach a little less today, and I want people to say, �I wish he would have kept going versus, �Well, that guy just landed the plane.

It�s similar to when Jen and I go out to a restaurant, and she�s like, �Oh, I really want some dessert and they bring it out, because Jen and I have this thing where we don�t split desserts, so they bring it out for her, and she�s just like, �Remind me because she�ll leave, and she�s just like, �Oh, I ate too much and she�ll go, �Remind me.

I don�t ever want to order that dessert again because it�s too big or it�s too rich or it�s too this or it�s too that. And in the same way, we can overstuff the people where they just get to a point where they really, I don�t want to say they can�t listen anymore, but they really won�t because it�s just gone on too long.

Steve, was it J .C. Ryle that said pastors should preach simply and plainly? And I don�t do it probably as often as I should, but almost every Sunday I think simple. How can I simplify this? How can I be Christ-centered and just make things simple?

So maybe if you�re here or listening to the show today and your pastor doesn�t do that all the time, but once in a while he does, it�d probably be good to go encourage him the times that he does. Pastor, thank you for that.

I could get my arms around that. And I�ve really been working on that. I�ve kind of developed a slogan, �Leave no saint behind kind of modeled after what the military practice is in the battlefield, right?

If we think of life as a spiritual battlefield, which it is, I don�t want to leave people unequipped, unknowing. They�re sitting in my Sunday school class especially, and I think, �Okay, I�ve got a lot of seasoned saints, a lot of people who have been through a lot in life and everything, and then I�ve got some people that are relatively new to the faith.

So especially in Sunday school, what should I try to do And I�m like, �Let me kind of help them along, and the others will be encouraged and also be reminded that there are other people that need to be equipped, that need to learn, right

That's good.

Mike Ebenroth today with Pastor Steve Cooley on No Compromise Radio. We are talking a little bit about February of 2023 for Israel, so you can write me if you�re interested, mike at nocompromiseradio .com.

Nothing confirmed yet. Who knows, Steve, with the prices and VAC stuff and everything else, but we�re going to give it a shot. Steve, let�s say someone�s sitting in the congregation, they�re listening to preaching, and the guy�s going on for maybe too long, it�s too technical, too heady.

He's a young guy, he�s enthusiastic. You can tell he studies, you can tell he loves the Lord and is loved by the Lord. What would be your advice to some of those folks sitting under that every week?

How Congregants Should Listen to a Young Preacher

Well, I would say two things. One is, tell yourself, �I�m not going to be the complainer right? And I�ll tell you why, because there�s nobody, you know, even as I�m driving home after I preach, I always think, �Man, I wish I would have done this or said that or whatever.

You know, I mean, great thoughts come into your head on the way home, right? So I mean, the criticism isn�t a spiritual gift. But the second thing I would say, and maybe, you know, you may not agree with me on this, but I think it�d be okay, especially if it�s a complicated passage, to just kindly, maybe later, a few days later, whatever, after you�ve thought about it and tried to sort things out for yourself, send the pastor a note and go, �You know what?

I didn�t understand this point or that point. Could you expand on that just a little bit And not in a complaining way, just kind of like, �I really didn�t get it. And I think that�s fine. I mean, pastors, I personally like that, you know, that somebody�s listening enough to do that, so.

I like that idea too, because it�s not this, �Hey, I�m just blasting you to blast right? We know people like that, that they want to criticize every single thing, and they don�t like you, therefore they don�t like what you do.

Kind of the flip side of, how can the Lord God, a thrice holy God, accept our sin-tainted works? Answer, He accepts us in Christ, so He accepts our works, right? You put a four-year-old�s drawing of you in the pulpit up on your refrigerator because you accept the child, and it�s flipped around too.

Once you don�t like somebody, you don�t like anything that they do, and you pick about it, or you pick on them about it. But when I talk to people after the service, Steve, and they�ll say, �Oh, Pastor Mike, you were talking about the armor in Ephesians 6, put on the armor of God, and that�s Christ, the Messiah warrior�s armor, and you said Isaiah 11, 49, and 59.

I thought that meant Isaiah chapter 11, verses 49 and 59, and then later in the message you said chapter 11, chapter 49, chapter 59. I go home, and I say, �Well, if one person says that, others have too and I quick make the notes, and I change it, so in the review the next week, I try to make that explicitly clear.

So that�s another thing that helps me, because other people think the same thing. Because even Steve thought that. Even Steve did. Well, I was so� I�ll tell you why I did that. I was so determined to get people to memorize those three chapters, 11, 49, 59, with this breastplate of righteousness, and we always kind of think, �Well, better be righteous this week.

You�re going to leave yourself open for satanic attack. I�m like, �Well, then I�m smoked. I�d like to live a righteous life, that�s true, but I have Christ-righteousness. And when the devil says you�re a sinner, you just say, �Yes, that�s exactly true, because I have an advocate.

Well, we�re talking about preaching and things that congregants could do. So, would you say I�d like to encourage congregants with a new pastor to take notes? Oh, absolutely. Yeah.

Why would that be helpful? Well, I think it�s helpful for a number of reasons. One is you can review the notes, right? And even for yourself, as you�re making the notes and you review it, you go, �Okay, I didn�t get it when he said it, but now I�m reading what I wrote and sort of I can work it out.

But secondly, it gives you something to kind of reflect on during the week or even later as you�re trying to understand the flow of the passage. I mean, I think it�s really helpful. And the better notes you take, the better it is for you.

It keeps you engaged. You know, I did that in particular when I was, you know, working graveyard and then going to church. How do you stay awake? Well, you stay awake by taking notes. You know, you force yourself to stay awake because you don�t want to miss anything.

And to Crossway�s credit, they came up with that brilliant idea of every book of the Bible you can have separately printed with the left side, the ESV text, the right side blank, and that would be actually a good note-taking thing to do.

I do that in the morning when I�m writing and taking notes and working on things, and you could bring one of those to church and just say, �As he preaches through, I�m going to kind of take notes, circle, underline.

I mean, what happens, Steve? Pastors in training at seminary love preaching. They listen to preaching all the time. They listen to mature preaching because it�s better. Mature preachers preach longer, probably use bigger words because the congregation is more mature and they�ve been in the ministry longer, and they think, �Well, my favorite preacher is Sinclair Ferguson, and he preaches for 55 minutes.

I�ll preach 55 minutes. Sure.

You think that�s what explains some of that? Well, I think it does, you know. I mean, we want to emulate the men that we, I�ll use the word, idolize, that we think highly of, we could say. And so, we try to do the same thing.

The problem is when you realize, �Okay, I�m not Sinclair Ferguson, I�m not R .C. Sproul, I�m not John MacArthur, I�m just Steve Cooley. So, I mean, God uses means and He works even within our limitations, right?

And so, if we don�t recognize our limitations, the Lord�s sure to bring them to our attention, you know, sometimes through His people. �Hey, Pastor, you know that hour and 15-minute sermon, yeah, that was long, bro, you know.

Only a few times have I had my clock malfunction, my watch, I lost track of time, because normally I�m right on top of that, and I think I don�t, I literally don�t know how long I preached. And it happened to be probably 55 minutes, which I think is typically too long.

But like, �Oh, brother, here we go. If a new pastor gets up to preach, I think he�s, the dump truck�s coming.

Yeah. I mean, you know, the challenge is, you know, in those couple of occasions where I�ve done a conference and they want you to go longer, you know, then you�re just like,.

�Wait a sec. Because I, along with you, actually feel subjectively like I�m done. Yeah.

Right? It�s time to land the plane. Yeah, the timer�s going. You know, it�s almost like at the end of a basketball game, you know, you can feel the five, four, and you�ve got to get done, you know.

Learning from Strong Preachers and Avoiding Mere Performance

Steve, I was preaching at a conference once, and there were two speakers after dinner, and I was the second one. I was the last speaker. And so the speaker before me had a slot, it was an hour slot, a couple songs, 50-minute sermon, 45-minute sermon, five-minute bathroom break, a couple songs, and I preach.

Well, I think I was supposed to be up at 8 o�clock, right? 7 to 8, and then 8 to 9. The guy before me, he preached, I don�t know, I don�t want to exaggerate, but it was about an hour and 30 minutes. So he was waxing eloquent.

Uh-huh, and taking some of my time, but I thought, I can�t cut my message down to 22 minutes. I mean, I guess I could, but I didn�t want to. And I was dying on the inside, just dying. I kind of wanted to just point to my wrist, raise your hand up, point to your wrist.

He�s like, �Mike, are you getting charismatic No.

I know. Well, you�re talking about Sinclair Ferguson. Who do you like to listen to? If you had to pull up somebody, you know, you can�t listen to John Owen unless somebody re, you know, if they read something on there.

But people that we have access to on YouTube, who do you listen to?

Well, I mean, I do like Sinclair Ferguson because, and I�ll just stick with him, because I think he makes the complex rather simple. You know, he has this way of boiling things down. And, you know, I, and then again, I do kind of like Alistair Begg.

And one of the reasons I like him, similar kind of thing, but he�s able to weave in these kind of anecdotes in almost like a Chuck Swindoll way, but they don�t, they don�t ever grate on me. I don�t ever think, �Eh, I wish you wouldn�t do that.

You know?

Well, some pastors, like a Swindoll, I think they have too many illustrations and they go on for too long. But Begg, you know, he has this little Beatles deal that he does or whatever. Yeah. That�s kind of effective.

I want you to know that on No Compromise Radio that we do quote the Bible. I don�t know if we�ve quoted the Bible in this show yet. And this is from 2 Timothy chapter 4. I can�t impress this on you too strongly.

God is looking over your shoulder. Christ himself is the judge with the final say on every one living and dead. He�s about to break into this open with his rules. So proclaim the Messiah with intensity.

Keep on your watch. Challenge, warn, and urge your people. Don�t ever quit. Just keep it simple. So see, all that talk about simple, it�s right there in the text.

You know, I actually like what he said there, but, you know, I think we need to throw a big error asterisk on that. That was, of course, the massage.

You�re going to find that there will be times when people will have no stomach for solid teaching, but will fill up on spiritual junk food, catchy opinions that tickle their fancy.

Again, you know, I mean, now that�s a good sermon right there, right? But it�s not the.

Text. Right. Do you think with Sinclair Ferguson, he is so insightful, God has so gifted him, that his insights and the way he delivers, he doesn�t have to raise his voice, he doesn�t have to be all emotional and talk louder, softer.

I mean, I�m not saying he doesn�t do any homiletical things to help you listen, but it�s usually with what he says. Did you notice that? Yes. I like that. Who�s kind of like a pastor that�s maybe a little more emotional in their delivery, but still solid?

Can we think of any? More emotional. Well, I can think of emotional.

Ones, but I don�t really like their theology. Yeah, I was going to say, you know, I don�t know that he�s always emotional, but I really, I found some of Votie Bauckham�s messages where he has been emotional, effective, you know, and biblical at the same time.

And for me, Steve, I mean, I set it up with emotion, so you answered with that, rightly so. I�m not even that concerned about emotions. Aren�t we mainly concerned, obviously, faithful to the text, but that the guy actually believes it?

Yes. I think that�s more than some kind of bluster or something like that. If you�re teaching the Bible to your children, make sure they actually think you believe it.

I mean, how many times have you and I said, you know, just watch some guy and just gone fraud, fake, you know, unattached to the text. You know, he could be talking about poetry, he could be talking about, he could be lecturing about anything because he�s not engaged with it.

Steve, that would be one of the errors of, or possible errors, pitfalls. You�re traveling around the world, you�re an expert on a particular biblical topic, and that�s all you talk about, and it just becomes rote versus what we get to do.

We get to study and see things, and I�m in second chapter of Revelation now, one to seven, and oh, what he�s saying, what to do, testing false apostles, what about love, lost first love. First thing he says to counteract that is remember, and I�m going to think, oh, remember who?

Remember Jesus, remember chapter one, this Jesus? And I get excited. But if you�re not really doing that, it�s just like, well, I just reviewed the night before. It�s not in you.

Right. Yep. And it all just becomes just a product.

Preaching with Deliberate Christ-Centeredness and Care for the Sheep

What do you think has changed the most in your preaching over 20 years?

I�m, you know, less concerned. I still like to have an outline, but I�m less concerned with that than actually making sure that I get to the gospel, you know, for sure. But even like, I�m not afraid to do different things, like sunrise service this last Sunday.

You know, just thinking to myself, okay, I have an idea. I think it�s interesting. Can I do this? And you don�t know how many times I try to talk myself out of it. And I was just like, no, this is working.

Just keep going, right? And so, finally, I get done with it on Saturday night, and I�m like, this is really going to work. I really believe it is. And so, you know, I think sometimes just being willing to digest all the text and come up with a different way of viewing things, I think, is, you know, because there are innumerable ways of preaching a text, I think.

I mean, almost innumerable ways. Well, I travel enough or get sick enough or both that you end up preaching a lot. And if people hear you all the time, I think it�s good to take a different angle and change things up so that people aren�t so used to what you do.

Oh, here�s an illustration. Here�s three points. Here�s a poem. Here�s the five diagnostic takeaway questions or whatever we do, which are fine to do, but if you do it every single time,.

I just try to switch things up. And you know what I really like? I mean, I don�t aim for this, you know, because I want to please the Lord. But when my wife says something good about my message, because, you know, I�ve told her, sorry, this is going to sound worse than it is, but I told her, I go, basically, if I do something wrong, you don�t need to tell me, you know, so she hardly ever talks to me about my preaching.

She loves the Sunday school class, but you know, when it comes to preaching, she�s just pretty much mum. But when she says something, I know it really means something because, you know, I really struck a chord.

If my wife says, honey, that was a good sermon today, just, you know, not bowing down or anything, but just saying that to encourage me, I can last all week on just that one sentence. Yeah, it�s pretty nice.

I think if I had to, in 20 seconds, describe how I think my preaching�s changed, I think I�m much more deliberate on talking about the Lord Jesus, especially to believers, and I�m thinking more about the people than I used to, right?

I was all concerned about the text properly, exegeting it, proper hermeneutics, that�s all good and true and right, but then I�m preaching to God�s people. How can I feed the sheep? Do you love me, Jesus said to Peter?

Yes, you know that I love you. Feed my sheep. So I�m trying to think about what the sheep need, and the sheep need a good, healthy dose of the Lord Jesus, and we get to show them Him in prophecy,.

In revelation, and everything in between. Week in and week out, that�s what we do.

Through verse-by-verse exposition of the sacred text. Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We�re right on Route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.