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In part one of this two-part series, the author described the logic-defying Wonderland of doctrine. In part two, he elaborates on its glory, practicality, and drama.

God's Gordian Knot

Another wonder of Christian doctrine is how beautiful and brilliant it is. A few days ago we flew through a stupendous cloudbank at 32,000 feet—marble-white arches miles high and shot through with sunbeams. I marveled anew at the handiwork of God. But nothing in all God's creation is so astonishingly beautiful as the gospel, nor does the intricacy of anything God has made match the genius God displayed in redemption.

You've probably heard of the Gordian knot. It comes from a Greek legend about a man named Gordius who tied his oxcart to a post with such an intricate, complicated knot that no one could untie it. Not only was the knot tight, but the ends of the rope were somehow buried in the middle of the knot. The legend also said that whoever would one day untie that knot would rule Asia. The expression "a Gordian knot" means a problem so intricate and complex it defies solution.

When we think of Almighty God we naturally think nothing is hard for him. Create a universe? He raises his hand and speaks, "Come forth!" and—boom—there it is. Love a sinner? No problem. After all, God is love. It comes naturally to him. But God faced a Gordian knot, a problem that very nearly defied solution—even for Almighty God—and to some extent, it was a knot of his own making.

Again, before we actually lay open the doctrines of God, we need to show the mind-boggling problems God had to solve to save sinners. How can God love and bless a people who all choose to reject him? How could God create a new race of people fit for heaven without giving up on the children of Adam? God himself made death final and irrevocable, so how could he ever give people eternal life? And if God's Gordian knot wasn't tangled enough, he tucked the rope ends into the knot himself when he decreed that his solution would come from Israel, that he would save by keeping his own Law, and that the Rescuer would be both God and man, born (by the way) in Bethlehem in the line of Judah and David, after the rise and fall of certain world rulers.

Maybe you've seen that commercial where a kid solves a Rubik's Cube, blindfolded, in seconds. We shake our heads in astonishment because we've tried to solve one of those puzzles and never even gotten close—with our eyes open! The Christian preacher must create that same sense of astonishment in our listeners at God's accomplishments in the gospel if doctrine is to sparkle as it should.

According to the legend, when Alexander the Great came upon the Gordian knot and learned that the one who untied it would rule Asia, he simply hacked it apart with one blow of his sword. But God had to play by his own rules. He had to untie the knot, strand by strand. Thankfully, "nothing is too hard for the Lord."

Our preaching, in effect, sets God up for a fall. Like a playwright, we build tension by showing the bind God was in, doors closing all around him. If we can get people to the point where they think Why, I don't see how even God could get out of that dilemma! then they are ready to see the beauty and genius of God's gospel.

The application of this kind of doctrinal preaching leads to worship and praise. We become psalmists: "Sing to the LORD a new song, for he has done marvelous things; his right hand and his holy arm have worked salvation for him" (Psalm 98:1) and apostles of praise: "Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! 'Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?'" (Romans 11:33, 34).

Sonogram

There is hardly an experience in life comparable to seeing your child for the first time on a sonogram. There in the shadowy mystery of your wife's womb you see movement, and then realize you're looking at the head and torso of your child. And it moves! That's your little quarterback in there, your dancer or juggler!

Doctrinal preaching should be like showing God's people a sonogram—their own sonogram—because when we preach doctrine we take them into the mysteries of Christ-life in us and our embryonic life in Christ. We don't just try to get people to practice what we preach. We show them that we're all living what we preach right at this minute. Doctrine is organic, pulsing, kinetic.

In one sermon recently, I was trying to explain the effect of having the Holy Spirit dwelling within us. I said, "Men, imagine that this morning you awoke and somehow you had absorbed your wife's spirit overnight. Yesterday morning you threw your dirty clothes in the laundry because you didn't want to hear your wife remind you. Yesterday morning you poured milk in a glass instead of drinking out of the carton because you didn't want your wife to walk in on you. Yesterday morning you ran into Walgreens to pick up a Mother's Day card because you were afraid it would hurt her feelings if you didn't. But this morning, after this spirit transfusion from your wife, you toss your clothes in the hamper because it is gross to leave them lying around. You pour a glass of milk because you'd feel uncouth if you didn't. And you can't wait to write a little love note in the Mother's Day card, and even put hearts instead of dots above the i's. We need holiness to be like that—holiness that is natural to us—and that is why God has given us his Holy Spirit."

Doctrinal preaching takes people to the places where they live even though they don't realize it. We put them in mask and gown and take them into a spiritual delivery room where dead people are born again of water and the Spirit. We take them to the courtroom to hear the fierce arguments against them from our accuser, and the stirring, uncontestable defense from our Redeemer, and then the Judge's "not guilty" verdict. We take them to the wrestling ground of Jacob's Jabbok where we watch ourselves contesting with the Lord. And we take them into the throne room of heaven, with its crystal sea and thunder and strange creatures. We show them the sealed scroll, and why John wept, and then rejoiced. All those field trips to the places where Christians live are part of preaching doctrine.

When we approach doctrine this way, the application of the sermon focuses on living in the reality of what we have, what is actually happening in us and to us, thanks to Christ. This is where we teach people to walk by faith, to pray, to worship what they cannot see, to live as pilgrims now because we are "looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God."

The drama

Dorothy Sayers (1893–1957), the Christian friend of Chesterton, Lewis, and Tolkien, wrote a classic essay about preaching doctrine entitled "The Greatest Drama Ever Staged," which begins this way,

Official Christianity, of late years, has been having what is known as a bad press. We are constantly assured that the churches are empty because preachers insist too much upon doctrine—dull dogma as people call it. The fact is the precise opposite. It is the neglect of dogma that makes for dullness. The Christian faith is the most exciting drama that ever staggered the imagination of man—and the dogma is the drama.

Civics may be boring, but preachers must be sure doctrine never is.

Lee Eclov recently retired after 40 years of local pastoral ministry and now focuses on ministry among pastors. He writes a weekly devotional for preachers on Preaching Today.