September 7, 2024
INDIANAPOLIS — Some churches today have a lot in common with the Savannah Bananas, pastor and seminary professor Hershael York suggested in his sermon Sunday night at the 2024 Southern Baptist Convention Pastors' Conference in Indianapolis.
Go to the team’s website, York said, and you’ll learn all about “Banana Ball” and what makes the Bananas “different.” What you won’t see is much talk about the game of baseball.
Providing on-field entertainment has been a popular strategy for a team that was struggling financially and almost went under, York noted.
“They’ve sold out every game since 2018,” he said. “But I believe they sell out because they sold out.”
Churches can fall into the same trap, said York, dean of the school of theology at Southern Baptist Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, and former pastor of Buck Run Baptist Church in Frankfort, Ky. Speaking on the theme “Faithful to God’s Word,” York noted how the Apostle Paul, in his final letter to Timothy, urged the younger preacher to persist in preaching the truth of the gospel.
“To fail to preach the Word is to fail to preach Christ because the only way to know Christ is through His Word,” York said. “Preach the Word with no regard for the season or the age or the tenor of the times.”
Paul’s warnings in 2 Timothy 4 remain relevant in a time when people “won’t put up with sound doctrine” but instead keep up with teachers “who give them what they want in accordance with their own passions,” York said.
“Do you think we’ve hit that day yet? Do you think people’s passions are governing the teaching they want to hear, and do you think there are preachers out there ready to scratch itching ears?”
When the people won’t endure sound doctrine, “give them sound doctrine” anyway, York urged. Don’t be tempted to change your strategy.
“Avoid no subject. Compromise no truth. Fear no reaction. Spare no passion. Preach God’s Word exactly as He put it there.”
“The Scriptures aren’t just informational, they are transformational,” York said. “We preach [the Word] because God not only has done something in the Scriptures, but he uses the Scriptures to do something in His servant, that he might be well-fitted, complete, capable, proficient, totally equipped and furnished for everything he needs.
“Isn’t that encouraging? Isn’t it a comfort that in every situation you encounter — as complicated as this world is, as challenging as the situations that we face are — everything we need is found in this Word.”
Even when the work is hard or unappreciated, preach the whole counsel of God faithfully with patience and dedication, York said.
“It’s not enough to be earnest or kind or loving or eloquent. As much as those things matter, your kindness and your sincerity are never enough. … Never forget that you are to exhort with doctrine, with solid teaching.”
We don’t need to invent easy truths for difficult days, he said. We don’t need novel beliefs in order to meet novel demands.
“We cannot become the ecclesiastical equivalent to the Savannah Bananas, excelling at entertainment while forgetting the very reason we exist.”
“Preach the Word. … God will make much of your little if you just preach the Word.”
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This story first appeared in The Baptist Paper.
