I don’t want to be new and innovative
A great post by J.D. Greear:
It seems that a really dangerous temptation of us that are younger is the desire to be new and innovative… to discover groundbreaking truth or some new methodology that changes Christianity, and then be able to speak prophetically into the church. I can’t tell you how many times I talk with guys in seminary who, when asked why they are going into the ministry, say, “I want to change this or that about the church.”
There is, of course, some level at which this is good. We really do need to rethink the state of the church on a continual basis.
But the need for newness is not the primary need of the hour. The problem is not that most people need a new way of hearing the Gospel, but that most people have never heard it all. My goal each week is not to give what the people in front of me will perceive as a “new approach” to the Gospel, but simply to explain the really old Gospel in as clear a way as possible to them.
If that is “new,” then let that be new. But my goal is not newness. It is the clear communication of the really, really old.
