“I heard Dr. Ironside tonight. Some people preach for an hour, and it seems like twenty minutes. Others preach for twenty minutes and it seems like an hour. I wonder what the difference is?” Haddon Robinson spent the rest of his life trying to answer that question.(https://www.dts.edu/read/truth-poured-through-personality-smith-steve/)
Along the way he helped thousands of us become better preachers. Not great preachers, Robinson said there are no great preachers, only a great Christ.
Robinson entered the presence of His Lord July 22.
Not only did Robinson teach at Dallas Theological Seminary, Denver Seminary, and Gordon Conwell, he taught and encouraged many more of us through his books and articles. The thoughts of two capable preachers of a great Christ captures much of power his example and teaching had.
"“Preaching,” said Phillips Brooks, “is truth poured through personality.” Haddon Robinson understood that. “We affect our message,” he wrote in Biblical Preaching, his best-selling manual now taught in over 140 seminaries and colleges. “The audience does not hear a sermon, they hear a person—they hear you.”
And they have." (same artcile)
Over the years, I have gained from Robinson's input on preaching. From him I learned that expository preaching is not only preaching from a given text of scripture, but allowing that Bible passage to guide me as I put the sermon together and shared it. I can't remember whether I heard him say it, or read it in an article, but he reminded me that everything in scripture is there for a reason. It is important. I've tried to remember that. I hope you won't think I'm disrespectful when I say that Haddon Robinson was one of three or four preachers who encouraged me because of what one would normally consider as a negative trait. Robinson didn't score very high on the good-looking scale. If anyone set out to draw a picture of a powerful spokesman and ended up with a picture that looked like Haddon, it would be because they weren't a very good artist. With all my shortcomings, I looked at Robinson, and thought, if that guy can stand in front of a group of people and effectively communicate the word of God, perhaps there is hope even for me. Though I never met him, Haddon Robinson encouraged me to be a better preacher. I hope in some small way I can encourage other communicators of the Word.
I'm confident that there is coffee in heaven. I also figure we'll all be good looking in "up there," yet we'll retain an essence that makes it clear that we are who we are. I look forward to spotting Robinson along the golden street, sitting down over a steaming cup, and talking about the craft of uplifting the name of Christ in preaching. I don't see why a little thing like death should keep us from continuing to work on such a noble craft.
It's STTA (Something To Think About).
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