Three generations look back, look ahead

FORT WORTH, Texas (SWBTS) - Jerry Vines recently announced that he will retire next February as senior pastor of the historic First Baptist Church of Jacksonville, Fla. Vines has been in the ministry for almost 50 years. Along the way, one measure of his success can be found in the many young men he has encouraged to pursue their passions of preaching and the ministry.

Two of his “sons in the ministry” recently reunited with their mentor on the campus of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, where Vines was the featured speaker at the seminary’s inaugural Expository Preaching Workshop February 29.

David Allen, dean of Southwestern Seminary’s theology school, and Scott Swain, assistant professor of theology at the seminary, both were called into ministry while they were members of a church where Vines served as pastor.

Vines, 68, was Allen’s pastor at West Rome (Ga.) Baptist Church in the late 1960s and 1970s. He was Swain’s pastor at First Jacksonville in the 1980s and early 1990s.

Vines, Allen, 48, and Swain, 34, three generations in the ministry, agreed to be interviewed together as they discussed their formative ministry influences, the importance of expository preaching in American pulpits today, and the challenges facing preachers and the Southern Baptist Convention in the 21st century.

THE CONNECTIONS

INTERVIEWER: Dr. Allen, when did Dr. Vines become your pastor at West Rome Baptist Church?

ALLEN: 1968. Jerry Vines was the new pastor. He was 31 years old. I was raised in that town and church. I was 11 when he was called to be our pastor, and he was my pastor all during my teenage years. I remember several things, not the least of which is how Dr. Vines began to just expound Scripture. He would preach through books of the Bible, and I’ve got notes on most of them.

INTERVIEWER: Notes you took as a boy?

ALLEN: When I was 14 to 17 years old; three years’ worth of notes. I still have those notes.

INTERVIEWER: Dr. Swain, when did Dr. Vines become your pastor at First Baptist Church, Jacksonville?

SWAIN: I was third generation First Baptist Church Jacksonville. I was in the fifth grade when he came: a Georgia preacher comes in and takes the eight o’clock service and Sunday night service. I was there all the way through college, so I sat under Dr. Vines’ ministry for 15 years.

THE CENTRAL ACT OF WORSHIP

INTERVIEWER: Dr. Vines, how do you define ‘expositional’ preaching?

VINES: Reading out of the passage its meaning rather than reading into the passage what I would like it to say. Taking books of the Bible, preaching paragraph by paragraph consecutively; that is what I do as a pastor.

INTERVIEWER: When you are preparing a sermon, whom are you thinking about?

VINES: Well, I think about all the groups in my congregation. I think about senior adults who are battling problems of aging and their own mortality. I think about the teenager out there who is battling with the temptations of drugs and premarital sex. I think about the businessmen, all of them.

But the wonderful thing about it is when you preach the Scriptures the Word applies itself. There is no way a preacher can consciously touch every need in that congregation. But scripture itself, beyond my awareness and knowledge and understanding, somewhere along the way, it will get everyone in that congregation.

INTERVIEWER: Dr. Allen, what is the role of the preacher in leading the church?

ALLEN: Well, he is the spiritual leader of that congregation. But I think there are few things he will do that have the long-term impact of systematic, consistent exposition of the word behind that pulpit Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night. It’s the Word that transforms lives.

I think preaching is the primary role, but preaching as not just what happens behind the pulpit.

INTERVIEWER: So preaching doesn’t always occur behind the pulpit?

ALLEN: Right. That is where it begins, and that is how we define the traditional idea of preaching. But the Word of God is transforming; it is not only what happens behind the pulpit. The preacher sets the tone for all the teaching ministry of that church, sets the tone for the activities of that church, sets the tone for the direction of that church. A church will take on the personality of its preacher.

VINES: Here is another thing. I think preachers have made a real mistake when they have taken the title of “worship leader” away from themselves and given it to the music leader. I believe the pastor is the worship leader. And I think we have gone astray when we have said, ‘worship equals music.’

The central act of worship is the proclamation of the Word, not the music. So when we abdicate the preaching of the Word in worship and let the music be central, we are totally off base.

First Baptist Jacksonville has the best music minister in the world and I dearly love him. But the music is to prepare the hearts of people to receive the Word and prepare the preacher to preach the Word. Music is a part of worship, not the totality. Too often we have made music the central thing in the church and we have put preaching over here as just a little add-on.

ALLEN: Preaching is more than just the performance of an hour; it is the outflow of a life. And that is where the pastor makes his impact. It begins in the pulpit but it carries on, it is the outflow of a life and the people pick up on that.

VINES: Worship is far more than just a service.

SWAIN: The people will return praise to God if they have had rendered to them the greatness of God through the exposition of the Word. They will sing about God greatly when they have come to know about him greatly.

THE INFLUENCES

INTERVIEWER: Dr. Swain, has Dr. Vines had an impact on the way you do ministry today?

SWAIN: Oh, yes. Two sermons Dr. Vines preached were key moments in my life. For some reason, they were mostly ‘first chapter’ sermons. He was just breaking into the text.

I remember when I was 15, about to make the transition to high school; it was about the age guys start getting into drugs. My friends were going that route. I remember feeling the tension. In my mind I basically said, ‘That is where I’m headed.’ I resisted it but I also felt it was inevitable.

Well, Dr. Vines preached from Daniel 1. Daniel ‘purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the king’s meat.’ The Lord used that to turn my heart away from a wavering kind of not knowing where I was going. The direction of the next three years, in a sense, was set.

I don’t think Dr. Vines got up that day to make his sermon appeal to high school kids ‘on the verge.’ But God knew what I needed and applied it in the right place.

The other time was my junior year in college (University of North Florida). I was getting ready to go to law school. At a Sunday evening service, Dr. Vines began a series from the Book of Romans. He began preaching from chapter one, verse one, where it says, ‘Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ set apart to the gospel of God.’ I wasn’t thinking about ministry. But, sure as I knew anything, God told me that night, ‘That’s where you are going.’

ALLEN: God met me, too, through his Word through the preaching of Jerry Vines. A key sermon I remember was from Romans 12:1-2. Later, he preached a sermon on Hebrews 12:1-3 that impacted me. The thing that impacted me was not just the good solid content but that the sermons where interesting. Jerry used colorful language and illustrations to apply it to my life. …

I remember one sermon specifically where he was talking about 1 Corinthians 3, about whether the foundation of our life was built on gold, silver and precious stone or wood, hay and stubble. He said that if you build on wood, hay and stubble, as a Christian you have to stand before the Lord and then that wood, hay and stubble will be burned up from the fiery gaze of the Lord.

I remember one thing he said that I have used many times, it impacted me, and I have wept over it. He said, ‘What a tragedy for a Christian who stands before the Lord with nothing to offer him but wood, hay and stubble, who sees all that go up in smoke, and who then presses into the nail scarred hands of Jesus the charred embers of a wasted life.’ And I’ve never forgotten that phrase. I went home that day and said, ‘Oh God, don’t let me do that, don’t let me do that.’

PASSING ON A TRADITION OF EXPOSITORY PREACHING

INTERVIEWER: Dr. Vines, who were some influences on your ministry?

VINES: My old pastor when I was a boy (in Carrollton, Ga.), Dr. John Tippett. He actually expounded the books of the Bible.

INTERVIEWER: Was ‘expounding the Bible’ unusual then?

VINES: It was very unusual in those days. When I was teenager, I can remember on a Sunday night our church would be packed. I knew that expositional preaching was what you needed to do.

The first church I pastored, when I was 18, I decided to preach from the Book of Romans. There were not even commentaries on the book of Romans at that time. The only books I had of a religious nature were the Bible, and George Truett’s book of sermons, “A Quest for Souls.” In 16 weeks I came out alive, but barely. I said I’d never try that again.

Dr. W.A. Criswell really had an impact me, too. I went to hear him preach at evangelism conferences. I remember when he was up in Chattanooga; four nights I drove round-trip from Birmingham (150 miles each way) to hear him preach. One night I got caught for speeding I got so carried away. I also read his books ... His expounding Scripture, his stuff on the Book of Revelation; of course I later learned it was (William) Barclay, but who cares, he got it to me. He didn’t have structure, but he had great content.

Another one who influenced me was Warren Wiersby … in fact Wiersby is really the guy who convinced me to go back to expounding books of the Bible.

SWAIN: On a personal level?

VINES: Yes. I went to hear him at another big Bible conference in Chattanooga. He just did things with the Bible. He just opened it up; it was really almost matter-of-factly. Not much life to it at all, but the dynamite was the Scripture itself. Wiersby is the man who caused me in my own personal preaching to get to that method.

Another man who had an impact on me who was little known was Jess Henley. Jess Henley was an evangelist. He had a unique background. He went to Georgia Tech and Southern Baptist Theological Seminary … He studied under Hershey Davis, the Greek scholar.

Henley is the only man I ever knew who knew every one of the over 5,000 Greek words of the New Testament by their lexical definition. He is also the only man I have ever known who could quote entire chapters of the Greek text. Yet, he was an evangelist, a fervent evangelist, but he put scholarship and evangelistic fervor together. He really put it together for me in that sense ... The greatest revival in the history of Jacksonville First was under the preaching of Jess Henley.

SWAIN:  I remember that, I was there.

VINES: At the invitation time, the balcony at the back of that old building, it flowed like a river. We had 375 professions of faith. We baptized 358.

SWAIN: If you think of Dr. (Paige) Patterson’s motto for Southwestern Seminary, “Do the work of an evangelist… Bring the scrolls, especially the parchments” (2 Tim. 4:5, 13), it means having fire for evangelism wedded to scholarly commitment and understanding Scripture. When Dr. Patterson thinks of those things, he thinks of Dr. Vines and Dr. Vines thinks of Jess Henley.

ALLEN: And then through him and through Dr. Vines that came into my life. I remember when I was a teenager at youth camp Jess Henley was the guest speaker. This was outside Atlanta, Ga. On a Thursday, the day before we were to go home, Dr. Vines got up and said, ‘Now what we are going do this afternoon is all load up on the bus and pair up in groups of two. We are going out to a pre-designated area and we are going to do soul-winning.’ Now imagine a youth camp doing that today.

INTERVIEWER: As a teenager, did the idea of doing street evangelism like that make your heart pound?

ALLEN: It absolutely did. But it taught me that I must balance Scripture knowledge, content and information with a heart for souls. If all I have is a notebook full of Bible messages and I don’t have a heart for the world, then I am missing what it means to walk with God, what it means to be a Christian.

VINES: Here was Dr. Henley, my youth speaker, and at the time he was in his late 70s. He taught the Book of Revelation and the kids were just spellbound.

SWAIN: You never heard young people walking around First Baptist Jacksonville bemoaning having to listen to the preacher. And you never had a culture of ‘we’ve got to bring in someone who can connect with these people.’ It just was not in their minds. A man of 50 years old, there was no doubt he could connect with them.

VINES: I wonder if they are connecting with me today.

SWAIN: They are. I guarantee they are.

VINES: I hope so; kids today are different.

LEARNING TO TRUST GOD

ALLEN: Two important ideas critical to me as a teenager that led to my hearing the Lord calling me to preach were ‘choice’ and ‘conviction.’

When I was 16 years old, I had to make a choice between participating in baseball All-Stars and going to a church youth camp. I loved baseball and All-Stars was by invitation only.

Through the years, Dr. Vines had preached the Word and taught that I needed to put the Lord first and trust him. That was good for me and I made a choice at that point to go to camp instead of All-Stars.

In that choice was a part of the formation of convictions in my life that Jesus would be first. That has served me well. I was called to preach at that youth camp. Young people are never going to build convictions until they learn how to make right choices.

SWAIN: Right before my call to the ministry, I was going to take a Law School Admissions Test (LSAT) preparation course. The only time it was offered was Sunday morning. At that time I was working … in the men’s Sunday school class. Through the counsel of those men, I said that doing that was more important than studying for the LSAT. I hadn’t given up on law school, but I said I’d take the LSAT test later.

VINES: That is so rare today. The church today is making it easy. It is hard to develop real discipleship when the church makes it so easy. Don’t get me wrong: I think we should be sensitive to people’s time schedules, sensitive to their family needs, all of this; but we have made it so easy that there aren’t many choices they have to make and so they don’t develop convictions. Today we are seeing a weak, anemic brand of Christianity.

ALLEN: That may explain why there is a high percentage of students who graduate from high school and totally drop out of church.

CHALLENGES FACING PREACHERS

INTERVIEWER: What do you think are challenges for men who are training to be preachers in the 21st century?

VINES: This may be controversial, but they are going to have to resist the temptation to get away from the exposition of Scripture … I think this whole idea that ‘you’ve got to be culturally relevant’ and ‘you’ve got to always be positive and never say anything negative,’ I think those are the seeds of destruction.

SWAIN: Or ‘you can’t touch people where they are at by expositional preaching.’

We here are saying just the opposite.

VINES: I am glad you are saying that. You know far better than I that there is a whole different deal going on out there. People saying, ‘expositional preaching is not the way to do it.’ I read an article from a guy who said, ‘Jesus only preached the good news and that’s the way you’re suppose to preach; that if you go into all this negativity, you won’t connect with people today.’ If that is true, then I have wasted 40-something years of my life.

SWAIN: Here is the thing: there is a sense in which there are some things you cannot accomplish in ministry except over a long period of time. You cannot send a David Allen to Criswell College; you cannot send a Scott Swain to seminary, with a head full of Bible knowledge and a heart for the lost, just through one sermon alone. You can only do it through 15 years of teaching the whole counsel of God.

VINES: Today it is all about crowds. We all want crowds. But really, there is a great difference between building a crowd and building a church.

INTERVIEWER: What is the difference?

VINES: Well, Herman and the Dirty Noses can build a crowd, but only an expounder in the Word of God can build a church.

CHALLENGES FACING THE SBC

INTERVIEWER: Our Southern Baptist Convention president traveled around the country this past winter asking people what they thought the biggest challenge is for the SBC. I’m curious how you might answer that question.

ALLEN: The biggest challenge is ultimately that if our conviction gets away from the deity of Christ, the preaching of the inerrancy of the Bible and the love for souls, if we deviate from that you can write us off.

SWAIN: The challenge that every generation faces: taking the gospel to the ends of the earth. Our particular version of that challenge is doing it with integrity. The SBC has not yet been reformed and revived.

We stand at the doorway of reformation, revival and renewal, but we have to get from where we confess biblical authority to where we practice biblical authority. From the way we do our Sunday school stuff as a convention, to the way we do our missions as a convention, all these things, we need the reformation to not only take the seminaries but every institutional structure in the SBC and carry through this thing of practicing biblical authority.

ALLEN: We won the battle in our convention for confessing the inerrancy of Scripture; the new battle is the sufficiency of the Scripture … our convention is in the throes of answering that question.

VINES: I agree with everything they said. I think the issue is whether we are going to be church ‘lite’ or church ‘right.’ The feel-good, anemic brand of preaching that seems to be popular today is not going to produce churches that will impact our nation or the world for Christ. We desperately need revival in our churches.