The Voices of Sinners and Saints

I've been listening to a lot of sermons at work lately. The old
mainstays have fed me pretty well. Sermons from the U.K - All Souls
Anglican Church (http://www.allsouls.org) in London, England and Eden
Baptist Church (http://www.eden-cambridge.org) in Cambridge have given
me much to think about. Stateside, I have listened to most every
sermon by Father Liias at Christ Church Episcopal in Hamilton, MA.
Sometimes I really wish I were a charismatic Anglican...maybe I am. Also, I have
listened to a few from Bethel Baptist Church in North Wilkesboro, NC.
My advice: stay away, far away from this guy. If I recall, his name
is Donnie Shumate. He makes sure to remind his listeners that he is
not a theological giant. I concur with his self-assessment. And that
is fine I guess. If his members are not theologically astute and
don't care to learn about anything substantial, then everything works
out for him and to those he speaks. Problem is, he also purports to
be Biblical and gospel-centered, but you guessed it - he is anything
but Biblical or gospel-centered. He fails to take any text seriously.
Rather, he reads a verse or two and then rails on his fellow brothers
and sisters about their lack of convictions, their compromise, and
their weaknesses. He then gets on his soapbox and preaches on one of
his pet topics ("Biblical" separation, the preservation of the Word,
etc.) then throws on the "plan of salvation" (with a Pelagian twist)
at the end and calls it a Biblical sermon. An example: he preaches on
the axe head that floats. He calls it a Type – which represents a
sinner that is broken and separated from God. The river is a Type of
death. This is the antithesis of being biblical and faithful to the
text. Everything just becomes an example to follow, or a type that
points to something else (never Jesus, of course) I have emailed the
pastor with some questions regarding some stuff he has said; he was
pretty nasty in his response. I guess I shouldn't be too surprised.

I also have listened to a few sermons from my high-school alumni church
links.  Immanuel Baptist,
(http://www.immanuelbaptist.org) in Richmond, and another church,
Brick Presbyterian (http://www.brickchurch.org), in Manhattan both
have audio sermons. I wasn't particularly impressed with a sermon by
Rev. Sparky Pritchard of Immanuel. I can't remember the title, unfortunately. I
did learn an interesting fact about Paul's thorn in the flesh. Other
than that, it was merely a moralistic message instructing his
parishioners about arrogance, pride, and egotism. Also, I learned
that God does not bless the proud. That was pretty much it. I rate
this sermon a 2 out of 10. I also listened to a guest pastor (Don
Whitney of Spiritual Disciplines fame) preach a Christmas message from
Matthew 2. It was decent, but not particularly helpful. I rate it
about a 5 out of 10. The sermon from the Brick Presbyterian Church
was entitled Strictly Ballroom. Pretty good stuff. The minister said
much more (to me anyway) in sixteen minutes than Sparky and Don said
in about 90 minutes combined. A smart guy I can tell. It was a
warning against formulating, codifying, and creating strictly ballroom
religion. You would have to see the movie or at least have a sense of
a brief summary of the movie of the same title to really get what he
was driving toward. A brief summary - the irony is we try to be
precise, predictable, graceful, and controllable when dealing with the
Church - the exact opposite of the way the Holy Spirit actually
works…he blows where he wills. Our challenge is to ballroom dance in
the church fresh with passion – wow'em with good old-fashioned
ballroom dancing done with a new few steps. This is indeed the
challenge of the church - to contextualize the gospel. To dance the
old steps in a way that is so fresh and so spirited that a lot of
people want to clap along. We pray, come Holy Spirt come. But if He
should ever actually come, frightening things may come to us that we
aren't particularly ready for. If we dare to pray that God the Holy
Spirit will transform us and those prayers be answered, be prepared.
Sometimes you will want to come along, but sometimes you will be
tempted to pull the plug before he is finished working. I also
listened to the latest sermon from Falls Road Baptist on their website
(http://www.fallsroadbaptist.org) . It was titled "Calvanism: What is
it and am I One." How one could be a "calvanism" I'm not exactly
sure, but I presume most knew what he meant. There are many in my former hometown who are concerned with the new minister's theology on grace and the sovereignty of God.  In my opinion, they don't have to be (unless
they had hoped he was Reformed – which I did). Anyway, he's not a
Calvinist…As you probably noticed, it was not even spelled correctly
on the sermon title. That should tell us something about his
theological leanings.  I think a Calvinist would make sure to
spell his own label correctly.
The best I can tell; he is a moderate Calvinist. He also mentioned
a former pastor and current member who considers himself a moderate Calvinist so the congregation
wouldn't throw tomatoes at him while he was speaking. I do give him
props, however he may feel about me (another story), for letting it all hang out.
Anyway, to further bolster his position and not look too bad in front
of the crowd, Scot made sure to mention that the former pastor told him that his
father (also a former, former pastor, I think - tpd2100 would know for certain) was a stronger Calvinist than both of them combined. I had
heard this from someone about six or seven years ago. Guess it was
true. I'm glad it was. Anyway, he explained what he did believe
(which is essentially almost four out of five points of the system),
but then denied adhering to any of the rest of Reformed theology. So,
in my opinion, he's not really even close to Reformed/Calvinistic -
just a typical Dispensationlist Baptist with a little better (more
biblical) understanding of election than the average Baptist preacher.
I give the sermon a 7.5 for clarity and charity. Of course, I feel
his theology was a bit off, but I won't let that affect my rating.
I also listened to the sermon of an alumnus who has somehow found himself in the very conservative Presbyterian in America (PCA) denomination.  How he ended up there, I am not sure.  From private converstaions with him, I have gathered he is definitely much less evangelical than I.  Anyway, his sermon was entitled Is Jesus Politically Correct.
I listened to it I think about ten months ago and again last week. This was a very good
sermon. The sermon did
not just have just have Jesus in the title – it was about Jesus. As
he reiterated, the real call is to be Jesus. That's the call - we get
to tell the good news. We get to be the good guy. We are free not to
judge, we are free to point others to the Savior, Jesus. He has given
us everything to be his disciple.  I wish
Shelton Sandford, the senior pastor, would allow him to preach more, so I would have a good way to
spend time at work.   I have
listened to over a hundred sermons the past few months, and you would
not believe how many pastors and churches talk about how they preach
Christ. In reality, they leave him out. It runs the gamut from
Baptist to Presbyterian to Lutheran to Methodist to everything in between. On a
side note, I have heard more Biblical sermons from even a couple
"almost" orthodox Unitarian ministers than I have from the ones
(mostly Baptists) who regard almost all other Christians with
suspicion, superiority, and even distrust of their professed faith in
Jesus. These pastors claim to preach the Bible, but rather they read
a verse, maybe even two or three, and then get off on their favorite
topic of the day. I think that's why I like the Anglican church so
much. They claim to be Biblical and then back up the claim by
actually taking the Scriptures seriously. They - for some odd reason -
preach from the text. Even the liturgy. It's mostly just a reading
of Scripture. I read a few printed sermons by Barbara Brown-Taylor,
who was preaching a Good Friday sermon series. It was pretty awesome.
She brought out things I had never even thought of before.
Unfortunately, she has retired from the Episcopal priesthood in the
diocese of Atlanta, I think. Her former parish was too small to
accommodate the crowds.
Another treasure I have discovered is Holy Trinity Brompton Church
(another Anglican church in London). Check their site out at
http://www.htb.org.uk/ - it would be well worth your time to download
the Sunday talks as Nicky Gumbel refers to them. You may have heard
of Nicky Gumbel. He is the brainchild behind the successful outreach
program ALPHA. It is being used by churches worldwide. In fact,  E is on the ALPHA board at my church (http://www.fcchamilton.org)
and is getting ready to gear up for the spring session. She and the
rest of the ALPHA team have run into a few problems with the church
board of elders, but that's a topic for a post in the future. Oh, if interested in the Is Jesus Politically Correct sermon, the link to the church is Westminster Presbyterian, Rock Hill, SC (http://www.wpcgo.com)