Jesus’ Preaching vs Modern Preachers

I assume most of our readers know the name Sewell Hall.  If you don’t, he’s a 94 year old gospel preacher living in the Atlanta area who has dedicated his life to living for Christ.

Brother Hall is  known as a careful Bible student, a faithful proclaimer of the Word, an excellent song leader, as well as a thought-provoking writer and author.  Among his published works are two of my favorites, The Winter of Life: Redeeming the Time, which encourages those of  us as we’re growing older, and Hallmarks: Lights in the World, true stories about every day Christians who are letting their light shine and making a difference in the world.

Today’s facebook Friday is from Sewell Hall’s pen.  Chad Brewer recently posted this on his facebook page. It’s classic Sewell Hall. Read and profit.

“Generally speaking, our generation has an aversion to authority, yet those who heard the Lord’s great sermon observed that “He taught them as one having authority.”

We prefer sermons that deal in generalities; Jesus dealt with specifics.

We prefer preachers who praise rather than condemn; Jesus condemned not only wrong conduct but wrong motives as well.

We object to “name calling”; Jesus unabashedly named unfavorably the leading religious party of His day.

We favor motivation by promise of rewards but Jesus, while offering rewards, did not hesitate to threaten “hell fire.”

Our society seeks instant gratification while the promises of Jesus are primarily for life hereafter.

We tend to think of everything as relative, but Jesus spoke in absolutes.

We criticize as simplistic any preaching that “makes everything black and white,” yet Jesus repeatedly divided His subjects into just two categories: right and wrong.

We applaud broad-mindedness and seek the easy way, but Jesus warned that His way is narrow and the gate is difficult.

Jesus knew that in every generation those who would follow the heavenly way would be few compared to the many who would reject it. His concern was not with quantity but with quality. Consequently, He compromised His standards not one iota to accommodate the weaknesses of men or the peculiarities of His generation. Had He made any compromise at all the resulting kingdom would not have been the kingdom of Heaven.”