That’s Deep!
“I wish the preaching in our church was deeper.” Yes, I’ve heard that. Maybe you’ve said it. By “deep preaching,” we typically mean…scholarly teaching, in-depth word studies, and theological paradigms.
The trouble is…that’s not how Jesus taught. It’s not how His disciples taught. It’s not how the early church leaders taught. While the New Testament expounded on many Old Testament Scriptures, see if you can find a single Hebrew word study that helps Greek readers know the fuller meaning of the Hebrew words being interpreted. You won’t. :-)
I think the problem is our understanding of depth. No one was deeper than Jesus. Paul was wonderfully deep, as were Peter and John. But they were not deep in the sense that many twenty-first century preachers/teachers think we should be.
Depth is doing ministry the way Jesus did ministry, and taught His followers to do ministry. Jesus told us, “Teach them to do all the things I have taught you.”
Depth is not getting into deeper knowledge. It’s getting deeper into obeying the knowledge He’s given us. Depth is overcoming your anger; openly sharing your faith; letting this world see what it looks like to follow Jesus, daily; and forgiving those who hurt you.
So in that sense, we should go deep. But a lot of preaching in supposedly deep-teaching churches could be replaced with a Study Bible.
At The Bridge, we try to follow the Biblical pattern of preaching: Inspiration, Explanation, Application.
Every sermon should inspire: why we should care about this passage.
Every sermon should explain: what this passage means.
Every sermon should apply: how this should look in our lives.
You may not get lots of cross-referencing in our sermons (there is a reason for that), and we may not spend a lot of time talking about Greek grammar, but I think everyone walks away, week after week, understanding what the passage that we studied means, while being inspired to do what it says.
If you want to go deep…Overcome your propensity to anger, or gossip, or whatever sin is holding you back. Take in a foster child. Run errands weekly for an elderly neighbor. Bring your coworkers and neighbors to church. Serve every week.
That’s deep!