Customer Reviews

Preaching Christ from the Old Testament: A Contemporary Hermeneutical Method

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

In this work, Greidanus takes up his pen to develop a theme he only touched upon in his previous work, "The Modern Preacher and the Ancient Text." This is the theme of preaching Christ. The bold departure that this book makes is that Christ should also be the very center of every sermon from the OT.

At this point one may seem skeptical to ask if he is suggesting that preachers should read Christ into OT texts that were not historically about Christ. He addresses this both historically and methodologically with a firm no.

The thought of the book progresses smoothly and naturally. The first four chapters of the book are an historical survey of preaching Christ throughout Church history. This survey focuses in on the Patristic and Reformation periods.

In the last four chapters, Greidanus turns to a viable methodology for preaching Christ from the OT. For Greidanus, (who is firmly anchored in Dutch Reformed covenant theology), Christ is the center of all of the history of remption to which all the OT institutions and events ultimately pointed.

The work is both timely and provocative. It is sure to challenge any average preacher, especially those who deliver a steady diet of New Testament based sermons.

Greidanus tackles a crucial topic in this book and handles it quite well. He notes that the Biblical (and particularly OT) illiteracy prevalent in the Christian church at large is in a large part due to the paucity of preaching from the Old Testament. Yet pastors often struggle to know how to preach from OT texts, and when they do they often fall into numerous pitfalls.

Greidanus does an excellent job of critiquing numerous pitfalls that the preacher might encounter in preaching the OT, especially those that would insufficiently address the text itself (i.e. using the text as a 'pretext' to skip to some other idea) or the more deadly error of ignoring the centrality of Christ in the sermon. Along with St. Paul, Greidanus exhorts the reader to be constant in preaching Christ crucified, and that generically 'God-centered' preaching is not enough. The task of the preacher is to specifically show how the fulness of God's self-revelation and salvation is found in Christ Jesus.

So in order to prepare the preacher for this great task, Greidanus provides an excellent review of major preachers/theologians in the history of the church, to see how they preached Christ from the Old Testament. As the author comes from a Calvinist background, I think he misrepresented Luther slightly, but overall he gave a fair and balanced critique of the preachers. He did critique Calvin's 'theocentric' method of preaching as insufficient. AFter his examination of historical preachers, Greidanus sets out at length to show positive methods for preaching Christ from the OT while remaining faithful to the text. He provides several sound approaches and shows step-wise how to apply each method. He offers samples on both easy and harder texts for preaching Christ in the OT.

Overall I found the book very helpful, and would expect that preachers from a variety of traditions could still read his book with great benefit. I think one aspect that I'd critique is that he was somewhat over-restrictive in the ways he saw fit to preach Christ from the OT. He was right to criticize the excesses of the allegorical method so common in the early church, but he seems to have an unnecessary concern about potential misuse of the 'details' of the OT texts. He harps on this point over and over, that the preacher should never attempt to draw out parallels in details of a text to the New Testament when preaching the typological method. But regardless, any reader will be able to see and examine for themselves the gamut of possibilities in OT preaching that Greidanus presents, and learn how best to apply them.

Preachers face a wide range of homiletical choices, and many disagree about what counts for "good preaching." In light of first-century options, the Apostle Paul stood with this plain conviction: "We preach Christ crucified" (1 Cor 1:23). Likewise, Greidanus' burden is crystal-clear: "In preaching any part of Scripture, one must understand its message in the light of that center, Jesus Christ" (p. 227).

Greidanus, professor of preaching at Calvin Theological Seminary, blends hermeneutics and homiletics to help pastors work out their commitment to Christ-centered preaching. First, he demonstrates the necessity of preaching Christ and preaching from the Old Testament (chs. 1-2). He then surveys the instructive but rather checkered history of christological interpretation as expressed in preaching from apostolic to modern times (chs. 3-4). The theoretical foundation of the book which follows is a well-illustrated treatment of seven biblical ways in which the testaments are united in Christ (chs. 5-6). These are the ways of redemptive-historical progression, promise-fulfillment, typology, analogy, longitudinal themes, New Testament references, and contrast. He concludes by laying out a 10-step process for the construction of Christ-centered sermons and invites the student into his study (so to speak) to work through the process with six separate messages (chs. 7-8).

Given the challenges of interpreting the Old Testament christologically and the temptations to engage in man-centered preaching, pastors desperately need encouragement and help to address the Church and world today with genuine Christ-centered, biblical preaching. Readers will immediately notice the Reformed theological framework of the book and may take issue with some individual interpretations, but none should miss or minimize the enormous help it offers. Greidanus is hermeneutically convincing and homiletically sound. This book will inspire you with fresh possibilities for presenting the life-changing message of Jesus!

Greidanus is already known for his other works on preaching from ancient texts. Here in Preaching Christ from the Old Testament, Greidanus wants to safeguard the modern preacher from reading Jesus Christ back into the OT, and seeks to assist the preacher to develop better skills--models, hermeneutics--to utilize the OT to preach the redemptive historical meaning of the text. I believe the shallowness and impotent preaching that pounds the pulpit in most Americanized churches stems from the poor hermeneutical and exegetical skills of most preachers. Reading a book like Preaching Christ from the OT will give the modern preacher a better framework to think about, in this case, OT texts and how they should and could be preached. Most how to preaching books concentrate on style or application--that is so utilitarian and practical American ingenuity. Greidanus brings us back to where the power of preaching comes from--the text of Scripture and how we handle it.

Dr. Sidney Greidanus serves as professor of preaching at Calvin Theological Seminary, Grand Rapids, Michigan. He is a prolific author, most notably the author of The Modern Preacher and the Ancient Text. Greidanus' aim in this volume is:

... to provide seminary students and preachers with a responsible, contemporary method for preaching Christ from the Old Testament. A secondary, but no less important, aim is to challege Old Testament scholars to broaden their focus and to understand the Old Testament not only in its own historical context but also in the context of the New Testament (xii).

He argues that this book is "not merely for the general category of God-centered preaching but for the more specific category of explicitly Christ-centered preaching" (37).

Summary

Chapter One, entitled "Preaching Christ and Preaching the Old Testament." Greidanus outlines the necessity of preaching Christ and well as the rationale for Christian churches to preach from the Old Testament. Griedanus outlines how the Old Testament brings forth redemptive history leading to Christ as well as shedding light on the New Testament itself. "Every Christian church today needs to hear the Old Testament for its function of teaching, reproof, correction, and training in righteousness, as well as for the hope it brings and the instruction it offers for `salvation through faith in Christ Jesus' (2 Tim 3:15)"(26).

Chapter Two, entitled "The Necessity of Preaching Christ from the Old Testament," Griedanus laments the profusion of human centered preaching from our pulpits, especially in relation to the Old Testament. He warns that preachers must not "create a breach between the Old Testament and the New and then scurry about to find some kind of continuity in order to bring a Christian message" (45).

Chapters Three and Four, entitled "The History of Preaching Christ from the Old Testament (I and II, respectively)," Greidanus aims to "take some distance from the contemporary scene and search for stability for our method of interpretation in a long-range, historical perspective" (69). He presents the various methods of interpretation (including their background, strengths, and weaknesses) throughout church history such as allegorization, typologization, Augustine's Fourfold Method, Christological Interpretation of Martin Luther, the Theocentric Interpretation of John Calvin, and contemporary Christological interpretations.

In Chapter Five, entitled "New Testament Principles for Preaching Christ from the Old Testament," Greidanus expresses a concern that many of our churches tend to separate Christ from the rest of God's work in redemptive history. The New Testament writers examined the Old Testament, starting "with the reality of Christ" (183). Greidanus outlines the six ways of preaching Christ from the Old Testament and uses these methods as a balanced corrective for preachers who may handle the text in a wrong manner.

In Chapter Six, Greidanus reveals the title of his method of interpretation, calling it the "redemptive-historical christocentric method" (227).

The christocentric method complements the theocentric method of interpreting the Old Testament by seeking to do justice to the fact that God's story of bringing his kingdom on earth is centered in Christ: Christ the center of redemptive history, Christ the center of the Scriptures. In preaching any part of Scripture, one must understand its message in the light of that center, Jesus Christ (227).

Chapter 7 outlines ten steps in going from the Old Testament Text to the Christocentric sermon, then applies these various steps to Genesis 22. In Chapter 8, entitled "Practicing the Christocentric Method," Greidanus seeks "to clarify further the use of this christocentric method and to make questioning the text about its witness to Jesus Christ an ingrained habit" (319). He takes three Old Testament passages that are apt to faulty interpretation and examine them from the ways of redemptive-historical progression, promise-fulfillment, typology, analogy, longitudinal themes, New Testament references, and contrast.

This volume concludes with two appendices. Appendix 1 ("Steps from Text to Sermon") presents a distilled outline of Chapter 7. Appendix 2 provides "An Expository Sermon Model" (349-350) and helps the expositor with the components of the introduction, sermon body, and conclusion.

Critical Evaluation

Greidanus promotes the idea of our preachers engaging in "explicitly Christ-centered preaching" (37) from the Old Testament. He also desires to help scholars to bring in the context of the New Testament into their Old Testament studies for a more comprehensive understanding for both preacher and scholar alike. Greidanus succeeds admirably in making his case.

The greatest strength this volume possesses is the conviction of ascertaining the true meaning and theme of the text, especially when dealing with certain texts of the Old Testament. He notes that "preaching Christ is as broad as preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God [and] more specifically, to preach Christ is to proclaim some facet of the person, work, or teaching of Jesus of Nazareth so that people may believe him, trust him, love him, and obey him" (8). Griedanus rightly believes that the Old and New Testaments possess a solid unity due to the Old Testament's witness of Christ and the New Testament's revealing of Christ. Greidanus
Greidanus expertly shows how the Scriptures bring together Christ and the rest of God's redemptive work. He says, "Christ is not to be separated from God" but must be seen as one "sent by God" who "accomplished the work of God, and sought the glory of God" (179). He correctly analyzes how preachers often plead with their listeners to receive Jesus as their Lord and Savior, lamenting the "pitfall of Christomonism..., that is, the preaching of Christ in isolation from God" (178). Greidanus rightly informs the preacher and the interpreter that Christ must be seen in relation to the totality of God's redemptive work in history.

Another helpful portion of this work is how Greidanus provides the church's history of preaching Christ from the Old Testament from the time of the church fathers to now. This inclusion helps rebut the conclusions of many advocates of the higher critical and source critical methods who question or outright reject the canonicity of the Old Testament. By including this portion, the reader learns much about what to do and not to do in interpreting various passages. Greidanus analyzes allegorical, typological, and fourfold interpretations and concisely displays their strengths and their weaknesses. Greidanus shows that while the writers were influenced by Jewish interpretation methods, the reader must never see the New Testament simply as a hermeneutics book. "Their concern clearly was to preach Christ from the Old Testament, and they did so in ways that were current at that time. Many of these ways still work today, but others do not" (189-190). The balance Greidanus provides is so helpful to the reader.

Another strength to this work lies in Greidanus' understanding of the various issues facing the average pastor. "Especially for busy pastors, the temptation is great simply to retell the story of one of these [Old Testament] characters and relate it to the lives their parishioners" (34). With this statement, he hopes to jar preachers out of their lethargic study practices and demonstrate how one may find Christ. Griedanus notes how preachers are often tempted to force Christ into an Old Testament passage.

The weakness were few in number. In Chapter Seven, Greidanus outlines steps in taking the sermon from the Old Testament text to the Christocentric method. What promised to be an intriguing chapter began with some concern from the perspective of the expository preacher. His first step states, "Select a textual unit with an eye to congregational needs (279)." Later in the chapter, he notes that "before selecting a text, we should decide which particular need should be addressed in this sermon. The congregation need provides the target. . . . By contrast, selecting the text first then belatedly trying to apply it to an acute congregational need can lead to unnatural and forced applications" (281). Greidanus' weaknesses in this argument are multifold.

First, one must select a text based upon first prayer and God's leadership and then preachers must select a text with an eye to the glory of God rather than primarily congregational needs. While he makes an excellent point "for more specific needs one has to exegete the congregation and the culture in which it lives" as part of one's pastoral ministry, taking one's focus off the Word of God as the foundation of sermon preparation and looking to the subjective needs of the congregation starts off on too slippery a slope.

In addition, are human beings who are tainted and tarnished by the Fall truly the best gauge of determining with accuracy what exactly are their needs? For example, while one may understand their need to be financial in nature and would expect to hear a sermon dealing with how God will bless them financially --- the listener may need to hear a sermon about greed. The listener may not feel this particular need, yet the preacher still must proclaim this truth and expose it so the Spirit may truly bring about the listener's true need --- repentance.

Conclusion

I would highly recommend this book to each pastor and seminary student serious about expository preaching. With the deficiency of Old Testament preaching from our evangelical pulpits today, this book will provide a welcomed remedy if the preachers heed its principles. Greidanus provides an excellent balanced work that not only looks back at history for lessons learned but also forward to the promising possibility that may arise from preaching Christ from the Old Testament.

In search of a richer hermeneutic, I bought this along with Dennis Johnson's "Him We Proclaim."

The best part of the book is Greidanus' survey of Hermeneutical history. It is very well researched, identifies the major schools and methods, and approaches them from a truly fresh angle, that you will not typically find in a hermeneutics textbook. For example, rather than spend extensive energy in discussing higher critics of the 19th century he deals with Spurgeon's interpretive method -- certainly much more relevant and interesting for the average reader of the book, and surprisingly a ground rarely covered. Therefore, I found actual research here strong and provocative Here we have a story of hermeneutics with more explanatory power.

I found a great deal of irony in the analysis of this material, however. This was because the emphasis of the book is to let the (Biblical) text speak for itself so that we may learn from it. Yet, when reading through his evaluations of the church tradition, they were not allowed to speak for themselves! The history that he finds, actually demonstrates fairly conclusively that the earliest interpreters relied heavily on typology, and that even the giants such as Augustine, Luther and Calvin all used it as well as allegory. In each evaluation they are praised for obeying the 20th century evangelical rules of interpretation, and criticized when they deviate. The history was thus marred by a foregone conclusion. His criticism of Spurgeon for example begins with "even the most generous reviewers will admit that Spurgeon makes numerous errors in his interpretation of Scripture." A quick dismissal for the "Prince of Preachers." If every major interpreter since Clement of Rome in 96 AD used allegory, should we pause to re-evaluate its significance at least, or examine it more carefully? Rather than just rank people on how much they did or didn't do?

To his credit Greidanus tells this story so in order to make an opening for himself to demonstrate how we can use the OT in broader ways than have been recently popular. The approach he ultimately builds off of this history does succeed in that, but Johnson's work was much bolder and really set a high bar. Johnson suggests that we follow the Apostolic method of interpretation and demonstrates in numerous ways how we can do just that. Some of the same kinds of interpretations that Greidanus dismisses as allegory, Johnson demonstrates to actually have textual warrant.

Bottom line, the history section in this book was really an education and worth the book if money is not a concern, but if your real concern is hermeneutics and how to preach Christ in continuity with that history, buy Johnson.

If you need a book that has looked at every angle of why and how to preach from the Old testament, this is it. Every question you may have will be covred, I promise. It can be long at times, and sometimes you might disagree. I did. I think he'd be okay with that as long as you left feeling as if it is important to preach Jesus from the Old Testament.

There are many books about hermeneutic and methodology how to preach. A preacher may have a lot of such books in his library.
This book may repeat some ideas about how to preach, but Greidanus is a good teacher.
His summary makes fresh dry and dusty theories.
He gives a new starter for preaching the Word.

Greidanus, a professor emeritus (retired) of preaching at Calvin Theological Seminary, has written a comprehensive textbook on preaching Christ from the Old Testament from a Reformed perspective. When I say comprehensive, I mean that this book is an academic resource filled with insightful information; it's one of those books that you find yourself consulting throughout the lifetime of your preaching ministry. Greidanus begins by arguing for the need to preach Christ from the O.T. and from all of Scripture because of the nature of progressive revelation. The first 60 pages of this work provides a mini-biblical theology which includes the inter-textual relationship between the O.T. and N.T. He then pours out almost 100 pages of ink providing a history of preaching Christ from the O.T. He explains the different methods used by the Apostolic Fathers, all the way through to Augustine, Luther, Calvin, and Spurgeon among others. What I appreciated was his critic of the abuse of allegorical and typological forms of preaching and he rightly argues for the combination of literary-historical interpretation of O.T. passages with canonical, redemptive-historical, and Christ-centered interpretation. He presents seven ways of preaching Christ from the O.T.: redemptive-historical progression, promise-fulfillment, typology, analogy, longitudinal themes, New Testament references, and contrast. He then explains and demonstrates the hermeneutical process he calls the "Christo-centric method." What I appreciate most is that this book is laced with example after example of the right and wrong ways to preach various passages from the O.T.

One example is the famous story of Abraham and Isaac from Genesis 22. Greidanus warns against the dangers of ignoring Genesis 22 as written for Israel and it's ramifications for Israel. The author warns against the dangers of biographical preaching which tends to look for attitudes and actions of the biblical characters and drawing contemporary applications based on these attitudes and actions, rather than focusing on the biblical author's intent of Israel. He warns against generalizing and universalizing the text, where God's testing of Abraham is applied to every Believer. God does not test all of his saints the way Abraham was tested; God does not call us to lay down our Isaac's as an atonement, and God does not reward our obedience by rescuing us. These are not unbiblical points, but it's not the point of the text. God putting for his Son for us was not contingent on our obedience. And God did not reward our obedience by putting forth Christ. God put forth Christ, and as a result we are able to obey God by trusting in Christ. The story of Abraham and Isaac in Gen. 22 was originally written to Israel to:
1) Teach Israel that it lives only by the grace of the Lord's covenant
2) move Israel to gratitude for the Lord's grace in providing a substitute offering
3) encourage Israel to fully trust their faithful covenant Lord to provide redemption
These three points can easily be applied through the New Covenant. There are many example such as this one throughout the text of this book.

The only critique I have is that Gredianus seems to press the necessity of preaching Christ in every single sermon. This is evident in his critique of John Calvin's preaching.

Gredianus writes: "According to John Leith, Calvin's purpose in preaching was to render transparent the text of Scripture itself. Although this goal is admirable in itself, from our perspective Calvin did not sufficiently focus on producing Christ-centered sermons in the context of the whole of Scripture."

Calvin probably did not always focus on producing Christ-centered sermons, because the scriptural text does not always produce a Christ-centered sermon. Yes, all Scripture eventually points towards Christ, but on this point Calvin was right to focus more readily on the immediate context of Scripture rather than forcing every passage into the grid of redemptive history.

Due to the text-book nature of this work, as well as it's length, I recommend this book as a resource for preachers.

What did you find in the book that would help you preach Christ from the Old Testament?

Chapter One:

Greidanus does an incredible job of not only giving the do's on how to preach Christ and do it from the Old Testament, but goes as far as explaining the don'ts as well. He shows how the New Testament church in its apostolic preaching had already done this type of preaching. Greidanus gives the reasons behind the meaning of "preaching Christ," but also tells and gives examples of what preaching Christ does not mean. Sometimes I think it is better to start off by telling people the way you don't want things to happen, so that they know exactly what you do want to happen. From the person and work of Christ he gives a clear example of the reason for preaching Christ, specifically from the Old Testament. Near the end of the chapter, after giving his reasons on why to preach Christ, Greidanus gives the reasons for why people in today's culture lack the preaching of Christ from the Old Testament.

Chapter Two:

Greidanus's reasons on why we are not preaching give great help on keeping the focus pointed towards Christ and not man. Here he shows a way of not just mentioning Christ to make the messages Christ-centered, but actually showing Christ from the Scriptures. What helped me most from this chapter was a way of looking at what God is doing in Scripture and not merely at the work against man. Also he shows the way the Old Testament is often looked at and how it should be seen as the link of Christ bringing the oneness to the story of redemption. Christ is the same all throughout Scripture. Lastly, Greidanus goes deeper than the first chapter in explaining a fuller explanation of Christ.

Chapter Three:

This chapter was helpful because Greidanus showed a biblical view of the way messages should be preached. It is not to be preached with new methods, ways, or other approaches that might lead to another way of study. He deals with all of today's movements and their beliefs that preaching ought to be from their perspectives; Greidanus shows the correct view of interpretation of the message throughout Scripture. I personally liked the fact that Greidanus goes back throughout history and the early church fathers and looks at the way they viewed Scripture. Giving allegorical and typological views and their different ways of viewing Scripture help one see the do's and do not's once again like he has already so many times done throughout his writings. Showing the short comings really made me think of how many people in today's Reformed Theology branch have sometimes gone too far in their typology of the Scriptures.

Chapter Four:

In this chapter Greidanus starts off by explaining Luther's hermeneutical method and its principle of sola scriptura. He goes on to explain Luther's contrast of law and gospel. Once again he not only shows the upside of Luther's view on interpretation, but the downside as well. He also reviews Calvin and his hermeneutical method dealing with all the areas in which Calvin would look at Scripture. He does this as well with Charles Spurgeon and Wilhelm Vischer. Personally my favorite is how he explains how Calvin would preach a text after many ways of studying it.

Chapter Five:

This chapter may show the major lacking theme of American Evangelical churches today. The lack of preaching Christ from the Old Testament is not because they lack knowledge of it, but how to do it. He shows exactly how to do this properly and how to exalt God in all of his glory by first preaching Christ. It is helpful to learn this when dealing with today's culture which lacks this in so many ways. He does this in a way that does not separate individual stories or books, but makes everything fit together in the work and redemption of Christ.

Chapter Six:

Here Greidanus revels and shows how to use his method: the Christocentric method.This is a huge help in understanding a text in not only its individual story but in a whole of all of the stories. Looking at each individual story, message, and text and then putting them in the plan of God in His story of redemption presents the Old Testament as a clear picture and shows Scripture in a whole new correct lens. The best part of this chapter is his proper job in explaining typology and how to do it correctly. The end examples are key to helping see how this is done as well.



Chapter Seven:

Starting off he gives ten ways to lead you in making the right Christocentric sermon from viewing the Scriptures. He gives several examples and how to do this from Genesis. This chapter is most useful to preachers and their ways or means that they don't understand for making a Christ-centered sermon, or coming about one. With these proper steps of viewing the Scripture in light of the entire major theme of the Bible, pastors or anyone in study, will be helped in coming to correct God honoring sermons or speeches.



Chapter Eight:

Here examples are given from Gen. 6, Ex. 15, 17, and Num. 19. These examples are ways of showing how this study would look and not look. He tries to clarify this method of studying Scripture. He uses these to go through their proper views like: redemptive history, fulfillments, typology, analogy, themes, New Testament, and looking at how to compare it with other passages. Examining the Scriptures through this lens seems hard to do but after reading Greidanus you can't wait to get your first Old Testament text to work your way through and use all these study tools to search Scripture deeper, finding much more meat in all of the story that consists throughout all of the Bible.





What did you find to be unhelpful and even a negative influence upon the preaching of Christ from the Old Testament?

This might be a little nick picky. I found it hard after six chapters full of how to preach Christ-centered sermons, to then begin in the seventh chapter with his "ten steps from Old Testament text to Christocentric sermons." His first step is to select a text from the congregational needs. Maybe this is why I am not, nor do I plan ever to be a shepherd of the Lord's people. But I do find it very hard to sit down and look for a text to fit the needs of the hearers of the Word. I also find this mindset contrary to his view on Scripture. If one wants to keep Christ first in the sermon, then there should be no reason why to pick a text for the hearer. The influence of this then tends to lead me to believe that the preacher would then meet the needs of his people. I understand in some areas how this can be, but I do not preach the gospel for man's sake, nor would I ever preach the gospel with my focus on the needs of the hearers. He says, "When church bells ring on Easter Sunday, people need to hear a word from the Lord about the resurrection." To which I'd say, "Shouldn't they hear the cross preached every week?!" I just do not see from my view how anyone could explain Christ-centered hermeneutics but then when coming to prepare a message, go to a man-centered way of thinking. I am by no means a preacher or a pastor nor do I have many of the skills to speak as a pastor would. I may be off on this area, but am willing to hear other opinions.

Greidanus mentions to make special sermons for the church year like Christmas, Easter, and the day of Pentecost. I would much rather teach the Scriptures and wait to see how the Lord's plan will be carried out. Then shortly after this point he says, "Before selecting a text, we should decide which particular need should be addressed in this sermon." This makes me wonder if in any way he is trying to say that we need to focus on the points and areas we must preach to our hearers before looking at what the Scriptures say. This would also make me believe that he will have assumptions of what "he wants to say" before he ever comes to the text and may allude to something different than what will be in the text. Lastly he states that this process will help us create sermons that are relevant from beginning to end. In no means would I disagree that we should be relevant to today's church. I actually believe this is one of the largest problems in America. Preachers get behind their pulpit and preach about something that happened 25, 40, and even 50 years ago in culture, which has nothing to do with the man in the pew.It almost seems that the pastor wants to do something to keep the hearer awake or try to appeal to him. The gospel stands alone; the gospel flies alone. The gospel plays a one man band and needs nothing but itself to appeal to the hearer of it. I think that the point Greidanus is trying to make is just not as necessary as he makes it. It seems to defeat the purpose of Christ-centeredness.