Puritan sermons are rife with application because Puritan preachers believed the word of God needs to be brought home to the mind, heart, and will of its hearers. Building on biblical precepts and following biblical patterns, the Puritans applied Scripture to their hearers with simplicity, thoroughness, and force as they trusted the Holy Spirit to strengthen the saints and lead sinners to repentance.

I hope that you appreciate a discriminating ministry. I do not mean a discriminatory ministry, marked by unfair bias or cruel prejudice, but discriminating, marked by discernment and insight, with careful distinctions between truth and error, between genuine and spurious conversion, between true and false experience, between truth in principle and in practice, and between different spiritual categories and classes of people. In preaching, such a ministry distinguishes itself by the depth and power of its application.

Application is bringing truth to bear upon the souls of your hearers. You would not introduce a can of paint into a room and claim that the work of painting is done. The paint needs to get out of the can and onto the wall — you need paintbrushes and rollers to work the product over every surface and into every crevice. You would not rest a nail against a plank of wood and suggest that the labor of construction is complete. The nail needs to be driven home at the right point by a well-directed hammer. Likewise, faithful preachers do not introduce truth — even biblical truth — into a room full of people and declare that a sermon has been preached. God’s word needs to be brought home.

The Puritans were masters of application. It was not merely an element of their preaching but the essence of their preaching. A typical Puritan would not have known whether to laugh or cry if told to leave truth dangling and hope that the Spirit applies it, as some might suggest today. They would have thought that practice both a denial of their pastoral duty and an insult to the Spirit of God. Their approach turns us from the tepid performance of toothless homilies, teaching us to bring God’s truth to bear upon men’s souls, in dependence on the Holy Spirit.

Biblical Precepts

The Puritans were not merely creatures of their context. They followed principles and practices from the Bible. The very nature of the “living and active” word of God is to cut and to pierce. It is inherently sharp and pointed, penetrating deeply and accurately, even “to the division of soul and of spirit,” bringing the hidden to light (Hebrews 4:12–13). The word “comes upon the conscience with such piercing dilemmas, and tilts the sword of conviction so deep into their souls, that there is no stanching the blood, no healing this wound, till Christ himself come, and undertake the cure.”1

Those qualities in Scripture are not to be relied upon passively but employed actively. Paul encouraged Timothy to be faithful to the gospel, reminding him that “all Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16–17). The word of God, in the hands of the gospel minister, must be brought to bear in various ways for the good of souls. Scripture tells us the right way, shows when we are out of that way, calls us back into the right way, and leads us in that way, so that Christ is comprehensively formed in us. Thus Paul exhorts Timothy, “I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching” (2 Timothy 4:1–2). The language of preaching in the New Testament indicates more than merely speaking truth: preachers herald; they evangelize, teach, exhort, comfort, and persuade.

The Puritans knew their Bibles. They were persuaded of a scriptural requirement to apply the word of God to men’s consciences. They knew that real preaching — under God — is meant to move men.

Biblical Patterns

The Puritans found instruction and example throughout their Bibles. In the Old Testament, they found men like Ezra and his companions, who “read from the book, from the Law of God, clearly, and . . . gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading” (Nehemiah 8:8).

Their preeminent model was the Lord Jesus, whether in pressing home the truth to individuals like Nicodemus (John 3:1–15) and the woman at the well (John 4:1–42), publicly denouncing woes upon the Pharisees with unerring accuracy (Matthew 23:1–36), or bringing commandments and comforts to his disciples in anticipation of his departure (John 14–16).

They also delighted in the earnest ministry of John the Baptist, who recognized and responded to the different characters and behaviors of those who heard him preach (Luke 3:10–14). They had the examples of apostolic sermons in Acts: Peter at Pentecost and Paul at Antioch or before Felix, Festus, and Agrippa. They considered what the apostles said to congregations and individuals in letters. They studied the Pastoral Epistles and labored to heed Paul’s charge to Timothy: “Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers” (1 Timothy 4:16).

The Puritans were not novel in their practice of application. They self-consciously stood in a scriptural tradition and were simply the latest to take up the baton.

Puritan Practice

With such precepts and patterns pressing upon their souls, the Puritans applied the word of God to the souls of men. A Puritan might speak of “improving” a text or doctrine. His meaning was not to make the text better but to make the best use of the text. They expected their hearers to profit from what they heard, and they labored to help them. Hearers were to think about the sermon, to meditate and reflect upon it, to work out and act upon its various implications, to make the most of what they heard. If the sermon was God’s gold, the congregation should invest it so as to get the best return. Richard Sibbes (1577–1635) advised his hearers,

We should be stirred up to beg the spirit of application, to maintain our communion and intercourse with God, that we may apply every thing duly and truly to ourselves and our own souls. All is to no purpose else, if we do not apply it, if it be not brought home to our souls and digested throughly [sic]2 in our hearts. We must say, This is from God, and this belongs to me; when we hear truths unfolded, to say of ourselves, This concerns me, and say not, This is a good portion and a good truth for such a one and such a one, but, Every one take out his own portion, this is for me. God saith, “Seek my face; thy face, Lord, will I seek,” with a spirit of application.3

Likewise, Vincent Alsop (1630–1703) closed a sermon about Christians not dressing like worldlings with this exhortation:

The use and application must be your own. This sermon will never be complete, till you have preached it over to your souls by meditation, and to the world by a thorough reformation. And if you slight this advice and counsel, yet remember the text, however: — that God “in the day of his sacrifice will punish all such as are clothed with strange apparel.”4

Puritan pastors did not believe that the work of application took place only on the preacher’s side of the pulpit. Faithful hearers were just as much engaged. However, it was the duty of the preacher to pursue and enable such application to oneself in dependence on the Holy Spirit. To that end, they aimed to apply God’s word with simplicity, thoroughness, specificity, selectivity, and force — all of which will improve our preaching today.

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