Set Your Hand to the Plough: Practical Advice for Gospel Ministers
#9 Preach grace
Here is my next piece of advice, particularly to those (often younger) leaders with much zeal—preach grace. You cannot give your people what they most desperately need. Only Christ can. What is the resolution? Preach grace!
The Pull Toward Preaching Law
This is especially important for young men. When you first enter the ministry, you bring vision, drive, conviction, and belief. You see the problems that need fixing. You see the doctrinal gaps, the family issues, the weaknesses in church life, and you long to address them. With a heart full of zeal, you start to preach: Do this. Change that. Adjust the other.
And here’s the thing — it’s all true. It’s all needed. But the power does not lie in the command. The power lies in the grace.
A young minister can preach with all the biblical accuracy in the world — chapter and verse, sound exegesis, clear exhortations — and still find himself wondering, Why is there no change? Why no fruit? Why does it feel like the truth I preach falls flat? The answer is simple: the law commands, but it cannot empower. Only grace changes hearts.
Grace Is the Power
This is where our Calvinism must grip us. Having declared what the Lord commands, we must also tell our people: I know you cannot do it. I know you have no power of yourself to obey. However often you try, however many times you start afresh, however determined you are — you will fail.
What then? The answer is not more law, but more grace. Grace that is sovereign. Grace that is almighty. Grace that is triumphant. Grace that enters into the weakness of our condition and supplies the very power we lack.
As our Lord Jesus said, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” But where does the love come from? Not from within. Not from our own resolve. It comes from the grace of Christ, flowing from His cross, purchased by His blood. The power to love Christ and obey Him comes only from Him. That is why we must preach Him.
Preach Christ, Preach His Cross, Preach His Grace
Our task, then, is to preach Christ — Christ crucified, Christ risen, Christ reigning. To preach the grace that flows from His cross and meets His people in their inability. And we must tell them, again and again, as Pauline Calvinists through and through: everything the Scripture commands you to do, you are powerless to perform — except by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Isn’t that why we cling to the benediction? Without the blessing of Christ’s grace, we are undone. But with it, we live, we endure, we are strengthened to walk in His ways. That’s why we send our people out of every service with the words ringing in their ears: “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.”
And not only at the end of worship. Grace must run through the whole of our preaching, our worship, our ministry. It is the lifeblood of the church.
So, to every brother setting his hand to the plough, I say again: preach grace.
This post is part nine of a ten-part series offering honest, practical advice for those stepping into gospel ministry. If you’re wrestling with the call or navigating the early days of serving a church, keep journeying with us through these reflections.
Oliver Allmand-Smith
Pastor of Trinity Grace Church, UK;
Trustee of International Reformed
Baptist Seminary, Mansfield, TX