Darrill L. Guder advocates that the western Church see itself as a peripheral movement, engaging its culture as a missional movement. If the Church is primarily a missional movement, is it still the Church? Some descriptions of what some emergent churches are doing seem more like a youth evangelism enterprise than a church. Marva J. Dawn describes this as “dumbing down” the Church. If emerging churches are primarily missional outreach vehicles, how and where will believing Christians be raised to maturity in Christian community? The regular exposition of the Scriptures through preaching has been a vital element in the formation of the Church and Christian people.
John Wallis is on the editorial team for www.next-wave.org, an Internet magazine that is engaging the emerging community. In an e-mail he writes about his emergent acquaintances, "I wonder if any of them even preach anymore. Most of the people I know are involved or leading missional communities, and I am not sure preaching as you are describing in your survey happens anymore. The first question made me stop. Most of the people I know are in communites (sic) that are less than 30. I still attend a large suburban church and (sic) not sure why at times, (sic) hear preaching every week from a gifted speaker but there is usually something missing. I sometimes wonder if preaching will slowly die out. I think it is starting to in missional communities maybe not, or maybe it has just taken another form."
It is because of the shortcomings of a primarily “missional” church that Stan Grenz argues that there is
An insufficient understanding of the role of doctrine in Christian life, or in formation of Christian identity…being Apostolic in doctrine is crucial to Christian identity, both as a community, as well as each of us as individual Christians. In His 'Preaching and Preachers', D. M. Lloyd-Jones wrote, “Is it not clear as you take a bird’s-eye view of Church history, that the decadent periods and eras in the history of the Church have always been those periods when preaching had declined? What is it that always heralds the dawn of a Reformation or of a Revival? It is renewed preaching.”
In his book, The Preacher’s Portrait, John Stott uses five biblical words to expertly examine the cross-generational attributes and responsibilities of a Christian preacher. He is a steward, a herald, a witness, a father, and a servant. The steward is the metaphor that best helps in examining the function of preaching in every age. A steward cares for another’s goods in trust. He does not own the goods himself. He dispenses the other’s goods as the other demands. He also serves the other’s guests. The owner’s guests have not come to visit with the steward; they have come to visit the owner and to be served by the steward along with the owner. The Word of God is entrusted to Christians. It does not belong to anyone. It belongs to God. Preachers in every generation must care for it in trust and dispense it with reverence and awe to those who gather to listen to his Word. Christians desire to hear the Word of their Master. Christians would be most disobedient stewards to serve the Master’s guests our own measly goods or our Master’s goods pretending they are our own.
In 'I Believe in Preaching', Stott writes, "Preaching is indispensable to Christianity. Without preaching a necessary part of its authenticity has been lost. For Christianity is, in its very essence, a religion of the Word of God. No attempt to understand Christianity can succeed which overlooks or denies the truth that the living God has taken the initiative to reveal himself savingly to fallen humanity; or that his self-revelation has been given by the most straightforward means of communication known to us, namely by word and words; or that he calls upon those who have heard his Word to speak it to others."
One popular compromise with postmodern culture is the rejection of expository preaching because it is seen as too methodological. It is true that when any spiritual exercise in the Church – including the exposition of Scripture – is reduced to techniques, it destroys the authenticity of the Church. James Houston writes, "What is destroying Christianity is the marketeering of Christianity…Disciple-making is not about replicable, transferable methods, but about the mystery of two walking together. Methods treat discipleship as a problem to be solved, but mentoring treats discipleship as a relationship to be lived."
Whether it is mentoring or preaching, the authentic work of Church leaders is to do what they have always been called to do. But they must do it by the Spirit in the context of their present culture. Leonard Sweet argues, “Christians should not embrace a postmodern worldview; we must not adapt to postmodernity…but we do need to incarnate the timeless in the timely.” What would this look like in a postmodern context?
