Advent HOPE Sabbath School 2012

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Advent HOPE Sabbath School

Alistair Huong

How to Listen to Sermons: What Every AudioVerse Listener Ought to Hear

Father in heaven, we're thankful for the Sabbath, for the blessing that it has been to us already.

I ask that you will guide us this afternoon as we share some time together, as we investigate and as we think about how to be not just hearers of the word, but doers, and that we can be faithful even as listeners to sermons in this modern age.

So may your spirit guide us in this discussion now in Jesus' name, amen.

So the message this afternoon, how to listen to sermons, what every audioverse listener ought to hear.

I could take the approach of the pragmatic approach, how do you use the website?

I could flash up the website, you know, recommendations, start here, listen to this, in this order.

How do you use a search function and the topics?

Or, I know people have frequently shared how they use the website or the content from the website and when they listen to it.

While they're driving to work, while they're in the shower, while they're jogging.

A lot of people actually listen while they're exercising, believe it or not.

Some people listen, this is a good 1, they listen to sermons to put them to sleep at night.

I guess there could be worse things to do.

So There could be all of these ways of how to listen to sermons, how to utilize the website, but really what I'm more burdened about are the spiritual principles, spiritual principles to apply as listeners, as users of the resources that we have, and that's really where we're going to be headed.

So I hope that what I'll be sharing with you today will be founded on God's Word and on his principles.

So if you have your Bibles, I hope you have them handy.

I do have the projector and the slides, but I don't believe in putting all the scriptures on the screen.

I'll just be flashing the references, but we'll have to look in the Bibles to follow along.

So to begin, I want to spend a few moments thinking about the purpose of sermons.

Because there are a lot of similar means and methods of communication as used today.

If you haven't noticed, recently we just had a conclusion to another presidential election.

And What do the candidates do everywhere they go?

What happens when you're in your English 101 class?

English 101 is probably more writing, but you get the idea.

Giving speeches, standing up, and delivering a message using words, a one-way type of communication, is a common method of communicating ideas and calling to action and all of these things throughout the ages.

What's the difference with a sermon versus just a speech?

I think the difference comes from the Bible.

So let's take a look at a couple verses to start off our presentation this afternoon.

2 verses, there probably are many more, but this will form a foundation to what we're going to be going through.

2 Timothy chapter 4, beginning, well I guess we're just going to read verse 2.

It says, preach the word, be instant in season, out of season.

Reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.

So the first passage here, Paul is giving some education, he's giving some encouragement to his protege Timothy, and he says, you, actually in the previous verse you can see that this is not just a recommendation.

Paul says, I charge thee, as the minister of the gospel, your responsibility is to preach the word.

It's not just something that God happens to say, you know, it would be a nice idea if you ever get a chance to preach.

No, this is God's designated means, 1 of his designated means for communication.

It says here, reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering, and doctrine.

Those are some of the things that sermons are meant for.

Reproving, rebuking, exhorting, and teaching.

We're going to come back to that, but let's continue on.

Actually let's read verse 14 and then we'll go to verse 17.

Verse 14, how then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed?

And how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard?

So we're also in the context of speaking about preaching here.

It says, So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

So Paul here in Romans gives another angle to the importance of preaching.

Preaching is required to communicate the gospel.

How will they hear unless there someone is sent to them and how will someone be sent or rather how can they hear without a preacher?

And so here the preacher is to develop faith because faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God.

Sermons, the purpose of sermons, they are for correction, reprove, rebuke, right?

Correction, For exhortation, that's another word for encouragement and admonition, and also for education.

It's not just a communication of intellectual ideas.

We're gonna come back to this thought later on.

And that is sermons are not a form of entertainment.

And number 4, this is something that I heard a preacher or a homiletics professor, teacher once say, and that in a certain sense, the process of a sermon being delivered, preaching of the word, In a sense, it is the Word being made flesh once more.

And if you really think about this, God's method of communicating with the human race is always in this formula.

There's always this formula of the divine integration with the human.

Some have called it in technical terms the incarnational model.

Because if you think about the prophets originally, this is all after sin, after sin.

After sin, God could not communicate his message to us in the supernatural divine language.

He could not appear as he really is or we would be consumed.

And so he had to envelop, to package his divine message in human form.

The prophets, inspired by the Holy Spirit, they had what's called inspiration, revelation and inspiration.

They had the revelation from the Holy Spirit and as they communicated, it was guided by the Spirit.

And if you think about Jesus Christ himself, The clearest communication that God could manifest.

It was divine, united with human characteristics and qualities.

So in a certain sense, when The message is being delivered once again.

It is also again, it's not inspiration in the same sense of the prophets, but enlightenment where the Holy Spirit is also shining.

He's guiding the mind of the preacher as he's studying.

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How to Listen to Sermons: What Every AudioVerse Listener Ought to Hear

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