Preaching: A Living Transaction

Martyn Lloyd-Jones

In Preaching and Preachers, Martyn Lloyd-Jones argues that preaching isn't merely about imparting information to the hearers. It's a living transaction.

Any true definition of preaching must say that [the preacher] is there to deliver the message of God, a message from God to those people…He has been sent, he is a commissioned person, and he is standing there as the mouthpiece of God and of Christ to address these people. In other words he is not here merely to talk to them, he is not there to entertain them. He is there–and I want to emphasise this–to do something to those people; he is there to produce results of various kinds, he is there to influence people. He is not merely to influence a part of them; he is not only to influence their minds, or only their emotions, or merely to bring pressure to bear upon their wills and to induce them to some kind of activity. He is there to deal with the whole person; and his preaching is meant to affect the whole person at the very centre of life. Preaching should make such a difference to a man who is listening that he is never the same again...

[Preaching] should always be a transaction between preacher and listener with something vital and living taking place. It is not the mere imparting of knowledge, there is something much bigger involved. The total person is engaged on both sides; and if we fail to realise this our preaching will be a failure...

[The preacher] is dealing with living persons, people who are in need and in trouble, sometimes not consciously; and he is to make them aware of that, and to deal with it. It is this living transaction...

If people can listen to us without becoming anxious about themselves or reflecting on themselves we have not been preaching…

[Preaching] addresses us in such a manner as to bring us under judgment; and it deals with us in such a way that we feel our whole life is involved, and we go out saying, 'I can never go back and live just as I did before. This has done something to me, it has made a difference to me. I am a different person as the result of listening to this'…

Preaching is that which deals with the total person, the hearer becomes involved and knows that he has been dealt with and addressed by God through this preacher. Something has taken place in him and in his experience, and it is going to affect the whole of his life.

Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Preaching and Preachers (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1971) 53-56, emphasis added.