restoring our biblical and constitutional foundations

                

Be a Peter!

 David Alan Black  

Today I have a brief word for all my Christian blogging friends, especially those of you who have no formal biblical training.

Be a Peter.

Yes Peter, who had never been to Bible school. Peter, who had never earned a theological degree. Peter, who had never studied homiletics or elocution.

Yet when he spoke on the Day of Pentecost, thousands were pierced to the heart by his holy boldness. There was no polish to his speech. He spoke like a Virginia farm boy – or like a Galilean fisherman might have spoken 2,000 years ago. He shocked without offending. People have a way of listening to preachers like that.

Friend, I want to encourage you to keep on preaching. People may call you an amateur. Some may question your right to say what you say. “Who is he?”

Let me remind you that God delights in using unlettered men and women to confound the wise among us. I see this day in and day out. If you speak with a compelling urgency, if you speak with boldness born of conviction, if you speak with earnestness, broken by the very truth you are trying so feebly to convey, men and women, boys and girls even, will understand you. That is, if you speak in the power of the Spirit and not in the strength of the flesh.

But it will cost you.

No doubt you will turn some people away. But the only fisherman who never let a fish get away is the fisherman who never made a catch. “In due season we shall reap, if we faint not” (Gal. 6:9).

I will say it plainly. The church needs you. I myself should choose impulsive, uneducated Peter any day in preference to a powerless know-it-all. God can use you in spite of your limitations. I see in so many of you a heart tenderized by the great grace of God. And I see that heart growing softer by the day.

So keep on speaking! Speak plainly. Speak truthfully. Speak lovingly. Speak compellingly. I for one will listen not only to your words, but to your heart.

November 7, 2008

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com.

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