Jesus Needs To Be The Center of Attention

Pastors, how many times has your people come to you at the end of service saying how they enjoy the sermon? How many people come to visit your church just to hear you preach as if you were that impressive? I know I hear that from our people when I have preached. It bothers me that people seem to be more impressive with the pastor who preaches than Jesus whom the gospel is truly about.

Who needs to be the center of attention in preaching? Jesus. Why? Is it the pastor who saves people? Is it the pastor who can be with them everyday of their lives even when they suffer? Is it the pastor who truly heals people? My concern with preaching in some churches, not all of them, praise God, is the congregation is more impressed with preacher than with Jesus, which is idolatry.

When it comes to preaching the gospel, the center of attention needs to be on Jesus. In Acts 3, Peter and John were going to the temple and saw a crippled beggar which has been lame since the day he was born. The beggar sees them and asks for money but instead Peter says, "I have no silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk!" (Acts 3:6).

The beggar got up and started jumping all over the place praising God. All the people that were there were so amazed at what happened they started to cling to Peter and John when Peter said, “Men of Israel, why do you wonder at this, or why do you stare at us, as though by our own power or piety we have made him walk? The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, the God of our fathers, glorified his servant Jesus, whom you delivered over and denied in the presence of Pilate, when he had decided to release him. But you denied the Holy and Righteous One, and asked for a murderer to be granted to you, and you killed the Author of life, whom God raised from the dead. To this we are witnesses. And his name—by faith in his name—has made this man strong whom you see and know, and the faith that is through Jesus has given the man this perfect health in the presence of you all" (Acts 3:12-16).

Do you see what just happened? The beggar gets healed and the people started to be impressed with Peter and John. Peter realized what was going on and said, "Are you really impressed with us? We are not the ones who did this. It was Jesus Christ whom the Father has sent to redeem us from our sins." Peter turned the people's attention on Jesus. Think about. If Peter and John were trying to please the people, then they would be loving all the credit they were getting and the fact that people were coming to them. Peter did not do that. He turned the people's attention away from themselves and preached the gospel.

I recently read an interview that Matt Carter did with Southwestern Seminary talking about expository preaching, which preaching the Bible verse by verse. He said that Jesus needs to be the Superstar of the sermon. Very true because we are going all the world telling people about Jesus. We are not to impress people with our words, but with the gospel. Matt goes on to say about the success of his church, that is not the fact he is a good speaker or his preaching is powerful, it is the truth preach in his church that makes it successful. I remember him saying that people thought expository preaching will never work in Austin, TX, where his church is located, and it has.

When we evangelize, we also need to point people to Jesus. Sharing our testimony is great, but if you leave Jesus out, then you just shared a good story about yourself and not the gospel. Jesus needs to be the center of attention in our worship, preaching, and evangelism because He alone is worthy to be praised, the only one who is impressive, and the one who can truly save our souls.