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Fighting for your congregation's imagination (part 2)

Preaching for spiritual formation means casting a vision for a new way of life.

Skye Jethani

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This is part two of a two-part series. In part one Skye described preaching as the primary means of casting a vision of life in the Kingdom of God.

PreachingToday.com: Compare a traditional homiletical approach to Philippians 4:19—"My God will supply all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus"—with an approach emphasizing spiritual formation.

Skye Jethani: The traditional approach would be to focus on God's promise to supply all our material needs. But the spiritual formation component in this passage is worry. We live in a society that keeps us scared about finances and security, so that we feel we always have to accumulate more. Jesus tells us not to worry about tomorrow; God will take care of it.

If I were preaching this passage, I would try to paint a picture of a life without worry. I would ask, "What would your life look like if you didn't worry?" That gets back to the character of God himself, which is Jesus' point in the Sermon on the Mount: If God ...