Introvert Preachers are Great! Or Introvert Preachers are Great?

Marvin Olasky recently interviewed Tim Keller for the May 8, 2010 edition of World Magazine. The title of the article is "A Wave Came In: How an Introvert Like Tim Keller Became a Great Preacher". I have never been an introvert or a great preacher, but I know that Tim Keller has a lot to teach us young preachers.

You can listen to the full interview here.

You can read what was printed in World here.

Is Christianity Rational or Emotional? The Prodigal God Requires Both

Often Christians find themselves erring in how they view their relationship with God in Christ. Some see Christianity as merely a relationship with God and they forget things like requirements, obedience, commands, and other biblical things. Too often, in the Reformed churches, we tend to make religion too rational. We do not think that Christianity has an emotional aspect to it. We think- head good; heart bad. We take a dogmatic and rational approach to God. Of course, we are to have a dogmatic and rational approach to the Scriptures and to the God of the Bible. We are also called to have a relationship with him- an experience of God. Timothy Keller touches upon this in his new book, The Prodigal God. Keller (in chapter 7) comments,

Salvation is experiential. A feast is a place where our appetites of senses, taste, sight, smell, are filled up. In John's Gospel we are told Jesus was in attendance at a wedding reception where the wine had run out too early. Both the bridal couple and the master of the banquet... were in danger of social humiliation. However, in his first public exercise of divine power, Jesus turned several large containers of water into wine. Amazingly, John the Gospel writer calls this miracle a sign, a signifier of what Jesus' ministry was all about. Why would this be his inaugural act? Why would Jesus, to convey what he had come to do choose to turn 150 gallons of water into superb wine in order to keep a party going? The answer is that Jesus came to bring festival joy. He is the real and true master of the banquet, the Lord of the feast...

Salvation is not only objective and legal but also subjective and experiential. The Bible insists on using sensory language about salvation. It calls us to taste and see that the LORD is good, not only to agree and believe it.. The difference between believing that God is gracious and tasting that God is gracious is as different as having a rational sense that honey is sweet and having an actual sense of its sweetness...

His love is like honey or like wine, rather than only believing that he is loving we come to sense the reality, the beauty, and the power of his love. His love can become more real to you than anyone else.

Redeemer Presbyterian Sermons

I have really enjoyed listening to Rev. Tim Keller lately. I was lent, on DVD, The Desiring God Conference, 2006, and really profited from his lecture "The Supremacy of Christ and the Gospel in the Postmodern World".

I have found that Redeemer Presbyterian Church has a number of his sermons here for free. (Boo to those for which they charge exorbitant amounts of money!)

I look forward to listening to some of these sermons. I would also like to read his latest book (which, of course, is whirling with controversy). But, I have little time for all of the reading that I would like to do.