i was afraid of the text

I was talking to a friend today, sharing my hesitancy to preach a pretty challenging message from a particular text of Scripture. The problem is that I originally thought the sermon was going to be about one thing, which would have been a pretty comfortable message for me to preach; but as I sat with the text for a while, I realized that its application was a bit more "in your face."

So I shared my anxiety with him and his response (via text) convicted me to the core and then immediately filled my heart with faith. He said:

Your objective is faithfulness to the text and to find the application that is coming out of it...Don't strip the word of its power.

Wow. Wow. Wow.

Immediately, I realized that my focus was in the wrong place. I realized that my heart was being gripped by "the fear of man" (Prov. 29:25).

My job is to lay the text out as clearly as possible, trusting God with the results.

So here's a lesson learned: God's transforming power is unleashed as preachers are faithful to say whatever the text says.