ArticleBlog | Preaching in the context of disciple-making
Preaching in the context of disciple-making
Author: Andy PeckPost Date: 16.06.21
There’s a frequently quoted suggestion that the word ‘crisis’ in Chinese is made up of two characters, which individually mean ‘danger’ and, intriguingly, ‘opportunity’. Whilst a native Chinese speaker would apparently take issue with the slightly simplistic and potentially misleading translation, the idea has stuck – alongside phrases such as ‘Never waste a good crisis’, often attributed to Winston Churchill, amongst others. What both thoughts have in common is the idea that good change can come out of bad circumstance. A more reliable quotation, and more specifically Christian, comes from C S Lewis: ‘God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pain.’1
The past year has been painful for us all. There has been an appalling loss of lives and livelihoods and even those of us, who have not been directly affected in those ways have suffered in others. The pandemic has exposed issues in society… but also in the church. In our pain, many of us have heard the voice of God calling us to refocus on prayer, on godly rhythms and, above all, on discipleship. One effect of losing the wonderful privilege of being able to gather together has been that we may have realised that we were overly dependent on others for our spiritual health. The gathering of God’s people is right and necessary, but there is always a danger – especially in larger churches or conferences – that it makes participation hard, reducing us to spectators or, even worse, consumers. Being disciples has to start with our own responsibility for following Jesus, and our relationship with him needs to be as much nurtured in the secret place as in the gathered congregation. Perhaps this pandemic crisis is indeed an opportunity to redress that balance? But does our preaching in the gathered space support personal discipleship or subtly undermine it?
