I read, listen to, and watch many sermons. Expository sermons commonly include much application but little exhortation, and there is a difference. The typical evangelical sermon today follows a predictable pattern.

Whatever happened to exhortation?

Robby Galaty and Steven Smith have an excellent chapter on exhortation in their book entitled Preaching for the Rest of Us: Essentials for Text-Driven Preaching. They write:

“Information without exhortation is not biblical preaching. … Every time God speaks, it demands a response. If we preach in a way that does not compel people to respond, in a way that does not communicate that God demands and expects a response, we have misrepresented Scripture. … The idea that one can explain, argue, and apply a text of Scripture without strong exhortation is a departure from the historical pattern of preaching” (p.120).

What is exhortation?

Exhortation summons people to action. We call for a response. We urge obedience. When we exhort, we persuade people to do what God demands. Applications become mere suggestions when we fail to exhort people to do them. The result is that sermons are preached in the indicative mood – what God has done for us – but fail to preach in the imperative mood – what we must do in response.

The verb parakaleo̅ is used 108 times in the New Testament, almost half in Paul’s letters (52). The verb has four meanings: to call or summon, to appeal or urge, to request or implore, and to comfort or encourage (BDAG). All of these meanings seek a response from the listener. Exhortation urges, appeals, implores, and encourages people to respond in some way to what God has said in the Bible. Application gives people a way to respond. Exhortation implores them to respond. Application explains God’s demands. Exhortation calls people to follow God’s demands.

For example, Paul says, “We exhort (parakaleo̅) you in the Lord Jesus, that as you received from us as to how you ought to walk and please God … that you excel still more” (1 Thess. 4:1).  He then reminds us of the “commandments (divine demands) we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus” (1 Thess. 4:2). He exhorts us to obey the divine demands and then goes on to specifically identify abstaining from sexual immorality as a divine demand and to exhort us to obey God’s demand (1 Thess. 4:3-8). Exhortation compels people to do what God demands.

Why are we afraid to exhort?

Preaching divine demands is scary and unpopular. Many are not even sure that the Bible contains divine demands. God’s commands are often viewed as God’s suggestions. Others fear moralism so much that they avoid exhortation because it borders on ungraciousness. Bryan Chapell argues that “to teach that there is merit in obedience is ungracious” and “to teach that God rejects for disobedience is ungracious.”[1] For that reason, many preachers are uncomfortable with biblical exhortation. We don’t want to be accused of moralism.

We should be careful of moralism, but moralism is not merely teaching morality. Moralism is teaching that we can please God by our own efforts apart from Christ and the power of God. However, our morality pleases God, as Paul said (see above, 1 Thess. 4:1) if it is grounded in Christ and energized by the Spirit. We are new creations in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17) who can be commanded to obey God (Rom. 6:11-14) by faith in Christ’s enabling power (Gal. 2:20).

Therefore, we can exhort believers to excel at obeying God. There is merit in obedience and loss of merit in disobedience as long as we do not consider merit solely in terms of eternal salvation or damnation.[2] Paul clearly warns Christians that disobedience incurs God’s judgment (1 Thess. 4:6), and Jesus taught that obedience brings God’s relational benefits (John 15:10). We should excel at living in ways that please God. His pleasure in our obedience is beneficial to us.

How do we exhort?

Peter illustrates the “how” perfectly (2 Peter 1:3-11). Peter exhorts us to add or supply a series of moral qualities by exerting all diligence in our efforts to live righteously. To add or supply these qualities is a command – a divine demand – that Peter emphasizes through his exhortations. If we add these moral qualities, they make us “neither useless nor unfruitful” in our Christian lives (2 Peter 1:8). If we lack these moral qualities, we are “blind and shortsighted, having forgotten our “purification from our former sins” (2 Peter 1:9). Our diligence in practicing these qualities makes our calling and election certain and our entrance into His eternal kingdom “will be abundantly supplied” to us (2 Peter 1:10-11).

We can and should exhort Christians to live moral lives because such living will benefit them. Furthermore, we can exhort Christians to work hard at this process, to be diligent, and to exert effort to obey the divine demands in the Bible. However, our exhortations to do what God demands are grounded in the power and promises of God, which give to us “everything pertaining to life and godliness” through Christ and make us “partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust” (2 Peter 1:3-4). We do because He did! We exhort because He empowers.

What is biblical preaching?

J.I. Packer argued that religious speech only becomes preaching when two elements are part of the speech: biblical content and practical exhortation. One without the other is not biblical preaching. First, we must get our content from the Bible, or more specifically, the God of the Bible. Second, “the discourse debouches in practical biblical exhortation, summoning us to be different in some spiritually significant way and to remain different whatever the pressure is put on us to give in to unspiritual ways once more.”[3]

[1] https://www.preachingtoday.com/books/art-and-craft-of-biblical-preaching/interpretation-and-application/application-without-moralism.html

[2] Abraham Kuruvilla, Privilege the Text! pp. 252-258.

[3] J.I. Packer, “Why Preach?” In The Preacher and Preaching: Reviving the Art, edited by Samuel Logan, p.10.