I was struck a few years back when reading through Sinclair Ferguson’s The Whole Christ where he made the remark that many pastors have within their libraries lots of books on preaching, and even books about preaching Christ, but surmises that there are probably far fewer on Christ himself.^[1] This point is underlined by another comment of Sinclair Ferguson’s I’ve heard him ask in a sermon: if you were forced to sit in an empty room with nothing to do but think about the Lord Jesus Christ, would you have enough material stored within your heart and mind to last 15 minutes? 30 minutes? An hour?

Considering what I would preach if I could only preach one sermon is an interesting and probing question, and yet, I think it would be fair to say that many pastors often do preach just one sermon. You know who they are, the pastor whose particular hobby horse always and inevitably arises in any given sermon. I know of one local pastor who, no matter what passage of Scripture he’s working through, seems to always draw out in his sermon his own brand of complementarianism. Or perhaps you know that one pastor where every sermon ends with some thoughts concerning the eschaton. Most pastors tend to have their idée fixe.

Indeed, if we’re being honest, I think every preacher of God’s word has at least some propensity to veer back into his own beloved issue, some theological point that he is passionate about. The more responsible preachers will of course always make sure that their preaching is constrained by the text of God’s word. But let’s consider still: if there is that always present soapbox, that perpetual pet subject, if there is that “one sermon” you will always preach, what would it be?

For me, I am more and more convinced that it ought the be the beauty and glory of the person of Jesus Christ. That is, in any given sermon, if I were to fall back and begin preaching on that one theological preoccupation, that “one sermon”, I would hope that it would be fixated upon the person of Jesus Christ.

I was struck a few years back when reading through Sinclair Ferguson’s The Whole Christ where he made the remark that many pastors have within their libraries lots of books on preaching, and even books about preaching Christ, but surmises that there are probably far fewer on Christ himself.^[1] This point is underlined by another comment of Sinclair Ferguson’s I’ve heard him ask in a sermon: if you were forced to sit in an empty room with nothing to do but think about the Lord Jesus Christ, would you have enough material stored within your heart and mind to last 15 minutes? 30 minutes? An hour? It is a condemnation upon us that so few today within the church can just sit and meditate upon our Savior. We do not know Jesus, his beauty and glory and majesty, and so our worship and our lives our woefully malnourished.

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