The Big Things 2.27.2025

     The single fact to understand about the Big Things we deal with in preaching is that there are not many of them. If there were lots of big things, then we would need to reclassify or reorder our understanding. In philosophical (logical) terms this is a category mistake. These kinds of errors occur when we misalign priorities or misidentify the categories or “families” into which items should be placed for either complex analysis or simple understanding. A quick example. The phrase “when pigs fly” uses a category mistake to envision an error. The joke works…because everyone understands swine do not fit into the category of “animals which fly”. 

    In discussing focus and diligence earlier in the month we were considering how to maintain our attention during our work, the question we were really asking was “how”? In looking at the little things last week, and now, the big things, the question we are asking is “what”? 

    In short, human beings are prone to making mountains out of molehills. We exaggerate the utility or value of what we like, or what aligns with our intellectual disposition and minimize things we either dislike or don’t understand. Preachers are no less prone to this disposition than are other humans. It is for this reason that we must be ever vigilant about mastering the performative details and not confusing them for the major issues we are called to discuss in our preaching. 

    In proceeding let’s examine some basic Biblical guidelines.  This is not exhaustive, but it does give us a clear picture of how one of our apostolic predecessors conceived of the “big things” essential to Christian doctrine. Bold print is mine to demonstrate how Paul thinks, in this one instance about what is essential. 

“but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles,” (1 Corinthians 1:23 ESV)

“Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand,” (1 Corinthians 15:1 ESV)

“Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.” (1 Corinthians 15:11 ESV)

    These quotes help delineate that the biggest big thing of all is Christ and the events of His passion. Paul goes on to provide some specifics: 

“  For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.” (1 Corinthians 15:3-8 ESV)

    In his long ministry Paul addressed many issues. The Corinthian correspondence is a laundry-list of problem issues and problem behaviors in the Church. As focused as we become on distracting minutiae, we need to subscribe to Paul’s view that the biggest thing of all Is Jesus-His life, death, burial, and resurrection. 

    What Paul says provides a basic blueprint for how we should approach the central matters of the Christian faith. The nature and person of Jesus, His role in saving us and calling us together into his Church and calling to make disciples. In proper theological terms the Big Things will generally be concerned with Christology and Ecclesiology. And I know that some of you just threw a flag on that last statement, since it contradicts multiple decades of felt-needs topical preaching. I believe my contention is correct for a simple reason. If we are wrong about Jesus and the nature and purpose of His Church, all the other “-ologies” whatever importance we assign them will be equally wrong. The Christian faith is about Jesus. If we start, there and focus on Him and His Gospel we will be better equipped to consider the smaller doctrines. If we are wrong about Jesus…none of the rest matters. 

    What’s that? Some of you say, “There are no small doctrines if something is in the Bible!” Good luck with that. To defend everywhere is to defend nowhere. To protect everything is to protect nothing. Focusing on the decor or finishing of a structure is pointless (sometimes even immoral) when the foundation is crumbling. And friends, the foundation of the Christian faith is under attack. Not from without, but from within. Not by enemies, but by so-called friends who would undermine the faith to make it more attractive to some, and those who would radicalize it to make it more useful to others. This multifaceted attack on the Church, by reducing it to popularity or ideology are equally lethal to the cause of Christ. 

     We serve a crucified and risen Lord. He is a Lord who is well aware of our weaknesses-and our strengths. I see nothing in the New Testament that points to the Church focusing on “4 ways to improve our finances”, “Six weeks to a Happier Marriage.” Or “5 ways to Hate Your Neighbor.” The focus on practical, common-sense, “little thing” preaching has reduced many congregations to gatherings of self-help junkies who don’t understand the faith and think that the Christian life is a matter of doing many, many, many little things correctly. The word for that is legalism. 

    Others see the task of the Church as being a moral police force for a fallen world. The sins the Bible mentions are to be attacked and eliminated. Everyone must get in line, even those who have not been converted. The word for that? Also, legalism—but of a different kind. The Pharisees and Sadducees were both legalistic parties. They just had different conceptions of enforcement. The Pharisees wanted everyone in their tent, the Sadducees were happy with the rich and powerful. 

    The signal difference between sectarian Judaism and Christianity is the New Testament doctrine (derived from an understanding of Who Jesus is and what He came to do) of regeneration. The behaviors of the Christian life were not intended to be enforced on those who had not come to saving faith in Jesus and who were not immersed into the life of His Body. And we should not expect non-Christians be behave like they are. It is a credit to the faithfulness of the early Church that “Christian Ethics” transformed the ethics of the Roman and all successive Empires until the Enlightenment. This allowed far too many Christians to suffer under the delusion that the Christian faith consisted solely of right behavior. We are at a turning point in history. The Post-Modern world reflects the circumstances of the first century world. Reacting with anger toward unregenerate people doing unregenerate things will certainly prevent the Church from reaching the unrepentant world with the Gospel. Enforcing Christian behavior as a universal norm invalidates the Christian plea that we must become “New men in Christ.” 

What then is the solution?

“preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.” (2 Timothy 4:2-4 ESV)

    The mythology Paul envisions is the fruitless pursuit of little things. Some of them are good. Obviously, some behaviors are better than others. We do need to have a correct understanding of all Biblical doctrine. And that means we must prioritize what Scripture prioritizes even if it’s not popular or sexy. We must be committed to putting First Things first and recognizing that the inspiration of Scripture was not designed to undermine its variety. If you aspire to be a Biblical preacher, you need to become accustomed to preparing and preaching weighty sermons that subsume the whole of Scripture beneath the single Big Thing, Jesus. 

    Until and unless we do that the Church will continue be handicapped in this age when cultural forces are capable of hijacking many if not all our little things, twisting them into cultural-driven hobbyhorses that set the faithful aflame but do little to bring any light to a fallen world. 

    Our job is not to make people religious. Our job is not to make people better. We can’t really fix people and our efforts to triage their spiritual pain eventually evaporate. The job is not simple to do but it is simply stated:

“Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ.” (Colossians 1:28 ESV)