Persuasive Preaching

Good preaching is persuasive.  It is not just a lecture about some aspect of God's character, or a lesson on church history.  Those things have their place in the life of the church, but not as a steady diet offered from the pulpit.  Good preaching enables people to connect with Jesus Christ.  The church seems to have lost the urgency of calling people to a first encounter with the living risen Jesus Christ.  Those in the pulpit appear to preach with the assumption that everyone in the church has already chosen to walk in a personal relationship with Jesus, or that such a relationship is not really necessary.  Either way it is a tragic assumption.   

I remember the years when Baptism of the Lord Sunday was preached with an invitation for people to come forward for baptism and a personal moment of professing faith in Christ.  In the beginning I was surprised that someone always came forward and then later on I came to expect it.  It seemed that whenever that invitation was given on that Sunday, someone who had not planned on it happening got up from their pew to be touched by baptismal waters.    

It would be a different church today if we could once again begin to live within that expectation.  In my Methodist tradition it would mean that the baptismal font hidden in the back corners of the sanctuary would be given a prominent place once again.  It would mean that there would always be water in the font.  It would mean that an invitation to receive Christ would be the norm instead of the exception.  It would mean that preachers would have no reason to be ashamed that a year or two or three had passed since someone said "Yes" to Jesus at the altar of the church.  It would mean living in the excitement of new beginnings for such is what happens when a single soul hears the call to accept Christ and begins the walk of faith toward Home.