The greatest need for the church today is renewal, and to paraphrase the apostle Paul, how will there be renewal without preaching? Though typically considered for his theological work, Jonathan Edwards’ preaching is still a model of preaching for renewal. Building on the Puritan doctrine of experimental preaching, Edwards famously wrote that preaching to the heart aims at helping the congregation experience the sweetness of honey rather than simply describing the sweetness of honey. But how is this done?
Two centuries later, across the Atlantic, Martyn Lloyd-Jones discovered two volumes of Edwards’ works and took up the thread of preaching for renewal. His preaching and writing on revival shows marked continuity with Edwards as well as adaptation to a different context. Yet again, Tim Keller, strongly influenced by both Edwards and Lloyd-Jones took up the task of preaching for renewal in the post-Christian American context of Manhattan. All three were primarily preachers; all three wrote on revival, and all three offered instructive theological and homiletic syntheses for the global church.
These three men, preaching in three very different contexts, provide a road map for preaching to the heart for global evangelicalism. By looking at each context and each approach, there are principles of preaching that transcend specific cultures and can be applied across the globe. This paper will focus on the cultural context, doctrine of renewal, and approach to preaching for renewal found in Edwards, Lloyd-Jones, and Keller in sequence, and offer trajectories for preaching for renewal in frontier contexts.