Why We Need Sermons

I’ve heard a lot of bad sermons in my day. Have you?

I remember growing up in church and sneaking out of the sanctuary to play in the hallways instead of hearing the pastor preach. When I grew older, I would sometimes try listening to a podcast or watch a video on Youtube of preachers, only to become distracted by Saturday Night Live clips.

Why is it sometimes so difficult to listen to a sermon?

I think part of the reason is that we know there are bad preachers. Preachers who aren’t entertaining enough. Preachers who deliberately lie to manipulate people. Preachers who claim that they are speaking on God’s behalf but they really seem to be only giving their opinion. Preachers who tell bad jokes.

These can be legitimate reasons to avoid preaching. In fact, when we call a person “preachy”, it’s usually as an insult.

But does the fact that there are bad sermons and preachers out there mean that we should avoid sermons altogether?

I don’t think so, and here’s why.

I don’t know everything.

I am wrong about a lot of things in life.

I make mistakes.

I lie to myself.

I am sometimes incapable of making good decisions.

For all of these reasons, every now and then I need to hear someone else preach to me. And I think if you were honest, you would have to say the same thing. People are messed up. Nobody has it all together.

We have to be humble and start with the premise that maybe, just maybe, there is someone out there who knows more than us.

This is very rare in America today. Pride is celebrated everywhere. We’re taught to be proud of ourselves, and to stand by our convictions, and to fight for what we believe in.

I am very guilty of this. I like to tell people what I think. I have been accused of being direct and blunt. This is not always a bad thing.

But sometimes, it can be wrong for us to assume that we are all that and a bag of potato chips. In fact, one of the blessings of the Internet is that it makes us realize that we don’t know everthing. We have to use Google every now and then.

How do I get directions to the mall? Google.

How long am I supposed to cook chicken? Google.

When does the next Avengers movie come out? Google.

And, of course, God knows everything. So if we want to find out more about ourselves as individuals, more about life in general, more about humanity and the future, we have to listen to what God says.

At this point, I think I know what you may be thinking. Doesn’t God speak to us as individuals? Isn’t it enough to just read our Bibles for ourselves? If God really wanted to communicate with me, why does he need a preacher to tell me what He could tell me Himself?

I worked for a brief time as an assistant. My boss would often tell me to tell other people what he wanted done. My boss had every right to tell me what to say and how to say it. My boss could have communicated to those people directly, but he chose to send me many times instead.

In the same way, God often wants to tell us about Himself through other people.

We have to be willing to take the risk that a preacher knows something about God that we don’t.

Is that risky? I would say it’s no riskier than relying on Google to give me the correct directions to the Hospital if I had appendicitis.

There’s a funny story in the Book of Numbers where a religious man named Balaam does not listen to God. I won’t go into the details, but at one point God uses a donkey to talk to Balaam.

In other words, God can use a complete ass to communicate truth.

If that’s not humbling, then I don’t know what is. God uses fallen, sinful, wicked men to teach us more about who He is and who we are. Jesus sent a ragtag group of unschooled young men who often doubted what He said to travel across the ancient world and teach others the very same words that they doubted.

How do we discern, then, what is truth and what is not?

That’s another blog post for another time (Spoiler Alert: the Bible). But suffice it to say that if we don’t listen, we may never fully know what God is trying to teach us through preaching.

In conclusion, here is my argument:

Why We Need Sermons

1. We don’t know everything.
2. God knows everything.
3. God tells things to us through other people.
4. Therefore, we need to listen to sermons, otherwise we’ll miss out.

Now go onto iTunes and search for some good sermons.