Creative Preaching: A Defense of Ed Young’s Methodology

Do you use sermon illustrations? Are they designed to draw people in to flesh out the biblical material, making it comprehensible? Do you ever use real world examples or illustrations drawn from culture?

I thought of these questions the other day while witnessing the latest round of criticisms aimed at Ed Young, senior pastor of Fellowship Church (FC), in Grapevine, TX. Fellowship started in 1989 as a mission of FBC Irving with 150 members. Today it is a multi-campus church with around 24,000 in weekly attendance. It is a highly contemporary church, known for its innovation, excellence in ministry, and creativity. Young himself has the reputation of being a “showman” – well-known for his onstage antics and what people refer to as publicity stunts. This week, he and FC posted pics and video on social media from the beginning of last week’s sermon series. In those posts, FC had constructed a full-sized basketball court in the sanctuary and had the mascots of the Dallas Mavericks performing trick slam-dunk stunts during the worship service. Traditionalists, discernment bloggers, and many Christian pastors and ministers stood aghast at the posted evidence of the spectacle, criticizing Young once again for his antics, and saying, “You’re supposed to go to church to worship God, not be entertained.”

In 2006, I was finishing up my education at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, TX, when my wife and I moved to Euless, just a few minutes away from FC. We had been visiting several churches in the immediate area when our new apartment manager invited us to attend Fellowship. We hadn’t considered a megachurch, but I knew of Young by reputation and the criticisms he received from seminary professors and students for the size of his church and his on-stage stunts. Nevertheless, we gave it a try and were thoroughly impressed. As a minister I was awed by the excellence and professionalism I witnessed. The worship was perfect, the sermons were engaging, the staff were tremendous, the volunteers were competent and well-organized. Everything was superb. Granted, my wife and I continued to explore other options, preferring to be where God wanted us to be. Nevertheless, we ultimately, strongly believed that this was Fellowship. So, we joined the church, took the best new members class ever, toured the facilities, and immediately volunteered to serve wherever they needed us. I served in the junior high ministry and, because of my seminary education, was asked to help write some of their in-house bible study materials. I served for a few years there, making friends with the staff and members, and learning all I could about effective ministry. I wanted to learn what they did, how they did it, and why. Most importantly, I really wanted to figure Ed Young out and uncover the underlining principles of his methodology.

In fact, understanding Young’s methodology was not difficult because he was so frequent in explaining it and because its evidence was everywhere: creativity and art. Creative art is everywhere at FC and in Young’s ministry. He himself has mentioned his artistic background and once painted a portrait of Jesus on stage as a sermon illustration. Note the titles of some of Young’s books:

The Creative Leader: Unleashing the Power of Your Creative Potential

Can We Do That?: 24 Innovative Practices That Will Change the Way You Do Church

The Creative Marriage - The Art of Keeping Your Love Alive

I own the first two books and have used them as ministerial resources for years.

Every year Fellowship Church holds the C3 Conference: Creative Church Culture. Early in the church’s existence, they met in an arts center. Furthermore, Young refers to his sermon preparation team as Team Creativity.

Here are some choice quotes from Young on creativity:

“I just feel so strongly that the church should be on the crest of creativity – that the most creative things out there should be the local churches. To me the exception should be when the church is not creative. But sadly, so often you find churches have somehow taken the Bible – the most exciting book – and made it boring. I tell people don’t blame God because God’s not boring. Blame the person speaking.”

“Creativity is not bouncing off the walls. It’s not gimmicky. It has to be biblically-driven. We’re not above the Bible or on the same level as the Bible. We’re under the Bible – we’re under scripture. So it has to be Biblically-driven. And I believe when its biblically-driven you’re going to find that sweet spot of communication.”

Here two more revealing quotes about the creative principles of Young’s methodology:

“God says create. Every time we do, it’s an act of love and worship to God. A lot of us get creativity cramps. We trade in creativity for dogma.”

“Why be creative? Because God invented it. Ephesians 5:1 calls Christians to be imitators of God. Jesus modeled creativity, using illustrations and stories to drive home a point.”

This last quote is of particular note for the purposes of this article. There is a very long biblical tradition of preachers throughout the Old and New Testaments performing stunning, sometimes provocative acts to seize audience attention and then hit them with the Word of God based on the acts underlining meaning. These are often referred to as sign-acts or symbolic actions, forms of communication in which a message was delivered by performing symbolic actions. As one person noted, “Sign acts are nonverbal actions and objects intentionally employed by the prophets so that message content was communicated through them to the audience” (Friebel, Dictionary of the Old Testament Prophets). Therefore …

The prophet Ezekiel lays siege to a brick, tied with ropes (4:1-8), bakes bread over dung (4:12-17), shaves his head and strikes some of the hair with a sword (5:1-2), covers his face and digs through a wall (12:3-7), and performs several other shocking acts. The prophet Jeremiah shuns marriage (16:1-9), buys a clay jug and breaks it (19:1-13), wears an ox yoke (27-28), purchases a field (32:6–15), and offers wine to those forbidden to drink it (35:1–19). The prophet Isaiah gave his children odd, symbolic names (9-12) and preached naked (20:1-2). All these acts were performance-artist acts used as symbolic sermon illustrations. The act was followed by explanations of what they meant. Similarly, Jesus himself performed many symbolic acts designed to illustrate a deeper meaning: feeding 5000 people, withering a fig tree, riding into Jerusalem on a donkey, washing feet, and clearing the Temple. All these acts were provocative, creative illustrations designed to draw in and audience and then drive home a particular biblical point. Again, this method of communication has a long biblical history, even in the church. Therefore ...

Ed Young does a bed-in with his wife on the roof of the church and uses a Big Bed vs Little Bed on stage to talk about sex issues. He brings a sheep on stage while preaching on the 23rd Psalm. He brings in WWE wrestlers to talk about “wrestling with God”. He brings a real lion and a real lamb on stage, he drives a car on stage, he brings on a door, he chops up cantaloupes, he paints a portrait of Jesus on stage … and then there was the week of “congregational copulation”. On another occasion, a crew filmed him ordering a meal at McDonald’s. Young compared that to “drive-through Christians” who cruise through church for a quick serving of grace but who never commit to serve. Such creative acts are part and parcel to Young’s methodology. He draws people’s attention in with an entertaining, bizarre stunt, which turns out to be an object lesson. It is an object lesson – a visual, learning aid – to address the congregation’s current needs by challenging their faulty assumptions based on the biblical teaching. He aims to use these performance acts so that people’s minds can be renewed. Therefore …

Young gets with his creative sermon team. They note the up-coming March Madness season. So, they decide to use their resources to build a basket ball court in their worship center, bring in a few basketball-trick artists, have them perform stunts, then use “the game of basketball as a powerful metaphor … to help full court followers of Christ win over trials in the game of life.” He uses the book of James to get people off the seats and onto the court to be more effective Christians. Here Young is using his using artistic background, his theological education, and his experience playing basketball (1979-1981) at Florida State University in Tallahassee, Florida, where he received a basketball scholarship. See here for the first part of Young’s sermon series.

Ed Young’s preaching methodology is a profoundly biblical and effective methodology that was used by Jesus himself. This is what Young does, this is why he does it, and this is where he got it from. And the results are over 2,000 baptisms a year and thousands more discipled. Indeed, his and Fellowship’s Kingdom success is the kind that every Christian – let alone every pastor! – should be celebrating. Ministers should be stumbling over themselves to read his books, attend the C3 Conferences, and visit FC to understand how they can be more effective in ministry. At the very least, let’s not allow our ignorance, envy, and old methodologies to cause us to criticize those who actually are making a large, positive impact on the Kingdom of God.

Memoirs of Hadrian, Antisemitism, and the Gospel

I’ve been reading Marguerite Yourcenar excellent novel, Memoirs of Hadrian. I’ve noticed how Yourcenar adeptly uses Hadrian as a mouthpiece for her philosophical and social concerns while still maintaining a historical realism that doesn’t devolve into crass anachronism. Nevertheless, she is not so adroit as to mask her own ideology; I quite suspected she was of a socialist bent and subsequent research proved this. Indeed, there is an air of the socialist sophisticant throughout the pages of the book. There is the dream of using the resources of government (in this case the Roman Empire) to reorder society along particular socio-economic standards, many of which have a noticeably leftist bent to them. In the book, there is the urge for social, economic, and cultural conformity of society and the world, so that everyone comes together as one. Naturally, what’s left unstated in this idealism is that it can only be achieved by force of government and its inherent violence.

Having understood the book in this light, yesterday I read its account of the famous Bar Kokhba Revolt (132–136 CE) and Hadrian’s fictional musings about the events and circumstances. The revolt was a rebellion by Jewish Zealots led by Simon bar Kokhba, against the Roman Empire, for the liberation of Palestine. This was the final revolt that led to the complete dissolution of the Jewish state. Hadrian was Roman Emperor at the time.

In his account, Hadrian notes how he and his subordinates attempted use the Roman army to revitalize Jerusalem as a Roman city, to establish religious pluralism, to spread Greek culture, and ending barbaric practices such as circumcision. Hadrian admits that he underestimated the Jews’ resistance to change, but nevertheless criticizes their religious “fanaticism” and unwillingness to conform to society for the greater good. Jewish resistance to conformity eventually leads to the utter destruction of Judea.

Now, based on my reading of the book and my research into Yourcenar, I do not believe that this account of the revolt has been written with ironic disapproval with regards to Hadrian. While I do not think that Yourcenar approves of violence, she nevertheless appears to approve of government-enforced conformity to society and to disapprove of resistance to it, typified in 2^nd century Jewish zealotry.

Even before I read this account, I had been thinking about the rise of anti-Semitism amongst the Anglo-Left, particularly the more various individuals and aspects of it embrace socialism. In doing so, I was reminded of the following quote by Kevin D. Williamson:

"For the Jew-hater, this is maddening: Throw the Jews out of Spain, and they thrive abroad. Send them to the poorest slums in New York, and those slums stop being slums. Keep them out of the Ivy League and watch NYU become a world-class institution inspired by men such as Jonas Salk, son of largely uneducated Polish immigrants. Put the Jewish state in a desert wasteland and watch it bloom, first with produce and then with technology. Israel today has more companies listed on NASDAQ than any other country except the United States and China.”

The ancient Hebrew anthropological conception insists upon the idea of the individual, though in balance with the community. Monotheism necessitates moral and ethical standards that are understood to be universal. Combine this anthropology and theology, along with election and the covenantal requirements of Torah, and you get a people who, when appropriately applying their principles, will succeed even in the midst of persecution and who will stubbornly resist conformity and the abandonment of those principles, even to the point of death. The early Roman emperors understood Jewish nonconformity and made allowances; Hadrian did not. But then neither did the Pharaohs of the Exodus, Antiochus IV Epiphanes, and the socialists of the 20^th and now 21^st centuries. The common thread of all has been the pursuit of an established, cohesive order of society and culture, either for the blatant securing of power or for the professed reasons of a greater, harmonious society. Unfortunately for the conformists, Jews stick out as an embodied contradiction to whatever ideology many conformists hold.

Jews continue to be the most persecuted minority in history, yet they’ve continually excelled in market-based capitalism amidst suffering, not with government help but despite government oppression. This defies much thinking in contemporary socialist and intersectional thought. Small wonder Jews are often excluded from leftist considerations of minorities; they don’t often fit within socialist formulas explaining the causes of minority oppression. Asians often face a similar exclusion. Instead, Jewish persistence - and even their existence - becomes embodied defiance of particular ideologies. Thus, in order to explain the discrepancy, Jews become subject to conspiratorial theories of manipulation and collaboration. Thus, when Jews did not fit within National Socialism’s reasons for the suffering of post-WWI Germany, they became part of the reasons for that suffering instead of a part of aggrieved victimhood. Small wonder Adolf Hitler justified his anti-Semitism to Otto Wagener on the grounds that “the Jew is not a socialist.”

I note this as an example of a profound truth essential to how we as Christians are to proclaim and enact the Gospel of Jesus as Christ and Lord and how we are to take part in his subjection of the powers to his Lordship. The powerful, and those pursuing power, seek greater control and conformity in order to attain and secure that power. Frequently, they must embrace, believe, and promulgate lies in that process. But lies, by their very nature, stand askew in the presence of reality; they must be repeated endlessly without opposition to be successful. On the other hand, truth by its nature aligns with reality and shines in the darkness and exposes the darkness for it is. Truth destroys lies by merely being spoken and is thus a threat to the powerful. That is why the powerful frequently seek to suppress the truth and seek to destroy all those who speak it. And the most threateningly effective means of speaking the truth is not merely by proclaiming it but also by living it. Those who embody the truth in their behavior and with their words live not by lives but shine like lights in the darkness. They are walking contradictions to a world ruled by lies, control, conformity, and abusive power. As Walter Wink put it:

“When anyone steps out of the system and tells the truth, lives the truth, that person enables everyone else to peer behind the curtain too. That person has shown everyone that that it is possible to live within the truth, despite the repercussions. ‘Living within the lie can constitute the system only if it is universal.’ Anyone who steps out of line therefore ‘denies it in principle and threatens it in its entirety. … If the main pillar of the system is living a lie, then it is not surprising that the fundamental threat to it is living the truth.’ That is why it must be suppressed more severely than anything else.”

Now the Gospel is the good news of the Kingdom of God and Jesus as its King (Matthew 4:23; 9:35; 24:14; Mark 1:14-15; Luke 4:43; 8:1; 16:16; Acts 8:12; 20:25; 28:31). In particular, by virtue of his Messiahship (Psalm 110 and Daniel 7), Jesus is actively at work in this world through his Spirit and his Spirit-empowered followers bringing all the corrupt powers of this world into obedience under him (Ephesians 1:20-22; Philippians 2:8-11; 1 Corinthians 10:13; 15:24; Colossians 1:13; 2:10, 15; Galatians 1:4; 2 Timothy 1:10; Jude 1:25; Revelation 2:26-27; 12:10; Matthew 9:8; 21:23; Mark 3:15; John 5:27; 12:31; 14:30; 16:11; 17:2; Luke 20:43; Hebrews 2:14; 10:13; 1 John 3:8; 1 Peter 3). Indeed, as is clear from 1 Corinthians 15 and 1 Peter, Christians are expected to take part in this process of subjecting the powers of the world to Christ’s Lordship. We are called to be faithful servants in bringing idolatrous powers through repentance back into allegiance to God.

There are a few ways in which we go about this. One of the most important is through truth and for the reasons stated above. This is why 1 Peter, Ephesians, and the Sermon on the Mount stress the importance of moral behavior and suffering as a means for defeating oppressive powers. The truth is a powerful weapon and living it, embodying it exposes the darkness of the fallen powers for what they are. It brings the powers and the people under its oppression to the place of conviction where they either embrace repentance or continue following the path towards condemnation. That is why we are to live the truth (Ephesians 4:17-18; 1 John 1:5-7; 3 John 3-4). And while the results of this embodying the truth can lead to suffering, God uses that suffering and persecution for his redemptive purposes, as 1 Peter teaches (1:7-11, 21; 2:5-10, 21-24; 3:22; 4:1, 13-14; 5:1-10). When we embody the truth against the oppressive powers’ forces of control, conformity, and lies, our work is not in vain (1 Corinthians 15:58).

An Answer to a Question about God’s Chosen People

[My teenage daughter] has been really struggling with why God has a chosen people...and why she isn't one of them.  Any suggestions on how I can explain this to her?

How about this?

God’s chose the Jews, the Israelites, the family of Abraham for a particular purpose - a particular task. They were called to be the tool that God used to deal with the problem of sin. They were chosen to be the light of the world. Their choosing wasn’t about God playing favorites. Indeed, God held his chosen people to a higher standard because they had received more knowledge of him than other nations. However, Israel as a whole failed in their task to be the light of the world. They failed in their task. But God wasn’t done with his plan. He had one Jew, one member of the family of Abraham, who would be the light of the world and be used to deal with the problem of sin: Jesus. Jesus was the real chosen one and summed up everything that Israel was chosen to do in the first place. Most importantly, all those who have faith in Jesus become children of Abraham (Galatians 3:7-9). Paul says non-Jews who have faith in Christ are grafted into Israel (Romans 11:11-31). This is why Peter can call Christians a chosen people (1 Peter 2:9). But that was God’s plan all the time. He chose Abraham and his family for their task so that all the world would be blessed (Genesis 12:2-3). You can see this idea of those who have faith in Jesus being considered chosen or elect in numerous places (Ephesians 1:3-14; 2 Thessalonians 2:13-15; 2 Timothy 1:9; John 15:16-17; Colossians 3:12-14; 2 Timothy 2:10). Therefore, if [your daughter] has faith, she is a part of God’s chosen people.