The venue for this year's EMA, the Barbican conference centre, is easy to find. Honest. Just follow the directions on our website. If you've booked, these will be emailed to you shortly. It takes about 5 mins from Moorgate (see below) or Barbican. 10 mins from Bank or Liverpool Street. 

Paternoster have done us a huge favour by collecting together a new Packer anthology focused on the Bible. It will be one of featured books at the EMA. The volume contains a collection of essays, interviews, articles and excerpts all about the word of God and engaging with it. It's a gold mine. I found myself underlining on nearly every page. It's classic Packer, readable, yet deep; honest yet perceptive. There are some really good chapters on preaching in particular, including re-asserting a classic evangelical view of preaching as something which mediates not only God's authority but also his presence: something we all believe but perhaps we need to be more explicit about?

Here, as a taster, are Packer's convictions that he believe every preacher must share. Each, of course, warrants further comment from Packer, but these are the kind of insights which makes reading him so rewarding. 

• Scripture is revelation
• God is glorious
• People are lost
• Christ is unchanging
• Persuasion is needed
• Satan is active
• God's Spirit is sovereign

Amen and amen! 

Today it's four weeks to go until the Evangelical Ministry Assembly. At this stage we're normally full – indeed if were still at our old venue, we would be closed for new applications about now. But we're at a new venue precisely so we can accommodate more people and we'd love to see you. Even if you've not been for a while, why not set aside some of the EMA days (Monday 24 June to Wednesday 26 June) to come and join us? And why not bring someone along? Whom could you encourage in ministry – perhaps a beleagured local friend who needs the solidarity of your fellowship and help? Perhaps a new local minister that you could invite along as a way of getting to know him?

If you're outside of London we've got some free accommodation options where local church members have very graciously offered rooms for nothing. Please do contact the office if you would like to make the most of one of these and save on train fares. We look forward to seeing you. You cam book here. 

Got a proposal through today for the EMA. I was sent a marketing email telling me that I could spruce up my event with DrumCafe who would put a drum on every seat. 

Give everyone a drum and watch the room unite and transform into a spectacular drumming orchestra

Tempting, I know. Mr Lucas would, of course, lead the group.

PT publishes two series of books – one is the well-known Teaching series (more about that another time). But we also have a secondary series which we call, informally at least, the Practical Preacher series. These are books that are useful for preachers and churches and which address issues particular to preachers and preaching. Our latest in this series is called Ministry Medical and is by Jonathan Griffiths, one of our teaching staff. The book is based on 2 Timothy and is, in essence, a checklist for those in word ministry. It sets out Paul's priorities and in 36 short chapters encourages us to measure ourselves against the Apostle and what he says to young pastor Timothy. It's the kind of book you might read a chapter of per week or even read together with leadership teams (I'm going to suggest ours does that). It's challenging and convicting, but also hopeful in that it holds out the word of grace to us and shows that we can, prayerfully and in the power God provides, be more the men that God calls us to be.

Peter Adam wrote "This book by Jonathan Griffiths is a brilliantly effective study, which makes good use of 2 Timothy to give us a diagnostic tool to assess the health of our ministry. It would be equally productive for those starting out in ministry, those in their middle years, and those nearing the finishing line! It is simple and straightforward: the format of questions and comments works very well, and make the book very user-friendly. This book will help you fight the good fight, finish the race, and keep the faith. Highly commended"

So, a few responses to my post last week about running on empty. Thank you to those who wrote. The responses all tended to ask the same question: how, recognising that we're depleted emotionally, do we recharge? We, for the most part, know how to do this spiritually and physically, but emotionally….? Short answer: I'm not too sure myself and I'm working through it. But here, for what it's worth, are my initial observations. These are not particularly biblical, or even from years of experience. They are simply things that I'm finding useful in the moment. 

1. I've had to recognise that the emotional is not separate from the physical, nor the spiritual. I am a whole man! Everything is connected to everything. At one level, emotional energy is spiritual energy is physical energy. So, taking care of my physical and spiritual self has vast benefits for my emtional self.
2. Sleep is a remarkable restorative for every part of life. I have found CJ Mahaney's sermon on this particularly useful.
3. I find that being disciplined about planning times for things I enjoy has helped me enormously. I don't know if there's any science behind this, but lack of emotional energy has meant that I have not been able to be joyful about things, so I decided to try to restore some of that energy by planning….well, enjoyable things. 
4. Intimacy in relationships is important. For marrieds that means sex and time with spouse (these go together!). But there is intimacy (of the right sort) in all kinds of relationships. I've planned a day at the British Museum with a good friend. I already know it will be emotionally recharging. 
5. A break is important. Next week is our school half term and I've planned some time away. I'm going to disconnect my iPhone's work email account. So there.
6. I've tried to build in some escapism. That sounds pretty dodgy, so let me explain. Ministry is emotionally draining and all encompassing. I find it quite hard to read a Christian book, for example, without thinking about whom it might also be suitable for in the congregation or which fellow pastor might benefit. I need a break from that. So, a good fiction book I can lose myself in (or a series) or a suitable TV series (Mrs R and I have been watching Borgen) helps me switch off from emotional outgoings and, it seems, helps with the ingoings.  

You'll have other ideas, and much more spiritual ones (this is deliberately not a biblical post). Just don't ignore the issue….

There’s an article in this month’s Briefing that I liked so much that we asked permission to print off a copy for every Cornhill student.  It’s called ‘Deadly, dull, and boring’ (now there’s a catchy title).  It’s an edited extract from a forthcoming book from Matthias Media on how not to preach deadly, dull and boring sermons.  The book’s by Phil Campbell and is called Saving Eutychus (geddit?).

In the article Phil offers ten tips.  None of them are about showmanship that attracts attention away from Scripture and towards the preacher.  They’re all obvious things about effective oral communication.  And, like many obvious things, they’re often only obvious when someone points them out to you.  A crucial one that I think would improve many worthy sermons at a stroke is this:  use shorter sentences. 

Here’s an example from me of a seemingly decent opening line in a sermon:  “If you watch the news on TV or read the newspapers, aren’t you often struck by the way in which humanity does not seem able to get any better and keeps repeating the same mistakes?”  Now apply Phil’s principle to that and you get something like this instead:  “Watch the TV news.  Does it look like the world’s getting better and better?  Read your newspaper.  Is humanity learning from its mistakes?”

The same content, but much punchier and therefore more effective.  Not dumbed down, just expressed more engagingly.  And as an extra bonus the preacher also get the thrill of breaking all those rules about writing style that your English teacher taught you  –  if you went to that kind of school.

One other thing.  Before I joined the Cornhill staff I used to read The Proclaimer blog (honest), and was always impressed that Adrian’s blogs had time-stamps like 7.07am and 7.16am.  I have now discovered to my relief that the blogs are written in advance [Ed: not too much in advance, please note!] and the time-stamp gives the time that the server automatically releases them, or something like that.  We try to work hard around here, but not stupidly hard.  For the record, I’m finishing this at 8.50am in the real world.

In my most recent post I was recommending an approach to sermon applications from biblical narratives which avoids both simply drawing out moral examples and just preaching biblical-theological points which can feel pretty same-y across lots of different narratives.  In this post I want to suggest one possible underlying theological reason why well trained expository preachers in our context are often nervous of moving from preaching the biblical-theological point, e.g. David is a type of Christ winning the victory for us  –  to also preaching David as a positive example for the believer to follow, e.g. David as a model of faithful action when the honour of God is maligned.

My suggestion goes like this:  these two strands of application follow from different aspects of God’s act of salvation in Christ.  The ‘biblical-theological’ application is an outworking of Christ’s substitutionary work:  he died on the cross in our place, doing what we could never do for ourselves.  Hence in seeking to apply 1 Samuel ch.17 we look for what is unique about David in his action on behalf of Israel.

On the other hand, the ‘moral example’ strand of application is an outworking of Christ’s representative work, in particular in the union of the believer with him:  we were united with him in his death and raised to new life with him.  A key consequence of this is that the believer ought to be growing in Christlikeness, obedient as he was, self-sacrificial as he was.  Hence in seeking to apply 1 Samuel ch.17 we will look for what David, even in his function as a type of Christ, shares in common with faithful Christian believers.

My hunch is that some conservative evangelical preachers who have (rightly) drawn deeply on such books as Goldsworthy’s Gospel and Kingdom are nervous about this second kind of ‘moral example’ application because we have tended to be much less familiar in our piety and preaching with Christ’s representative work than with his substitutionary work.

Maybe this puts it more simply:  theologically, we should preach (e.g.) David as a unique type of Christ because of what Christ has done for us that we could never do for ourselves.  And we should also preach David as an example for the believer because in his role as a type of Christ he demonstrates some of the Christlikeness that we, in our union with Christ, ought to be growing in.

Or even more simply:  we’re not David, and also (from another perspective) we are David.  The former is what prevents the latter being the dreaded ‘pure moralism’;  the latter is what prevents the former from making all the richness of scriptural narrative seem essentially pointless.  Such is the mystery of God’s saving action for us in Christ, and therefore such can be the richness of biblical application to those who are in Christ.

Many preachers in conservative evangelical circles say that they find narrative the hardest parts of Scripture to preach.  I think that is particularly true of the way in which we draw appropriate applications from biblical narratives.  Here’s the issue for a preacher who already knows that what he ought to be is expounding the text:  once I’ve got to the heart of what this passage is really about (what we call at Cornhill the Big Idea, but other names are available), in what particular direction and from which particular angle should I apply that truth? (in Cornhill parlance, what’s the Aim?).

Graham Goldsworthy’s book Gospel and Kingdom many years ago had, so it seems, a significant influence in rightly warning preachers away from simply mining biblical narratives for moral lessons (stuff like “which ‘Goliaths’ in your life should you be slaying?”). That is an extremely helpful corrective, but it can sometimes leave a question hanging.  I’ve often heard that question expressed like this:  if I’ve taken that kind of warning on board, how can I avoid having essentially the same application in every single sermon of a series I preach on, say, the book of Judges?  Won’t that approach lead me to preach just the great theological themes of a passage (nothing wrong with that in itself), but to do so quite repetetively and without paying a great deal of attention to the details of character and plot in each particular text?  (To be fair to Goldsworthy, he may deal with that.  I ought to re-read Gospel and Kingdom.)

I recently came across this two-fold piece of advice in drawing application from narratives:  ‘identify the central act of God in a narrative and observe the way the characters in the drama respond to him’ (Daniel Doriani, Putting the Truth to Work: the theory and practice of biblical application, p.181).  The first instruction here is essentially in the Goldsworthy line:  avoid moralism and preach what God is doing in this event.  The second instruction, though, leads us to the details of the characters and plot in each particular narrative.  Doriani is wanting the preacher to hold the characters up to his hearers as models and examples, whether good or bad, of different responses to the actions of God.  Thus in 1 Samuel 17 (Doriani’s major example) we must certainly preach that believers now are first of all to identify ourselves with the Israelites cheering on the hillside while they watch God’s appointed champion defeat God’s enemy on their behalf.  But in addition to that we can and should also preach David as an example to follow in caring deeply enough for the honour of God to act bravely, and also his brother Eliab and Saul as negative examples, in their own separate ways, of a response to the action of God narrated in the text.

This avoids moralism.  It also helps avoid same-y expressions of good biblical theology that might pay too little attention to the details of each particular narrative.

Expository preaching, says Dick Lucas, is a mindset not a method. That's a really helpful thought and one I've been coming back to again and again recently. Someone asked me last week at our younger ministers conference whether there is a PT approved (!!) set length of passage to preach. That's a fairly bizarre question when you stop to think of it. Every text has a context right up to the context of the whole Bible and if you never stop saying 'this portion I've got belongs in a wider context' you just end up with the Bible as your text – and therefore one (rather long) sermon! So, a bizarre question. But the right answer is that we teach a mindset not a method. 

In other words, the answer to the question is no. We do encourage preachers to take whole sections that belong together, especially in OT narrative. But you can preach a text in an expository way just as you can a longer section. (Though preaching a text which is faithful to its context and setting is much harder than a longer section; even though it may appear otherwise). You can even, I believe, have a topical series which is still expository. A wedding sermon can be expository, as can a youth club talk. 

All that we teach tends to focus on handling the word of God accurately. These lessons apply whether you're preaching on Acts 2 in its entirety or just verse 42. Both can be expository sermons. Because expository preaching is a mindset not a method.