Daniel Darling gave this advice on how to better apply our sermons to our people: I endeavor to live in and among my people in such a way that I hear their conversations, listen to their pain, and understand their struggles. I cannot simply preach from the ivory pulpit; I must seed my preaching with the blood, sweat, and tears of those whom I serve (“Who Exactly Am I Preaching To?” in Leadership, Fall 1997). Someone else described pastors who do not take Daniel’s advice: “These shepherd no longer smell like the sheep.” This is critical for pastoral preaching.
A sermon without application is like someone shouting to a drowning man “swim” "swim" but not throwing him a life preserver. Spurgeon believed so strongly in sermon application that he said, “Where application begins, there the sermon begins.”
John R. W. Stott, in his book Between Two Worlds, believed this is the part of the sermon where we preach ethics. The first is individual Christian ethics. The next ethic is church ethics. There are also domestic ethics. The fourth area of ethics is social ethics. Finally, there is political ethics.
Haddon Robinson added another angle to the importance of sermon application, “More heresy is preached in application than in Bible exegesis” (Leadership, Fall 1997, page 21). See also The Heresy of Application | CT Pastors | Christianity Today (plus three other helpful articles). An example of misapplying truth is found in Job 4:8 when Eliphaz misapplied his true belief about suffering to innocent Job. Both Proverbs and Job are Wisdom Literature. The book of Proverbs gives practical wisdom for godly living. Live right and God will bless you as in Proverbs 3. Job, however, is philosophical wisdom. Job asks the troubling question, “Why are godly people not blessed by God.” Eliphaz was in essence quoting Proverbs (at least the principles to be later contained in Proverbs) to Job and misapplying it.
The fourth rhetorical process, Application, answers the crucial question, “What do these verses have to do with my life?” We do not preach just to inform, but to transform as seen in these verses: 1 Corinthians 8:1; 2 Timothy 3:16-17; James 2:22-25.
1. The Danger of Misapplication: Making the application as authoritative as the interpretation.
Haddon Robinson gave this example using the commandment: “Thou shalt not commit adultery”
A. Necessary Implication: Do not have sex with a person who is not your spouse because it is sin.
B. Probable Implication: Be careful about building strong friendships with a person of the opposite sex who is not your spouse.
C. Possible Implication: You ought not to travel regularly with a person who is not your spouse.
D. Improbable Implication: You should not have lunch any time with someone who is not your spouse. This is an improbable implication. For example, it would not be wrong at a work cafeteria, for the supervisor to have lunch with one of his employees, of the opposite sex, to discuss a project.
E. Impossible Implication: You ought not to have dinner with another couple because you will be at a table with another person who is not your spouse.
“Too often preachers give to a possible implication all the authority of a necessary implication, which is at the level of obedience. Only with necessary implications can you preach, ‘Thus saith the Lord.” (Robinson).
The danger of misapplication is legalism in the application as with the text, “Honor thy father and thy mother."
1) Legalistic application would insist on the aging parent living in the home of the children as the only way to obey this commandment.
2) If the aging parent loses touch with reality and begins to disrupt the family or the family can no longer meet the physical needs of the aging parent then it will become necessary to put the parent in a skilled nursing home so other Bible principles are not violated.
2. Methods for Proper Applications
A. Proper exegesis of the text: What did the author say to his ancient audience?
B. What does the text say about God and man who do not change in their natures (if these doctrines are in the text)?
Sometimes the preacher can “take the biblical text straight over to the modern situation … Jesus says, ‘Love your enemies.’” The preacher can say to his audience, “If you have enemies, you must love them.”
Other times when you cannot draw a straight line from the first century into the 21st century, you can find the theology of the passage and apply that to your audience as with Theology proper and Hamartiology: God’s holy nature never changes and sinner’s unholy depraved nature never changes (if these doctrines are in the text). Study Robinson's Abstraction Ladder on page 25 of the Leadership article for a visual on making this application.
1st Corinthians 8 is an example. In this passage, Christ is the redeemer who gave His life for believers in 8:11. Therefore Paul argues, I will not eat meat, because if I wound my brother’s weak conscience, I sin against Christ, who redeemed him. In this passage man is depraved: People want their rights, so they don’t care that Christ died for their brother.
C. Apply the text to your life
Ezra is our model preacher in this regard: "For Ezra had prepared his heart to seek (study) the law of the Lord, and to do it (apply), and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments" (Ezra 7:10).
D. Study the culture in which your audience lives
In his chapter, "What is a Missional Church?" Mark Driscoll states that "a missional church must be not only a missionary but also a missiologist. A missionary is someone who can bring the gospel to people in an effective cultural way. A missiologist is someone who studies the various cultures and subcultures in a community to help train all the missionaries to be effective." What applies to the missional church applies to the pastor of the missional church. Driscoll lists some ways to observe the culture in order to help your church better minister in its culture. Just a disclaimer about all the authors I quote. I do not endorse all of their teachings. I disagreed with Robinson’s egalitarianism, Stott’s denial of the eternal conscious suffering of those who never heard the gospel, and Driscoll’s ministry philosophy.
1. Watch Television (minus pornographic material). At the Advance 09 Conference, there was a question asked by John Piper and Driscoll about their different views on watching TV. http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/MediaPlayer/3970/Video/You can read Piper's later response to that question.
2. Surf Talk Radio
3. Walk the Mall
4. Pay Attention at the Grocery Store
5. Hang out at the Magazine Rack
6. Pay Attention to Kids
7. Talk to the People
8. Go Online
9. Break Your Routine
E. Know your audience
Example: Robinson said, “When I prepare, I imagine about eight people standing around my desk. One is my wife’s mother, who is a true believer. In my mind, I also picture a friend who is a cynic, and sometimes I can hear him saying, “Oh, yeah, sure.” I picture a business executive who thinks bottom line. I have a teenager I occasionally hear saying, “This is boring.” I look at these folks and think, What does this have to say to them?
Vines and Shaddix recalled “that Alexander Maclaren placed an empty chair before him as he prepared his sermons. That empty chair represented to him the people who would listen to him preach. It was a constant reminder that his sermon was being prepared for real people” (Vines, Jerry. Power in the Pulpit, 327. Moody Publishers. Kindle Edition).
F. Courageously and specifically apply the text. When a preacher says, “May the Spirit of God apply this blessed truth to your life,” what he really means is, “I do not have a clue how this applies to your life.” Donald R. Sunukjian provides some helpful examples (notice the specifics of these applications).
1. Ask yourself, where would this truth apply to my life
a. “When you head to the ‘fifteen items or less,’ checkout line at the grocery store, only to find yourself behind a cart that has forty-five items in it. And then to further the aggravation, the offending shopper waits until all the items have been scanned and sacked before beginning a lengthy fumbling for coupons and a hunt for dimes and pennies with which to pay.”
b. “When you come home after work and find bicycles in front of the garage door, despite the many times you’ve told your children to put them away. You’re hungry, your blood sugar is down, and you’ve had a hard day. You honk loudly and repeatedly, hoping to get someone to come out of the house and move the bikes. But the house is sealed up tight against the weather, and the kids are in front of a noisy TV. Nobody hears you, nobody comes out.
Your first impulse is to teach them a lesson by running over the bikes, but you realize you’d then have to buy them new bikes. So you get out of your car, throw the bikes into a corner where it will be difficult for the kids to untangle them, pull the car into the garage, storm into the house, loom over the unsuspecting kids on the floor, and loudly vent, ‘How many times have I told you to . . .’”
2. Make the applications specific and extended
“Suppose I’m teaching a fifth-grade boys Sunday School class, and I come to the end of the lesson. To press home the lesson, I say, ‘Guys, what does this mean to your everyday lives? It means, ‘Be a good Christian.’
“Uh, Mr. Sunukjian, that’s a bit vague. Could you be more specific?” “Yeah, I see that’s kind of broad. OK, it means, ‘Respond to those over you.’” But respond is not a picture word. And when you’re in the fifth grade, everybody is “over you.” So I try again. “It means, ‘Obey your parents.’” Parents is a picture word, but obey is not. But they’re willing to let it go at that: “Thanks, Mr. Sunukjian. That’s good. We’ve never heard that before.”
But I must not be content with such vagueness and brevity. I must visualize in extended detail some situations in their lives so that they can see what godliness would actually look like in various concrete moments.
For example: “Guys, it means when your mom gives you sixty-five cents and tells you, ‘Use this at school to buy milk to go with your sack lunch,’ and you work your way up to the front of the canteen line, and the lady behind the counter asks what you want---it means you use the sixty-five cents to buy milk and not junk food” (Donald R. Sunukjian, Invitation to Biblical Preaching, Grand Rapids: Kregel, 2007, 112-125).
Mark Dever also provides what he calls a sermon application grid. Here is what 9Marks says about the grid.
In his sermon preparation, Mark Dever uses what he calls an “application grid” as a tool to help him think about how each point of the sermon relates to the rest of redemptive history, the person and work of Christ, and how it applies to different categories of hearers. Download an application grid: Blank | Completed Sample https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/justin-taylor/sermon-application-help/.
Here is how Haddon Robinson used the application grid to get specific with his application: Knowing that, some preachers try not to exclude listeners and fall into preaching in generalities. For example, if I say, "Irritation bothers us all," I'm speaking to no one in particular. A sermon full of generalities hits no one in particular.
We do better to focus specifically on two or three types of people in a message (changing who those two or three groups are each week). The surprising thing is that the more directed and personal a message, the more universal it becomes.
I might illustrate a sermon on conflict by saying, "You live with your roommate, and your roommate has some irritating habits, like not cleaning the dishes right after the meal. Or you're married, and your husband comes home and plops himself in front of the TV without any regard for what your day has been like." Although these two scenarios don't fit all listeners, all can identify with these specific experiences and the feelings they elicit.
To help me speak to what different members of an audience may be going through, I use a suggestion given by a good friend, Don Sunukjian. I prepare my sermons using a life-situation grid.
Across the top of the grid, I label columns for men, women, singles, married, divorced, and those living together. On the side of the grid, I have rows for different age groups (youth, young adult, middle-aged, elderly), professional groups (the unemployed, the self-employed, workers, and management), levels of faith (committed Christians, doubters, cynics, and atheists), the sick and the healthy, to name a few. I develop my grid based on the congregation and community I am preaching to ( “Preaching to Everyone in Particular” Leadership, Fall 1997).
The goal is not to use every application point one might devise while filling out the grid; it’s simply a device to force the preacher to think through different kinds of applications every time he prepares a sermon.
Whether a preacher uses a grid like this or not, we would encourage pastors to think through different categories of applications and people for every sermon. Doing so will help one’s congregation learn how to apply the Bible to different areas of their lives.
I want to now discuss the Argumentation of the application, which answers your listeners’ objection to your application: “Why should I do this?” Driscoll addresses this developmental question as the fourth of the six questions he always asks as he prepares to preach.
1. The Biblical Question: What Does Scripture Say? We answer this question by Driscoll with an Explanation.
2. The Theological Question: What Does Scripture Mean? We answer this question by Driscoll with the Argumentation of explanation.
3. The Memorable Question: What is my Hook? "A word, image, concept, doctrine, emotion, or person needs to be the hook that is woven through the sermon." We answer this question, though not completely, with the MPS.
4. The Apologetical Question: Why do we Resist This Truth? We answer this with Argumentation for the Application. Driscoll states well the need for this developmental question: "Here we are assuming that people will not simply embrace God's truth but fight it with their thoughts and/or actions because they are sinners who, like Romans 1:18 says, suppress the truth. So we attempt to predict their objections so that we can answer them and remove their resistance to get them to embrace God's truth for their life" (Vintage Church: Timeless Truths and Timely Methods. Wheaton: Crossway Books, 2008, 100).
5. The Missional Question: Why Does This Matter? We answer this question by Driscoll with Application.
6. The Christological Question: How is Jesus the Hero-Savior? We would answer this with Argumentation for explanation if there is Christology in the text.
Arguing for application is one of the strengths of Donald R. Sunukjian's Invitation to Biblical Preaching. Grand Rapids: Kregel, 2007. Sunukjian gives three reasons and examples why our listeners do not practice our application.
1. Our listeners do not see the cause-effect connection.
James 1:5 presents a cause-effect connection. The cause for much of our praying is our need for God’s wisdom.
If you preach this verse after you explain, argue, and illustrate, you would apply it by saying: “You can come to God anytime. He will give you wisdom.” Your listener may need to be convinced by additional argumentation for the cause-effect connection, such as when Solomon asked God for wisdom, and God granted him his request. Or the “distraught father who stood before his kicking and screaming child. He was baffled by his son’s temper tantrums. When his son started beating his head against the floor, the father dropped his chin to his chest, shaking his head in silent prayer, ‘Help me know what to do.’ When an idea flashed, he got down on his knees, grabbed his son’s head, and said, ‘Here, let me help you bang it.’ Careful not to hurt his son, he helped him with his tantrum, instead of resisting it. His surprised son stopped, cured of using tantrums that no longer worked” (Charles Sell, The House on The Rock. Wheaton: Victor Books, 1977, p. 19).
2. Our listeners think the Biblical statement is contrary to real life.
You are preaching on Ephesians 6:2 “Honor your father and mother.” You anticipate this objection: “If you knew my parents, you wouldn’t tell me to do that. If you knew their vices . . . if you knew how manipulative they were . . . if you knew what my father did to my sisters as they were growing up . . . if you knew how my siblings and I are still trying to get rid of the baggage from living in that dysfunctional home, you wouldn’t tell me to honor my parents."
Your argumentation for your application would go like this: What do the keywords mean? “Honor” means “speak politely and respectfully to,” not necessarily “publicly praise.”
Sunukjian suggests the following:
1. Probe the alternative course of action: "If your parents are unsaved you will never win them."
2. Find positives for obeying God’s Word. “You might say to a man who finds it difficult to honor his parents: They may have been poor parents. They may have made a lot of mistakes. But they probably did some things right. Whatever their failures, we owe our parents a great debt. They gave us life. They fed us, clothed us, and put a roof over our heads for years. The human infant is not like an animal infant---able to take care of itself after a few months. Unless someone was watching out for us, and taking care of us, we would have died. Maybe your dad went to a job he hated and gritted his teeth while some supervisor gave him a bad time. Everything in your dad wanted to stuff it down the boss’s throat, but jobs were hard to come by and he was determined to provide for you. And as we think of the years of that debt, we may be able to speak quietly and respectfully in his presence.”
3. Our listeners do something that is more important to them.
The example given by Sunukjian is 1 Timothy 2:9, “In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel.” Your application of this verse to your Sunday morning listeners is, “Dress in non-provocative apparel.”
How do you deal with objections such as the teenage girl who might prayerfully commit herself on Sunday to “dress modestly to the glory of God” but then on Saturday, at the beach, she wears a bathing suit that doesn’t fit anybody’s definition of modesty and twines herself around some college guy. This doesn’t necessarily mean she’s a hypocrite. It may simply mean that though she buys modesty, she buys even more having a boyfriend or getting affirmation that her femininity is desirable.
So our Argumentation for our application would sound something like this: To get her to buy or value God’s truth most of all would require bringing up the other values on Sunday, acknowledging their tug on her, and then showing either the superior benefits of acting according to God’s truth or the dangerous side effects of acting according to the contrary values. One way or another, the goal is to help her see the biblical truth as more important” (Donald R. Sunukjian, Invitation to Biblical Preaching, 93-105).
Haddon Robinson also made these three points of application.
First, we should seek not to offend.
A young couple moved into a Chicago suburb and attended one church for several months. The church helped them through the husband's unemployment. Several times the pastor met with the man, who had advanced degrees in ecology and was interested in deeper involvement in the church.
Then he and his wife abruptly stopped coming. The pastor repeatedly tried to contact them, and finally, after several months, he was able to take the man out for lunch. He asked him why they had not come to church in such a long time.
"In several of your sermons," the man replied, "you made comments that belittled science. If that is the way you feel, I don't think we're on the same wavelength."
The pastor remembered the remarks, which were either passing comments or rhetorical flourishes contrasting the power of Christ and the weakness of human thought. But the consequence was not passing: a man who showed promise of moving into deeper discipleship had been diverted.
2. When we offend, we should apologize.
John Maxwell was extremely busy and exhausted from ministry and just hauled off and canceled his church’s Sunday evening services. There was a lot of pushback. What did he do? He publicly apologized and started back having Sunday evening services.
3. We should remember we can’t spare the truth for the sake of not offending.
But if we focus too hard on not offending, or if we read too many letters from the offended, we can become paralyzed. We start qualifying every sentence. We end up with weasel sermons that are defensive, cautious, and spineless (“Preaching to Everyone in Particular” Leadership, Fall 1997).
I want to close with McDill’s thoughts on preaching: “All preaching aims for repentance. The New Testament word for ‘repentance’ is metanoia, which basically means ‘a change of mind’” (McDill, 128). One way God changes minds in our “reproving, rebuking, and exhorting” is when we answer their objections to our applications.
How can the use of applications help pastoral preaching?
These authors connect pastoral preaching and leadership.
I make the case that these two subjects (preaching and pastoral work) must be joined in our thinking. Preaching is a pastoral work (Caldwell, Richard. Pastoral Preaching: Expository Preaching for Pastoral Work, Rainer Publishing, Kindle Edition, 2016, 17-18).
Rhetorical leadership for the purpose of this study, refers to pastoral leadership expressed as the pastor leads through the sermons preached in the church worship services. This definition is based on the principle presented by Michael Quicke, that pastors’ “preaching of God’s Word should exercise leadership by envisioning, confronting, encouraging, stretching, releasing, and uniting God’s people to live out his will” (Danny R. Cochran, “The Relationship Between Servant Leadership and Pastoral Preaching” Ph.D. diss., Carolina University, 2018, 13). (Michael J. Quicke, 360-Degree Leadership, Baker Publishing Group, 2006, Kindle Edition, 2006, p. 17)
Realizing that pastoral preaching is crucial to pastoral leadership, how can the use of applications help pastoral preaching and leadership in areas of church growth or church revitalization, counseling, training leaders, and protecting the flock from false teaching, and solving church problems?