I’m in the process of rereading Roger Wagner’s very helpful book on preaching, Tongues Aflame. The brilliance of the book lies in its goal: develop a homiletic that is thoroughly “apostolic.” The author does this by surveying the sermons in Acts, giving special attention to the method and content of each sermon. A theme constant throughout the books is that the apostles were “men of the Word of God written.” They knew the Scriptures inside and out. Obviously, this is true when they explicitly recite (from memory!) large sections of Isaiah, or Micah, or the Psalms. But it’s also true implicitly, as Wagner points out, when they are engaging a Gentile audience ignorant of the Scriptures. The apostles didn’t base their authority on the written word when talking to one audience, but on some other authority when talking to another. They weren’t “planting their feet in midair” as Schaeffer would say. To the contrary, whether to Jews or Gentiles, the apostles always had their feet firmly planted on God’s revelation of himself. Says Wagner:
The Spectacles of Special Revelation
I’m in the process of rereading Roger Wagner’s very helpful book on preaching, Tongues Aflame. The brilliance of the book lies in its goal: develop a homiletic that is thoroughly “apostolic.” The author does this by surveying the sermons in Acts, giving special attention to the method and content of each sermon. A theme constant throughout the books is that the apostles were “men of the Word of God written.” They knew the Scriptures inside and out. Obviously, this is true when they explicitly recite (from memory!) large sections of Isaiah, or Micah, or the Psalms. But it’s also true implicitly, as Wagner points out, when they are engaging a Gentile audience ignorant of the Scriptures. The apostles didn’t base their authority on the written word when talking to one audience, but on some other authority when talking to another. They weren’t “planting their feet in midair” as Schaeffer would say. To the contrary, whether to Jews or Gentiles, the apostles always had their feet firmly planted on God’s revelation of himself. Says Wagner: