August 19, 2025 • 28 mins
Today our focus on The Pastor’s Heart is on how to preach for transformation for real changes in people’s lives.
Two men with a lifetime’s passion for preaching — Robin Sydserff, Director of the Proclamation Trust and David Cook, former principal of Sydney Missionary and Bible College and a long-time preaching mentor - now with the Expository Preaching Trust.
We start by looking at how Christian leaders the UK and Australia influenced preaching patterns overseas.
We look at preaching that has led to record enrolments at Bible Colleges, the purpose of preaching, the life and relationships of the preacher, training preachers and what patience is needed in preaching growth.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
how to fix our preaching.
Robin sits earth and davidcooker with us.
It is the pastor's heart, it'sdominic steel.
Today, on the pastor's heart,we're joined by two men with a
lifetime's passion for preachingdavid cook, former principal of
syd Missionary and BibleCollege and a long-time
preaching mentor now with theExpository Preaching Trust, and
(00:29):
Robin Sidserf, director of theProclamation Trust.
Today, our focus is on how topreach for transformation, for
real changes in people's lives,and we're going to start with
the pastor's heart and lookingback.
And we'll start with you, david, because some people don't know
our history, and I just wantyou to tell us some of the
(00:51):
stories about how the EnglishmanJohn Stott and Dick Lucas have
impacted Australian preaching inthe past.
Yeah Well thanks, dominic.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
John Stott came to preach on 2 Corinthians, I think
, at the CMS Summer School atKatoomba in 1965.
The year I was born and JohnChapman and Dudley Ford walked
away from that convention andsaid we need to do everything we
can to encourage that sort ofpreaching expository faithful
(01:23):
engaging preaching in Australia.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
And from that- and I think you're saying expository
preaching wasn't really the mainthing at that point.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
No, I gather it wasn't.
It was more textual, I think.
You pick a text, pick a verseyeah, that's right and a
different text from a differentpart every week, that sort of
thing, I think.
But in 1970, as a result ofthat, they formed the Anglican
College of Preachers in theSydney Diocese, which met every
year to encourage preachers.
And then of course it went onfrom there and John Chapman came
(01:56):
to Moore College every Tuesdayfor many years and then he'd
come to SMBC Sydney MissionaryBible College every Thursday and
he'd just teach preaching.
He taught Mark's Gospel,dialogue, evangelism and
preaching classes and it waswonderful.
His influence was tremendous.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
And Robin.
I mean correspondingly some ofthe Australians who've impacted
the preaching in the UK.
Speaker 3 (02:19):
Yeah, I mean, what's striking about the timeline you
described, so the 70s, JohnStott, the influence here and
what happened in England I guessit started in England with Dick
Lucas and David Jackman waskind of just half a generation
later in the UK aroundexpository preaching.
(02:47):
We got a big dose of Sydney atthat point, particularly Philip
and Chapel, and what they did isthey came in and they just kind
of dynamized it.
So what happened in the UK isthat it got a real leg up by
that partnership betweenAustralia and London and that
bridge has been there ever since.
I would come forward anothergeneration with this man here,
(03:09):
because when I worked in Londonbefore that was really David
beginning to come into the UKscene and what you brought David
was a kind of we're going totalk about preaching for
transformation, that sort ofclear commitment to the purpose
of preaching, which is thetransformation of people's lives
(03:32):
.
And you helped us, I think, inthe UK just to rest a little bit
of a risk that we were becomingtoo formal, too explanatory,
whatever, and really preachingfor transformation.
So a double dose of Sydneyinfluence.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
This is the impact of Philip Jensen, john Chapman
yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:48):
Yeah, first Philip and John and then, I guess more
recently, david.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:54):
So, david, the preaching that's led to people
being called into ministry.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
Yes.
Well, if you look at therecords of Moore College and
SMBC, you'll find recordenrolments in 1960, in 1969, and
in 1980.
Now why?
I mean, I was part of therecord enrolment as a student at
SMBC in 1969.
In our year there were 35 men.
(04:23):
The year before me there wereseven men.
Wow, Now, that's five times thenumber.
I think more college, you mightfind it similar.
And what had happened?
In 59, billy Graham had come,and in 1968, billy Graham had
come to Sydney and in 1979,billy Graham had come to Sydney.
So it not only does that gospelpreaching bring people to
(04:47):
salvation, but people who aresaved are challenged by this as
a proper vocation for my life.
And I think you see that inPhilip's ministry, through the
University of New South Walescampus Bible study, how many
people came out of that andthought that's what I want to do
with my life.
Not only am I changed,converted and grow in Christ,
(05:11):
but I want to do that with mylife.
And in our own denominationthere was a man in the late 70s
called J Graham Miller who'dbeen the principal of the
Melbourne Bible Institute and hecame to Hurstville.
I think there are a dozen menentered Moore College as a
direct result of hisencouragement and his ministry,
because they went to Hurstville.
(05:31):
They see the model, they hearpreaching and they think, man,
that's what I want to do with mylife.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
And in the UK, if you think back to the sort of
dynamic time with this renewalof exploratory preaching through
dick and david and davidjackman, dick lucas, people look
at it and they say it was akind of renewal and expository
preaching.
What it was also was theraising up of gospel workers and
(06:00):
they kind of coincided.
They're both sides of the samecoin.
And one of the things that Dickdid so powerfully he was a
people man, a people person.
His people were with him,whether in his expository
lectures or his conferences orin church, and they caught it
and were inspired by it, by abrilliant model of a preacher in
(06:21):
front of them.
One of the dangers is we'vekind of we describe that as
principles, or people even callthem Lucas lessons.
But what they Lucas lessons?
Well, some of the hermeneutical.
Speaker 1 (06:33):
Give me a Lucas lesson, I'll sit at your feet.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
So keep the preacher under control, something like
that.
Don't say more or less than isin the Bible or stay online.
You know, preach the melodicline of a Bible book and they're
great and they're important,but they are just tools.
When you listen to Dick and I'dbe doing that recently again
(06:56):
you see a real he would almostlike you can hear him in St
Helens on a Tuesday expoundingthe Bible and looking people in
the eye and saying, you know, asthey went back to their city
desks, do you believe this?
Do you believe it?
Your life matters or yourfuture matters.
(07:19):
So it's like taking the heartof a Bible text, a big gospel,
and saying do you believe this?
Do you believe this?
Do you believe this?
And always he expanded theBible, expecting prayerfully
people to change.
That's a powerful thing.
You can.
(07:39):
I mean, you remember that, weremember it.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Yeah, yeah.
And I think the basis of allthis is that, as teachers of
preaching, I would lecture inpreaching, but I knew the most
effective way to encourage goodpreaching was to model it.
And so at SMBC in 1991, westarted a preaching conference.
We had it every second year.
(08:02):
Dick Lucas spoke at the firstone.
They modeled it.
You don't learn preaching, Idon't think, from lectures or
reading a book about it.
You learn from sitting andlistening to preachers.
We had Haddon Robinson a coupleof times, dale Ralph Davis, don
Carson, peter Adam, johnChapman, and they were modelling
(08:22):
preaching.
And I found as we went on, wewere receiving a larger intake
of students in our odd years,because there were students
coming to SMBC so that in theirthree-year course they'd get two
preaching conferences.
You see, it was just attractiveand they were effectively
producing preachers by modellingit.
Speaker 3 (08:46):
When this sort of became captured in the UK in
some ways in something like theCornhill Training Course, which
was just one contribution, insome ways in something like the
Cornhill training course, whichwas just one contribution, there
was a kind of sense that youwent to Cornhill to train to
preach.
That was never going to happen.
What you get out of a courselike that is a leg up, are some
(09:08):
tools, some principles.
But you can only train topreach when you're in the
company of preachers and in alocal church, and it takes time.
It takes time, it takes time.
I often pick up in the UK asort of view that the people
that come out of training arenot great preachers.
My question would be five, six,seven, ten years on inside a
(09:30):
local church, when they'repreaching to real people with
good mentors around them?
That's when you've got to askthat question, Because we can't
train in a classroom people topreach.
We can help them, give themtools, but they have to go and
preach and have good mentors.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Now you just drew the correlation between really good
preaching and an uptake inBible college enrolments.
We're seeing a down take inBible college enrollments.
Are you therefore diagnosingthat we've got a preaching
problem?
Does the negative correlationstand?
Speaker 3 (10:04):
Or, to pick up your point, what's the answer to the
downturn?
What's the answer We've beenthinking this week, the group of
us here in Sydney?
Speaker 1 (10:18):
what is the Bible?
Who is this group?
So a?
Speaker 3 (10:20):
group of people really committed to raising up
gospel workers.
From around the world, yeah,around the world, we come up
with a kind of what does theBible say?
How do you train people We'vecome up with with and send?
You know, jesus had theapostles with him.
He trained them and he sentthem.
Paul had Timothy with him.
He was with him and he trainedhim.
So the with person.
(10:40):
So what's the answer to therecruitment crisis?
People being with people, thensend them out, and what happens
when they're with them?
What did Jesus do?
He equipped them and trainedthem to preach as they listen to
him.
So I think the first thing Iwant to say is what's the answer
to the recruitment crisis?
Before we get to strategywhatever, a really healthy
(11:03):
culture of people listening toreally good preaching and being
inspired by that I meanpreaching at its best raises up
people for preaching.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
You had a line from Chapo there's nothing as good as
good preaching.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
And there's nothing as bad as the opposite.
That's what he would say, andyou can see at college.
You'd look over the years atthe number of students who are
coming in who were reallystarting off preaching well.
They came from expositorypreaching churches.
They had it modelled for them.
But I think one of the problemsis we, in our trust.
Now we have a mentoring program, so we have 13 at the moment.
(11:46):
We have 13 experienced mentorsand we have over 40 mentees
people getting mentored but wedon't have senior pastors and I
think I would want to challengesenior pastors, lead pastors or
whatever you want to call themLots of them are watching us now
.
Sorry, lots of them are watchingus now.
Are you investing in yourpreaching?
(12:09):
Your preaching is developing.
It is developing.
It's developing some way.
Are you investing in it?
And I've been preaching for along time but I've got a
preaching mentor who Iappreciate, giving him my latest
sermon and saying Roddy, giveme feedback, what do you
appreciate?
Knock some corners off here too.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
How does that work?
I mean, I can't imaginecoaching you, do you know?
Speaker 2 (12:34):
Well, I had to choose the bloke very carefully and I
said to him now are you okaywith this, because I think a
mentor you need to.
We call it lather and shave.
Yeah, you say this is what'sgood about the sermon.
Now shave me, tell me how.
Areas of improvement?
And very often I think it'smuch easier for some blokes to
(12:57):
lather and not shave, and someblokes find it easier to shave
and not lather, so you've got tolook for both.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
Tell us about your latest session.
What did he say to you?
Well, no.
Speaker 2 (13:07):
I preached yesterday, so that's going to be his first
session with me and I'm surehe's a really he's a good friend
and I think the wounds of abrother, you know they're
helpful, and so he'll tell mewhere it was lacking.
Speaker 3 (13:23):
Even inside a church.
So say we link a realcommitment to grow as preachers
with a real commitment to raiseup workers.
Inside Chalmers, where I waspastor for a number of years, we
tried to have a lot of input,not so much feedback Feedback
was to kind of assess it over afew months but lots of input
week in, week out.
(13:44):
The reality was because we didmost of the preaching, we'd meet
with a group of six or eight,including the apprentices and
the folks training, and theywould critique me and the other
preachers in the preparation.
So we built this kind ofculture of iron, sharpening iron
, in a robust, loving, good way.
But it really helped me no endto have to sort of say, well,
(14:09):
okay, I want your feedback andit helped me grow as a preacher
and especially when you become asenior minister, you get super,
super busy.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (14:18):
And nobody tells you, nobody feeds into you about
your preaching.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
One of your critiques and we heard this from Richard
Cokin a little while ago is oflack of application.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
Yeah, yeah, I wonder if I would come at it slightly
differently from Richard.
So as I listened to Dick andothers and I think we've lost
something that they had, let mesay that they were great
(14:51):
expounders of the Bible.
I don't think it's expositionplus application equals
transformation.
I think it's exposition with aneye to transformation that
makes exposition applicatory, ifyou like.
So I think John Piper has justdone this little podcast on what
is application and he calls itsoul-searching exposition.
(15:16):
So in the Bible passage there'struth and transformational
intent and as you expound theBible, you're always looking to
say do you believe this?
Do you understand this?
Are you living for Jesus?
So I think we've got to becareful that we don't look for a
kind of missing link and saythere's a kind of bridge we need
to build, giving peopledirection and so on and so forth
(15:38):
.
We've got to preach a biggospel but look people in the
eye and say do you believe this?
Do you believe this?
Do you believe this?
Are you living this?
Are you living this?
There is something missing.
But my view would be listeningback to and others the way they
did.
Exposition was always appliedall the way through.
(16:02):
Does that make sense?
Speaker 2 (16:03):
Yeah, I think engagement.
I've now been mentoring, Ithink, for five years, and
mostly Sydney-trained people, sothey're good on the exposition,
but when it comes to theengagement and application,
sydney-trained people, sothey're good on the exposition,
but when it comes to theengagement and application, what
Dudley Ford used to say, thejet takes off and lands maximum
(16:24):
thrust getting off the ground,maximum thrust, getting back on
the ground.
I want to listen to your firstfew minutes and then your last
few minutes.
And engagement is important andmy own experience.
I went from Moore Collegestraight out to a church in Wee
War which was full of Americanpeople.
I'd followed a brilliantcommunicator as the first
minister and I was out there inWee War ready to give 30 to 40
(16:48):
minutes theological lectures andit wasn't working.
And I went and spoke to thesenior minister in cotton
farming country.
Cotton farming country and hesaid you're preaching the
statement, not the question, andthat really was helpful to me.
That is, preach the questionthat the statement is answering
(17:08):
and then make it a marketablequestion.
So God so loved the world thathe gave his only son.
Whoever believes in him shouldnot perish, have eternal life.
Okay, so for eternal life, putfaith in Jesus, god's gift of
love.
All right, the question is howcan I have eternal life?
But I'm not there yet becauseif I got up and preached, how
can I have eternal life?
Three-quarters of thecongregation know the answer to
(17:30):
that question and that doesn'tengage them.
So I'm looking for a moremarketable question which
answers that question but whichengages.
And so I find a lot of my timein mentoring.
I'm talking to the preachersabout getting from the big
question to the marketable bigquestion.
And then the way to get to themarketable big question is you
do your work of application andthen you go to your now what is
(17:54):
your marketable question?
And I think Chapo always taughtpedagogically and Dick Lucas
taught you are a teacher, sogive regard to educational
method Pedagogically.
The impossible application ofthe passage is really helpful.
That is, that I can haveeternal life and not believe in
(18:15):
Jesus.
You see, so Dick Lucas used tosay, preach scriptures negatives
as well as positives.
So look for the impossibleapplication of the passage, and
I reckon you could estimate thatall of us go through periods of
living consistently with theimpossible application of the
passage.
And when I look at what thepassage cannot, how it cannot
(18:37):
apply to anyone and how it mustapply to everyone and how it may
apply to some, I'm ready to getmy marketable big question.
Speaker 3 (18:45):
So, for example, I heard you speaking on this when
you came to the UK and I editeda book that you wrote and
teaching acts, and you had thisat the start of the book you
can't serve two masters.
Yes, I can.
So what you do is you lookpeople in the eye and say some
(19:06):
of you might be thinking you can, you can't.
You get under people's skinthat way.
You're not having to, just sortof, you're not having to to
give them sort of methods ortools, it's just arresting them
with the, the truth of the.
I mean dick, dick and david's.
(19:27):
Jackman's.
Great contribution to us in theuk was to have real confidence
in the bible so that a biblepassage or a Bible book gives
you truth and transformationalpurpose, the kind of melodic
line thing why is this book inthe Bible?
Why is this passage in the book?
When you get a grip of that,what they did is not simply
(19:48):
explain that that was there,they just went for it and they
did it in all sorts of ways sothat people left a Tuesday
lunchtime service really withoutthe ability to say well, that
applies to somebody else, thatapplies to somebody else.
And that's real preaching,preaching for verdict.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
So next week, dom, we have a preaching conference for
a full day at Wurrunga.
Simon Flinders is preachingRomans 1 and Michael Leong
preaching Romans 5 in betweentwo preaching groups, and then
the leaders will give their toptip for preachers and then we'll
have a Q&A panel.
Brilliant day, good food, goodcoffee.
Come along, you see, and thenwe're doing the same at the
(20:32):
Armidale Cathedral in two weeks'time.
It's a great way to invest inyour preaching, and we provide
through the trust.
We have very generoussupporters of the trust, so
we're able to provide mentoringfree of charge, and it's a great
privilege.
(20:53):
So what we do in my mentoringsessions, zoom, is 45 minutes
for free, so it lasts 45 minutes.
So we have 45 minutes on aweekly or a fortnightly basis
and it's a great, great time.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
That's great, yeah.
Now pastoral relationshipbetween the preacher and the
hearer is key to transformation.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
Yeah.
So the locus of preaching, theplace of preaching, is in the
local church or the ministry,setting One of the most profound
comments I ever heard andtucked away as a pastor these
are the people God has given youto love.
You preach to them likeyesterday you'd have done in
this church, consciously awareof what's going on in your lives
(21:38):
.
You don't change the message,you don't change the purpose,
but you just bring it to bear.
Jim Packer said you bring it tobear I think he said this at
EMA in 1991 with life changingthrust to their lives, because
you know them and you love them.
And as I look out in the church,you know them and you love them
(21:59):
.
And as I look out in the church, I can think of a man called
Alan who'd lost his wife, whowas desperately, desperately
grieving, and I'd just look himin the eye at a certain point
and you'd connect.
It's like Christopher Ashedescribed it as silent dialogue
through the monologue ofproclamation.
And these are the people Godhas given you to love and that's
(22:21):
why, in a sense, you can'tlearn to preach fully until
you're in a local church withpeople.
So it's a critical connection.
It's a critical connection.
And listening to Dick in theearly days on Tuesdays.
He had that critical connectionwith these people.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
So just that there's a real place for convention
ministry.
But being in the local churchbeing preached to by the man, I
know who knows me, I know how itworks out.
I know how the local churchbeing preached to by the man, I
know who knows me, I know how itworks.
I know how he treats men, women, I know how he treats the
disabled, I know how he treatschildren.
I know this man and he'steaching me, preaching to me,
(23:02):
from all his imperfections andshortcomings, as well as all his
growing godliness, and I thinkthat's very powerful and added
to that the preacher's owntransformation through the word.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
So, the preacher, why do you need to prep in
preaching?
Why do you need to pray inpreparation?
So that you come to the pulpitof the lectern having been
thoroughly worked on by theSpirit and the word, and that
you stand up in front of peoplein some ways as somebody who has
been changed in the way thatyou are praying.
(23:36):
For that transformation.
And that makes it a hard graftand a prayerful activity.
Speaker 1 (23:48):
Growing younger preachers.
It takes years, though.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
Well, we're always growing, aren't we as preachers?
We're always growing.
We just need to make sure thatwe're growing To be in our
effectiveness.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
So what encouragement to a younger preacher who's
frustrated by their slowprogress.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
Well, expose yourself to a whole range of things,
learn really good theology,learn how to understand the
Bible, but make sure you arewith someone, with people who
can help you, who can instructyou, who can mentor you.
(24:33):
I think of the apostlesdesignate, with the Lord Jesus
listening to his preaching.
Think of Timothy with Paullistening to his preaching.
And then Timothy Paul said tohim off you go, I'm going to
send you out, but he kept hishooks in, kept his relationship
with him.
So learn the Bible, learn aboutJesus, but be with people who
(25:00):
can mentor you and help you andtreat and there is no one more
relational than Philip Jensen,john Chapman, dick Lucas, david
Cook.
Speaker 2 (25:11):
And the other thing is there's lots of opportunities
here.
You can join a preaching club.
There's preaching clubs allover Australia, but also you can
Corn Hill, australia.
They meet in Newtown and theymeet in Rooty Hill.
Rooty Hill Thursday, newtown onTuesday, and that just do it.
It's a one-day-a-week courseand I do that.
(25:33):
I lecture in that two terms ayear and occasionally recently I
had a senior Anglican ministerin there just brushing things up
and he had a great contributionto make and it was terrific to
have him in the course as well.
So these opportunities arethere.
And if you're from overAustralia, at the moment the
(25:56):
class I'm in at Rudy Hill hasgot as many people online as
attending in person.
So they're from Geraldton,there's a couple from the
Sunshine Coast, some from theHunter Valley and they're all
enjoying and contributing andjoining the preaching groups as
long as and I'd say this aboutLondon the Cornhill course is
only one third of the equation.
Speaker 3 (26:17):
So it works really well when it's in a really good
partnership with anapprenticeship program, for
example in a local church, sothat what the guys, the men and
women, are doing is they're outthere in the local church with a
pastor, teacher, learning howto preach and teach and we kind
of partner with that.
I mean, one of the greatcontributions to the UK was the
(26:40):
ministry apprenticeship cultureWay back in the early 2000s.
What came across was a cultureof being with and being sent
information for ministry.
one of the the challenges we'vegot to face in the uk is the
apprenticeship programs havebecome one year, not two oh
(27:01):
really well, many of them have,and all sorts of reasons for
that, but you've lost time beingwith people to be sent out to
be trained.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
I mean, I just remember I was useless the first
year and vaguely confident thesecond.
Well, that's right.
Speaker 3 (27:17):
And if you're there for one year, you're in for six
months and you're worrying whatyou're going to do next.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
And a ministry training scheme.
That's a lot of the people atCornhill are from doing this.
Yeah, Thank you so much.
We could keep going, but we'vegot to.
That's a lot of the people atCornhill are from MT Are doing
this.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Yeah, thank you so much.
We could keep going, but we'vegot to stop.
Robin Sidserf has been ourguest from Proclamation Trust in
the United Kingdom, and alsoDavid Cook, and David now works
with the Expository PreachingTrust.
This has been the Pastor'sHeart.
My name's Dominic Steele.
We'll look forward to yourcompany next Tuesday afternoon.
how to fix our preaching.
Robin sits earth and davidcooker with us.
It is the pastor's heart, it'sdominic steel.
Today, on the pastor's heart,we're joined by two men with a
lifetime's passion for preachingdavid cook, former principal of
syd Missionary and BibleCollege and a long-time
preaching mentor now with theExpository Preaching Trust, and
(00:29):
Robin Sidserf, director of theProclamation Trust.
Today, our focus is on how topreach for transformation, for
real changes in people's lives,and we're going to start with
the pastor's heart and lookingback.
And we'll start with you, david, because some people don't know
our history, and I just wantyou to tell us some of the
(00:51):
stories about how the EnglishmanJohn Stott and Dick Lucas have
impacted Australian preaching inthe past.
Yeah Well thanks, dominic.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
John Stott came to preach on 2 Corinthians, I think
, at the CMS Summer School atKatoomba in 1965.
The year I was born and JohnChapman and Dudley Ford walked
away from that convention andsaid we need to do everything we
can to encourage that sort ofpreaching expository faithful
(01:23):
engaging preaching in Australia.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
And from that- and I think you're saying expository
preaching wasn't really the mainthing at that point.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
No, I gather it wasn't.
It was more textual, I think.
You pick a text, pick a verseyeah, that's right and a
different text from a differentpart every week, that sort of
thing, I think.
But in 1970, as a result ofthat, they formed the Anglican
College of Preachers in theSydney Diocese, which met every
year to encourage preachers.
And then of course it went onfrom there and John Chapman came
(01:56):
to Moore College every Tuesdayfor many years and then he'd
come to SMBC Sydney MissionaryBible College every Thursday and
he'd just teach preaching.
He taught Mark's Gospel,dialogue, evangelism and
preaching classes and it waswonderful.
His influence was tremendous.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
And Robin.
I mean correspondingly some ofthe Australians who've impacted
the preaching in the UK.
Speaker 3 (02:19):
Yeah, I mean, what's striking about the timeline you
described, so the 70s, JohnStott, the influence here and
what happened in England I guessit started in England with Dick
Lucas and David Jackman waskind of just half a generation
later in the UK aroundexpository preaching.
(02:47):
We got a big dose of Sydney atthat point, particularly Philip
and Chapel, and what they did isthey came in and they just kind
of dynamized it.
So what happened in the UK isthat it got a real leg up by
that partnership betweenAustralia and London and that
bridge has been there ever since.
I would come forward anothergeneration with this man here,
(03:09):
because when I worked in Londonbefore that was really David
beginning to come into the UKscene and what you brought David
was a kind of we're going totalk about preaching for
transformation, that sort ofclear commitment to the purpose
of preaching, which is thetransformation of people's lives
(03:32):
.
And you helped us, I think, inthe UK just to rest a little bit
of a risk that we were becomingtoo formal, too explanatory,
whatever, and really preachingfor transformation.
So a double dose of Sydneyinfluence.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
This is the impact of Philip Jensen, john Chapman
yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:48):
Yeah, first Philip and John and then, I guess more
recently, david.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:54):
So, david, the preaching that's led to people
being called into ministry.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
Yes.
Well, if you look at therecords of Moore College and
SMBC, you'll find recordenrolments in 1960, in 1969, and
in 1980.
Now why?
I mean, I was part of therecord enrolment as a student at
SMBC in 1969.
In our year there were 35 men.
(04:23):
The year before me there wereseven men.
Wow, Now, that's five times thenumber.
I think more college, you mightfind it similar.
And what had happened?
In 59, billy Graham had come,and in 1968, billy Graham had
come to Sydney and in 1979,billy Graham had come to Sydney.
So it not only does that gospelpreaching bring people to
(04:47):
salvation, but people who aresaved are challenged by this as
a proper vocation for my life.
And I think you see that inPhilip's ministry, through the
University of New South Walescampus Bible study, how many
people came out of that andthought that's what I want to do
with my life.
Not only am I changed,converted and grow in Christ,
(05:11):
but I want to do that with mylife.
And in our own denominationthere was a man in the late 70s
called J Graham Miller who'dbeen the principal of the
Melbourne Bible Institute and hecame to Hurstville.
I think there are a dozen menentered Moore College as a
direct result of hisencouragement and his ministry,
because they went to Hurstville.
(05:31):
They see the model, they hearpreaching and they think, man,
that's what I want to do with mylife.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
And in the UK, if you think back to the sort of
dynamic time with this renewalof exploratory preaching through
dick and david and davidjackman, dick lucas, people look
at it and they say it was akind of renewal and expository
preaching.
What it was also was theraising up of gospel workers and
(06:00):
they kind of coincided.
They're both sides of the samecoin.
And one of the things that Dickdid so powerfully he was a
people man, a people person.
His people were with him,whether in his expository
lectures or his conferences orin church, and they caught it
and were inspired by it, by abrilliant model of a preacher in
(06:21):
front of them.
One of the dangers is we'vekind of we describe that as
principles, or people even callthem Lucas lessons.
But what they Lucas lessons?
Well, some of the hermeneutical.
Speaker 1 (06:33):
Give me a Lucas lesson, I'll sit at your feet.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
So keep the preacher under control, something like
that.
Don't say more or less than isin the Bible or stay online.
You know, preach the melodicline of a Bible book and they're
great and they're important,but they are just tools.
When you listen to Dick and I'dbe doing that recently again
(06:56):
you see a real he would almostlike you can hear him in St
Helens on a Tuesday expoundingthe Bible and looking people in
the eye and saying, you know, asthey went back to their city
desks, do you believe this?
Do you believe it?
Your life matters or yourfuture matters.
(07:19):
So it's like taking the heartof a Bible text, a big gospel,
and saying do you believe this?
Do you believe this?
Do you believe this?
And always he expanded theBible, expecting prayerfully
people to change.
That's a powerful thing.
You can.
(07:39):
I mean, you remember that, weremember it.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Yeah, yeah.
And I think the basis of allthis is that, as teachers of
preaching, I would lecture inpreaching, but I knew the most
effective way to encourage goodpreaching was to model it.
And so at SMBC in 1991, westarted a preaching conference.
We had it every second year.
(08:02):
Dick Lucas spoke at the firstone.
They modeled it.
You don't learn preaching, Idon't think, from lectures or
reading a book about it.
You learn from sitting andlistening to preachers.
We had Haddon Robinson a coupleof times, dale Ralph Davis, don
Carson, peter Adam, johnChapman, and they were modelling
(08:22):
preaching.
And I found as we went on, wewere receiving a larger intake
of students in our odd years,because there were students
coming to SMBC so that in theirthree-year course they'd get two
preaching conferences.
You see, it was just attractiveand they were effectively
producing preachers by modellingit.
Speaker 3 (08:46):
When this sort of became captured in the UK in
some ways in something like theCornhill Training Course, which
was just one contribution, insome ways in something like the
Cornhill training course, whichwas just one contribution, there
was a kind of sense that youwent to Cornhill to train to
preach.
That was never going to happen.
What you get out of a courselike that is a leg up, are some
(09:08):
tools, some principles.
But you can only train topreach when you're in the
company of preachers and in alocal church, and it takes time.
It takes time, it takes time.
I often pick up in the UK asort of view that the people
that come out of training arenot great preachers.
My question would be five, six,seven, ten years on inside a
(09:30):
local church, when they'repreaching to real people with
good mentors around them?
That's when you've got to askthat question, Because we can't
train in a classroom people topreach.
We can help them, give themtools, but they have to go and
preach and have good mentors.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Now you just drew the correlation between really good
preaching and an uptake inBible college enrolments.
We're seeing a down take inBible college enrollments.
Are you therefore diagnosingthat we've got a preaching
problem?
Does the negative correlationstand?
Speaker 3 (10:04):
Or, to pick up your point, what's the answer to the
downturn?
What's the answer We've beenthinking this week, the group of
us here in Sydney?
Speaker 1 (10:18):
what is the Bible?
Who is this group?
So a?
Speaker 3 (10:20):
group of people really committed to raising up
gospel workers.
From around the world, yeah,around the world, we come up
with a kind of what does theBible say?
How do you train people We'vecome up with with and send?
You know, jesus had theapostles with him.
He trained them and he sentthem.
Paul had Timothy with him.
He was with him and he trainedhim.
So the with person.
(10:40):
So what's the answer to therecruitment crisis?
People being with people, thensend them out, and what happens
when they're with them?
What did Jesus do?
He equipped them and trainedthem to preach as they listen to
him.
So I think the first thing Iwant to say is what's the answer
to the recruitment crisis?
Before we get to strategywhatever, a really healthy
(11:03):
culture of people listening toreally good preaching and being
inspired by that I meanpreaching at its best raises up
people for preaching.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
You had a line from Chapo there's nothing as good as
good preaching.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
And there's nothing as bad as the opposite.
That's what he would say, andyou can see at college.
You'd look over the years atthe number of students who are
coming in who were reallystarting off preaching well.
They came from expositorypreaching churches.
They had it modelled for them.
But I think one of the problemsis we, in our trust.
Now we have a mentoring program, so we have 13 at the moment.
(11:46):
We have 13 experienced mentorsand we have over 40 mentees
people getting mentored but wedon't have senior pastors and I
think I would want to challengesenior pastors, lead pastors or
whatever you want to call themLots of them are watching us now
.
Sorry, lots of them are watchingus now.
Are you investing in yourpreaching?
(12:09):
Your preaching is developing.
It is developing.
It's developing some way.
Are you investing in it?
And I've been preaching for along time but I've got a
preaching mentor who Iappreciate, giving him my latest
sermon and saying Roddy, giveme feedback, what do you
appreciate?
Knock some corners off here too.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
How does that work?
I mean, I can't imaginecoaching you, do you know?
Speaker 2 (12:34):
Well, I had to choose the bloke very carefully and I
said to him now are you okaywith this, because I think a
mentor you need to.
We call it lather and shave.
Yeah, you say this is what'sgood about the sermon.
Now shave me, tell me how.
Areas of improvement?
And very often I think it'smuch easier for some blokes to
(12:57):
lather and not shave, and someblokes find it easier to shave
and not lather, so you've got tolook for both.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
Tell us about your latest session.
What did he say to you?
Well, no.
Speaker 2 (13:07):
I preached yesterday, so that's going to be his first
session with me and I'm surehe's a really he's a good friend
and I think the wounds of abrother, you know they're
helpful, and so he'll tell mewhere it was lacking.
Speaker 3 (13:23):
Even inside a church.
So say we link a realcommitment to grow as preachers
with a real commitment to raiseup workers.
Inside Chalmers, where I waspastor for a number of years, we
tried to have a lot of input,not so much feedback Feedback
was to kind of assess it over afew months but lots of input
week in, week out.
(13:44):
The reality was because we didmost of the preaching, we'd meet
with a group of six or eight,including the apprentices and
the folks training, and theywould critique me and the other
preachers in the preparation.
So we built this kind ofculture of iron, sharpening iron
, in a robust, loving, good way.
But it really helped me no endto have to sort of say, well,
(14:09):
okay, I want your feedback andit helped me grow as a preacher
and especially when you become asenior minister, you get super,
super busy.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (14:18):
And nobody tells you, nobody feeds into you about
your preaching.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
One of your critiques and we heard this from Richard
Cokin a little while ago is oflack of application.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
Yeah, yeah, I wonder if I would come at it slightly
differently from Richard.
So as I listened to Dick andothers and I think we've lost
something that they had, let mesay that they were great
(14:51):
expounders of the Bible.
I don't think it's expositionplus application equals
transformation.
I think it's exposition with aneye to transformation that
makes exposition applicatory, ifyou like.
So I think John Piper has justdone this little podcast on what
is application and he calls itsoul-searching exposition.
(15:16):
So in the Bible passage there'struth and transformational
intent and as you expound theBible, you're always looking to
say do you believe this?
Do you understand this?
Are you living for Jesus?
So I think we've got to becareful that we don't look for a
kind of missing link and saythere's a kind of bridge we need
to build, giving peopledirection and so on and so forth
(15:38):
.
We've got to preach a biggospel but look people in the
eye and say do you believe this?
Do you believe this?
Do you believe this?
Are you living this?
Are you living this?
There is something missing.
But my view would be listeningback to and others the way they
did.
Exposition was always appliedall the way through.
(16:02):
Does that make sense?
Speaker 2 (16:03):
Yeah, I think engagement.
I've now been mentoring, Ithink, for five years, and
mostly Sydney-trained people, sothey're good on the exposition,
but when it comes to theengagement and application,
sydney-trained people, sothey're good on the exposition,
but when it comes to theengagement and application, what
Dudley Ford used to say, thejet takes off and lands maximum
(16:24):
thrust getting off the ground,maximum thrust, getting back on
the ground.
I want to listen to your firstfew minutes and then your last
few minutes.
And engagement is important andmy own experience.
I went from Moore Collegestraight out to a church in Wee
War which was full of Americanpeople.
I'd followed a brilliantcommunicator as the first
minister and I was out there inWee War ready to give 30 to 40
(16:48):
minutes theological lectures andit wasn't working.
And I went and spoke to thesenior minister in cotton
farming country.
Cotton farming country and hesaid you're preaching the
statement, not the question, andthat really was helpful to me.
That is, preach the questionthat the statement is answering
(17:08):
and then make it a marketablequestion.
So God so loved the world thathe gave his only son.
Whoever believes in him shouldnot perish, have eternal life.
Okay, so for eternal life, putfaith in Jesus, god's gift of
love.
All right, the question is howcan I have eternal life?
But I'm not there yet becauseif I got up and preached, how
can I have eternal life?
Three-quarters of thecongregation know the answer to
(17:30):
that question and that doesn'tengage them.
So I'm looking for a moremarketable question which
answers that question but whichengages.
And so I find a lot of my timein mentoring.
I'm talking to the preachersabout getting from the big
question to the marketable bigquestion.
And then the way to get to themarketable big question is you
do your work of application andthen you go to your now what is
(17:54):
your marketable question?
And I think Chapo always taughtpedagogically and Dick Lucas
taught you are a teacher, sogive regard to educational
method Pedagogically.
The impossible application ofthe passage is really helpful.
That is, that I can haveeternal life and not believe in
(18:15):
Jesus.
You see, so Dick Lucas used tosay, preach scriptures negatives
as well as positives.
So look for the impossibleapplication of the passage, and
I reckon you could estimate thatall of us go through periods of
living consistently with theimpossible application of the
passage.
And when I look at what thepassage cannot, how it cannot
(18:37):
apply to anyone and how it mustapply to everyone and how it may
apply to some, I'm ready to getmy marketable big question.
Speaker 3 (18:45):
So, for example, I heard you speaking on this when
you came to the UK and I editeda book that you wrote and
teaching acts, and you had thisat the start of the book you
can't serve two masters.
Yes, I can.
So what you do is you lookpeople in the eye and say some
(19:06):
of you might be thinking you can, you can't.
You get under people's skinthat way.
You're not having to, just sortof, you're not having to to
give them sort of methods ortools, it's just arresting them
with the, the truth of the.
I mean dick, dick and david's.
(19:27):
Jackman's.
Great contribution to us in theuk was to have real confidence
in the bible so that a biblepassage or a Bible book gives
you truth and transformationalpurpose, the kind of melodic
line thing why is this book inthe Bible?
Why is this passage in the book?
When you get a grip of that,what they did is not simply
(19:48):
explain that that was there,they just went for it and they
did it in all sorts of ways sothat people left a Tuesday
lunchtime service really withoutthe ability to say well, that
applies to somebody else, thatapplies to somebody else.
And that's real preaching,preaching for verdict.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
So next week, dom, we have a preaching conference for
a full day at Wurrunga.
Simon Flinders is preachingRomans 1 and Michael Leong
preaching Romans 5 in betweentwo preaching groups, and then
the leaders will give their toptip for preachers and then we'll
have a Q&A panel.
Brilliant day, good food, goodcoffee.
Come along, you see, and thenwe're doing the same at the
(20:32):
Armidale Cathedral in two weeks'time.
It's a great way to invest inyour preaching, and we provide
through the trust.
We have very generoussupporters of the trust, so
we're able to provide mentoringfree of charge, and it's a great
privilege.
(20:53):
So what we do in my mentoringsessions, zoom, is 45 minutes
for free, so it lasts 45 minutes.
So we have 45 minutes on aweekly or a fortnightly basis
and it's a great, great time.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
That's great, yeah.
Now pastoral relationshipbetween the preacher and the
hearer is key to transformation.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
Yeah.
So the locus of preaching, theplace of preaching, is in the
local church or the ministry,setting One of the most profound
comments I ever heard andtucked away as a pastor these
are the people God has given youto love.
You preach to them likeyesterday you'd have done in
this church, consciously awareof what's going on in your lives
(21:38):
.
You don't change the message,you don't change the purpose,
but you just bring it to bear.
Jim Packer said you bring it tobear I think he said this at
EMA in 1991 with life changingthrust to their lives, because
you know them and you love them.
And as I look out in the church,you know them and you love them
(21:59):
.
And as I look out in the church, I can think of a man called
Alan who'd lost his wife, whowas desperately, desperately
grieving, and I'd just look himin the eye at a certain point
and you'd connect.
It's like Christopher Ashedescribed it as silent dialogue
through the monologue ofproclamation.
And these are the people Godhas given you to love and that's
(22:21):
why, in a sense, you can'tlearn to preach fully until
you're in a local church withpeople.
So it's a critical connection.
It's a critical connection.
And listening to Dick in theearly days on Tuesdays.
He had that critical connectionwith these people.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
So just that there's a real place for convention
ministry.
But being in the local churchbeing preached to by the man, I
know who knows me, I know how itworks out.
I know how the local churchbeing preached to by the man, I
know who knows me, I know how itworks.
I know how he treats men, women, I know how he treats the
disabled, I know how he treatschildren.
I know this man and he'steaching me, preaching to me,
(23:02):
from all his imperfections andshortcomings, as well as all his
growing godliness, and I thinkthat's very powerful and added
to that the preacher's owntransformation through the word.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
So, the preacher, why do you need to prep in
preaching?
Why do you need to pray inpreparation?
So that you come to the pulpitof the lectern having been
thoroughly worked on by theSpirit and the word, and that
you stand up in front of peoplein some ways as somebody who has
been changed in the way thatyou are praying.
(23:36):
For that transformation.
And that makes it a hard graftand a prayerful activity.
Speaker 1 (23:48):
Growing younger preachers.
It takes years, though.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
Well, we're always growing, aren't we as preachers?
We're always growing.
We just need to make sure thatwe're growing To be in our
effectiveness.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
So what encouragement to a younger preacher who's
frustrated by their slowprogress.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
Well, expose yourself to a whole range of things,
learn really good theology,learn how to understand the
Bible, but make sure you arewith someone, with people who
can help you, who can instructyou, who can mentor you.
(24:33):
I think of the apostlesdesignate, with the Lord Jesus
listening to his preaching.
Think of Timothy with Paullistening to his preaching.
And then Timothy Paul said tohim off you go, I'm going to
send you out, but he kept hishooks in, kept his relationship
with him.
So learn the Bible, learn aboutJesus, but be with people who
(25:00):
can mentor you and help you andtreat and there is no one more
relational than Philip Jensen,john Chapman, dick Lucas, david
Cook.
Speaker 2 (25:11):
And the other thing is there's lots of opportunities
here.
You can join a preaching club.
There's preaching clubs allover Australia, but also you can
Corn Hill, australia.
They meet in Newtown and theymeet in Rooty Hill.
Rooty Hill Thursday, newtown onTuesday, and that just do it.
It's a one-day-a-week courseand I do that.
(25:33):
I lecture in that two terms ayear and occasionally recently I
had a senior Anglican ministerin there just brushing things up
and he had a great contributionto make and it was terrific to
have him in the course as well.
So these opportunities arethere.
And if you're from overAustralia, at the moment the
(25:56):
class I'm in at Rudy Hill hasgot as many people online as
attending in person.
So they're from Geraldton,there's a couple from the
Sunshine Coast, some from theHunter Valley and they're all
enjoying and contributing andjoining the preaching groups as
long as and I'd say this aboutLondon the Cornhill course is
only one third of the equation.
Speaker 3 (26:17):
So it works really well when it's in a really good
partnership with anapprenticeship program, for
example in a local church, sothat what the guys, the men and
women, are doing is they're outthere in the local church with a
pastor, teacher, learning howto preach and teach and we kind
of partner with that.
I mean, one of the greatcontributions to the UK was the
(26:40):
ministry apprenticeship cultureWay back in the early 2000s.
What came across was a cultureof being with and being sent
information for ministry.
one of the the challenges we'vegot to face in the uk is the
apprenticeship programs havebecome one year, not two oh
(27:01):
really well, many of them have,and all sorts of reasons for
that, but you've lost time beingwith people to be sent out to
be trained.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
I mean, I just remember I was useless the first
year and vaguely confident thesecond.
Well, that's right.
Speaker 3 (27:17):
And if you're there for one year, you're in for six
months and you're worrying whatyou're going to do next.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
And a ministry training scheme.
That's a lot of the people atCornhill are from doing this.
Yeah, Thank you so much.
We could keep going, but we'vegot to.
That's a lot of the people atCornhill are from MT Are doing
this.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Yeah, thank you so much.
We could keep going, but we'vegot to stop.
Robin Sidserf has been ourguest from Proclamation Trust in
the United Kingdom, and alsoDavid Cook, and David now works
with the Expository PreachingTrust.
This has been the Pastor'sHeart.
My name's Dominic Steele.
We'll look forward to yourcompany next Tuesday afternoon.
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