Preaching and Preachers

The Congregationanswer to all that is that people have always found this language to bestrange. The answer to the argument that people in this post-Christianage do not understand terms like Justification, Sanctification andGlorification is simply to ask another question. When did peopleunderstand them? Whendid the unbeliever understand this language?The answer is: Neverl These terms are peculiar and special to theGospel. It is our business as preachers to show that our gospel isessentially different and that we are not talking about ordinarymatters. We must emphasise the fact that we are talking about somethingunique and special. We must lead people to expect this; and sowe are to assert it. Our business is to teach people the meaning ofthese terms. They do not decide and determine what is to be preachedand how: it is we that have the Revelation, the Message, and we haveto make this understood. That was the great principle on which theProtestant Reformers worked. That is why they produced their newtranslations; they wanted the message as they put it, 'to be understandedof the people'. There is all the difference in the world betweenthe failure of a II1aD to understand Latin and his failure to understandthe terms connected with salvation, such as Justification. It is alwaysright that the Bible and preaching should be in the native language ofany people, butthat still leavesuntouched the problem of understandingthe special terminology o£ salvation. 'This is the special businessof preaching. We should not expect people to understand these terms;the whole point of preaching is to give them this understanding. 'Thenatural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they arefoolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they arespiritually discerned' (I Cor. 2:14). We do well to heed the words ofProfessor J. H. S. Burleigh in his Croall Lectures on St. Augustine'sPhilosophy and especially on Augustine's City of God. QuotingAugustine he says:'If Moses were alive, I would lay hold of him and ask him andentreat him to unfold these things to me. I would offer my bodilyears to the sounds breaking forth from his mouth. But ifhe should13 1