POWER IN EXPOSITORY PREACHING
by Faris D. Whitesell
www.fotbc.org

Chapter 7 Power Through APPLICATION 
A discourse without application would not be a sermon, but only a declamation—a monologue. "Where the application begins, there the sermon begins," said Spurgeon. We are not merely to speak before people but to them.
William Cleaver Wilkinson distinguished Phillips Brooks from Henry Ward Beecher on this basis: "For Mr. Brooks is not an orator such as Mr. Beecher was. He does not speak to people, into people, as Mr. Beecher did; rather he speaks before them, in their presence. He soliloquizes. There is almost a minimum of mutual relation between speaker and hearer. Undoubtedly the swift, urgent monolog is quickened, reinforced, by the consciousness of an audience present. That consciousness, of course, penetrates to the mind of the speaker. But it does not dominate the speaker’s mind; it does not turn monolog into dialog; the speech is monolog still."1
Application means to put to use, to bring to bear upon, or to bring into contact with, as in the application of a poultice. It includes the idea of relevancy which is prominent in preaching theory today. Application brings the hearer under the claims of the gospel; it searches his heart and reins; it brings into divine encounter; it makes the listener say, "I am the man," or "He is speaking to me." Application "is the main thing to be done," says Broadus. Truth is designed to be obeyed or practiced, not merely to furnish entertainment or information. Good application turns a sermon into a message. J. W. Etter said: "…and a preacher preaching a sermon without application would be like a physician giving to his patients a lecture on general health, and forgetting to write him a prescription."2
Therefore, the application may be considered the most important part of the sermon because it is the part that motivates the hearer to action. Without it, the sermon fails, because Biblical truth is meaningless unless it bears on life. It is better to make definite, searching application than to imply or hint at it.
How does one go about making application of sermonic truth? It may be done in several ways. The selection of a text and the framing of a title have application in mind. The phrasing of a sermon thesis should point in the direction of application. The explanatory part of an expository sermon often has elements of application in it. In making the truth plain, the bearing of that truth on conduct is almost certain to be evident. Sermon illustrations often help to make the relevancy of the truth manifest. 
David R. Breed believed that application was also in the preacher. He wrote: "No preacher has any right to abdicate his function and refer his hearers only to a distant and disembodied divinity. The preacher must be the embodiment of the truth which he announces, and it must have with him a vital power. The mistake that some ministers make is that of thinking that truth contains its own force; but there is no force at all in mere truth. It is only when the truth takes hold on some man, and thus becomes incarnate, that it has influence and power. It is not true that ‘truth is mighty and will prevail’ if that truth be dissociated from a living and energetic personality. The application, therefore, is in the preacher. It has power because he is himself possessed by it."3
Audience analysis is necessary before the best application can be made. The preacher must know the nature and needs of his congregation in rather minute detail in order to offer the truth to them helpfully. We can always assume safely that a congregation has certain general spiritual needs—to repent, to believe, to pray, to forgive, to love, to serve, to grow, to study the Scriptures, to witness—because they are men in the flesh and not yet in heaven. True enough, but do they realize these needs? Are they trying to meet them? Or, have they become discouraged? Do they understand how to go about meeting these difficulties? What other more specific and more conscious needs do they now have?
In order to make sound and forceful application, truth must be lifted out of its local and temporary references and shown to be timeless and universal. There is something powerful about elemental, eternal truth. Such truth lies underneath the surface of all Biblical material. One of the major tasks of preaching is to find and lay bare these timeless truths in such a way that they will challenge and move listeners. These truths are essential to good sermon titles, theses, main points, and application. The normal mind has capacity to see and recognize at once the force of timeless truth. To apply such truth is relatively easy, for it almost applies itself. In order to grasp the significance of timeless truth, let us observe how some of the great expository preachers develop such truth here and there in their sermons.
Alexander Maclaren in his sermon, "Three Kinds of Praying," says: 
Yes, God’s delays are not delays, but are for our profit that we may always pray and not faint, and may keep alight the flame of sure hope that the Son of man cometh….4
He who truly prays "sees no man any more," or if he does sees men only as subjects for intercession, not for contempt.5
In the judgment of heaven, which is the judgment of truth, sin forsaken is sin passed away.6 
In his sermon on "Entering the Kingdom," Maclaren utters these eternal truths: 
A great man’s hangers-on are always more careful of his dignity than he is, for it increases their own importance.7
The infant’s lowliness is not yet humility; for it is instinct rather than virtue…. On the other hand, clinging trust is the infant’s life. It, too, is rudimentary and instinctive, but the impulse which makes the babe nestle in its mother’s bosom may well stand for a picture of the conscious trust which the children of the kingdom must have.8
The entrance gate is very low, and if we hold our heads high, we shall not get through it. It must be on our hands and knees that we go into it.9 
F. B. Meyer often developed these timeless, universal truths. From a few pages of his book, Moses, the Servant of God, we select these: 
Nor will our lives ever be what they might until we realize that God has a plan for every hour in them; and that He waits to reveal that plan to the loving and obedient heart, making it known to us by one of the ten thousand ministries that lie around us.10
We are all too apt to run before we are sent, as Moses did in his first well-meant, but ill-timed, endeavours. We put our hands, at our own prompting, to a work that needs doing; we ask God to help us, and we go on very well with the momentum of our own energy for at least a day. But on the morrow, when chiding and rebuke and difficulty arise, as they did to Moses, we are disappointed, and throw it all up; betaking ourselves to flight, finding our refuge in the solitudes of the desert.11
When God wants an implement for His service He does not choose the golden scepter, but a shepherd’s crook; the weakest and meanest thing He can find—a ram’s horn, a cake of barley meal, an ox-goad, an earthen pitcher, a shepherd’s sling. He employs a worm to thresh the mountains and makes the hills as chaff. A rod with God behind it is mightier that the vastest army.12
We only learn as we endeavour to obey. Light is given to us to know what next step we should take—just light enough and no more; a rim of light, hemmed in by darkness, falling as a faint circle on our path.13
And you will never get back into the warm, blessed circle of his manifested presence, where his face smiles and his voice speaks, till you have gone back to the place where you dropped the thread of obedience, and, taking it up where you left it, do what you know to be the word and will of God.14 
G. Campbell Morgan was mighty in revealing timeless truth. Looking at his sermon on "Songs in Prison," based on Acts 16:25-26, we note the following: 
At first we are amazed with the cheerfulness and heroism of these men, and then we find out that their singing was not abnormal but normal. It was not the result of a transient emotion. It was the expression of a constant experience of the soul.15
Their supreme consciousness was not that of the prison, or the stocks, or the pain, but of God. They were not callous or indifferent; pain was pain to them; confinement was confinement; loneliness was loneliness; but they realized how all these things were yet held in the grasp of the King of the perfect order, Whom they knew as their Lord and Master and, consequently, they sang praises.16
First, we learn that men who sing while they suffer are men who have learned the profound secret that suffering is the method by which joy is perfected.17
But again, men who sing in prison are men who cannot be imprisoned…. Fellowship with God is the franchise of eternity.18
And finally, men who sing when their work is stopped are men whose work is never stopped…. A man who can sing in prison is a man whose work is never done.19
That earthquake does not always come. We shall miss a great deal if we imagine that when we are in prison and sing, there will be an earthquake. Prison doors may not be opened at all. Thousands have been left in prison and died there, but they sang, and they sang through until they joined the new song on the other side. That earthquake does not matter.20 
A few modern examples of timeless truth from Helmut Thielicke taken from his sermon on "The Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus," Luke 16:19-31, may be appropriate: 
It all depends upon one’s identifying oneself with one of the five brothers and taking the right attitude toward the Word of God. This is the point of the story. Only as we start with this will the story be unlocked.21
In one way or another every one of us has this poor Lazarus lying at our door, since every one, even the poorest of us, is in one way or another a rich man.22
For to be in hell simply means to be utterly separated from God….23 
It is the torment of the dead that they cannot warn the living, just as it is the torment of the mature that the erring young will not listen to them.24 
Accordingly, there remains to us, the five brothers, nothing but "Moses and the prophets" and all that they have to say about this Jesus.25 
The Bible deal’s with God’s revelation in the past. The work of Christ in redemption was once-for-all in history. Preaching must speak with authority about these events and truths of the past, but the application of the truth must be brought into the present tense. "…now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation" (II Corinthians 6:2, kjv). Sin, Satan, the flesh, and the world are the same today as two thousand years ago. The work of God in Christ and the work of the Holy Spirit are as valid today as ever. The gospel has as much saving power now as in the first century. The needs of humanity in our affluent society are basically unchanged from Bible times.
The preacher’s responsibility is to make the truths of the Bible contemporary and relevant. To do this, he will have to swing from the "they," "he," "she," and "it," to "you," the second person personal pronoun. "You" are the sinner who needs salvation; "you" are the church member who must experience redeeming grace; "you" are the youth whom Christ is calling; "you" are the one whom temptation has overcome and who must be cleansed. The preacher should not address God as "you" in his public prayers, but he should frequently address his audience as "you."
As a magnifying glass brings the sun’s rays to a burning focus upon a piece of grass or wood until it flames, so must the truth of the Scriptures be brought to a burning focus upon the lives of auditors until they respond to God’s call. Jesus did not hesitate to do it. He said, "I tell you, No; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish" (Luke 13:3, rsv); and, "How can you believe, who receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the only God? Do not think that I shall accuse you to the Father; it is Moses who accuses you, on whom you set your hope" (John 5:44-45, rsv).
Peter used the second person at Pentecost, "…Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs which God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know—this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hand of lawless men" (Acts 2:22-23, rsv). When his hearers were cut to the heart, and cried, "‘Brethren, what shall we do?’… Peter said to them, ‘Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit’ " (Acts 2:37-38, rsv).
Breed says that application includes recapitulation, illustration, inferences, and exhorta-tion,26 but it must go beyond that.
In his sermon on "Abel," Alexander Whyte bears down on our responsibility for our brother, in these words: 
Where, then, is Abel thy brother? Answer that on the spot. Where hast thou hid him? Say on the spot, Lord, come with me and I will show Thee. Go back to Abel’s grave. Go back continually in your past life. Go back to your school days. Go back to your college days. Go back to your first office, your first shop, your first workshop. Recall your first friend. Pass before your eyes the first young man, the first young woman, you were intimate with. Call up the long-mouldered corpse of your first affection, your first passion, your first love, your first lust. Give instances. Give names; and ask if God has another case like yours in all His Book. Face full in the face the monstrous folly; that word, that act, that makes you blush scarlet and turn in your seat to think of it. They are turning in their bed in hell at this moment for far less…. Why is introspection the only thing that you have no time for, and always push it into a corner? Is it because you are not your brother’s keeper? Is it because you never struck a foul blow in the field? Is it because no grey head has ever gone down to a grave that your hands dug? Is it because no young man’s faith, and no young woman’s trust, and no unsuspecting friend’s good name has ever been shaken, or deceived, or pulled down and murdered by you? Have your hands been always so washed in innocency? Are there no tears against you in God’s bottle, and no names in His book?27 
Whyte enforces the thought that when his first son was born, Enoch began to walk with God. In his sermon on "Enoch," his application is: "Fathers and mothers, young fathers, and young mothers, fathers and mothers whose first child has just been born, and no more—seize your opportunity. Let not another day pass. Begin today. Begin tonight. It is late, if not yet too late, with the most of us; but it is not yet too late with you. Take Enoch for your father. Take him for your patron patriarch. Take him for your example. Follow him in his blessed footsteps in his family life."28
Broadus tells us that application should include practical suggestions concerning the best mode and means of performing the duty urged.29 We can readily see how this is true. Many hearers do not understand how to go about practicing the good resolutions they make. They are dominated by carnal habits which are hard to break. Take the matter of prayer. People need to pray and they know it, but how to practice prayer effectively is what they have never been able to do. The preacher can suggest devotional books, prayer lists, prayer times, prayer places, prayer partners, prayer while driving, prayer retreats, and other useful practices.
In the matter of witnessing, almost all Christians would like to, but they do not know how to begin. They can be told about the value of keeping a Bible on the desk, how to circulate Christian literature and tracts, how to write witnessing letters, and how to bring Christ into ordinary conversations. 
Christian families need help in practical procedures. Sermonic application can include ideas on family worship, family council, family purse, dividing the work load, taking vacations together, and worshiping together. Illustrations of how others are using unique and successful ways of practicing Christian ideals will enforce all such practical suggestions.
Modern psychological sermons have specialized on the "how to" emphasis, and many of them fail because they are more psychological than Scriptural. But that is no reason for the expository preacher to fail in the ways and means of application. 
Under the title, "The Church’s Attitude Toward Work," from the text, I Thessalonians 4:11 (kjv), "…study to be quiet, and to do your own business, and to work with your own hands…," Harold J. Ockenga points up his application in these words: 
Consistency of testimony is essential. Paul’s word translated "honestly" is really seemingly or appropriately, but it has the meaning of honestly as well. It seems that we who are Christians working in an office for non-Christians must give a full labor value for the time for which we are paid. We cannot be chiselers, or clock-watchers, we cannot give fifty minutes for our sixty minutes pay, or seven hours work for our eight hours pay. To do so is to steal from those for whom we work. Some of the practices of our unions in America approximate that. When bricklayers are required to lay only two hundred bricks when they could lay twice that many in one day or when the machine that could lay several times that many is kept off the market, it is dishonest practice. This can be multiplied in many instances. On the other hand, when companies deliberately keep down the basic wages of employees, they encourage unions in such practices, or when companies refuse to share the profits which have been made by these employees, there is a certain degree of dishonesty involved, and Christians should give heed to these things. The Christian should be able to produce a better day’s work, a better service, a better product than the man who is a non-Christian. This is the highest commendation of the Christian way of life.30 
T. DeWitt Talmage had the right idea about the place of application in preaching. Preaching on "Jehu, the Swift Driver," he said: "Thus far my discourse may not have touched your case, and I consider that sermon a failure which does not strike every one somewhere. I have no desire to escape personal preaching. What is the use of going to church if not to be made better? I never feel satisfied when I sit in church unless the preacher strikes some of my sins and arouses me out of some of my stupidities."31
Preachers have differing sensitivities about pressing personalized application, and doubtless there is a difference in the abilities of ministers to do so; to do so with love, concern, tact and cogency is a capacity to be sought and cultivated.
The expository preacher, as well as all others, should not be satisfied except with positive response to his application. To do this requires the highest use of his imagination and persuasive skills. He should try to understand the art of motivation and use it according to Christian principles.
Human skills, techniques and capacities, no matter how excellent, are never enough in the field of preaching. There must be the backing and enduement of the Holy Spirit, in both the preparation and delivery of the sermon, if the sermon is to do its highest work. The Holy Spirit can work before, under, through, around, and after the words of the preacher strike the ears of the hearers. He can make suggestions, bring up memories, reveal needs, and motivate decisions that are vital, though they may never be known to the preacher. The preacher’s privilege, then, is to seek the cooperation of the Holy Spirit in preaching. 
Chapter 8: Power Through IMAGINATION 
Fantasy can create the weird and impossible—ghosts, goblins, and space ships from other planets—but imagination stays with the hard, concrete facts of known existence