I Preached Another Man's Sermon

Yesterday (4/26/26), I preached another man’s sermon!  Last week, my good friend, Pastor Jason Calhoun told me about a sermon that Pastor Nathan Holmes of the First Pentecostal Church of North Little Rock had preached.  He preached it on their mid-week service about the fear of the Lord from Proverbs 9:10. I didn’t catch it until Friday morning of that week, but I ended up listening to it twice that day and then again, another time on Saturday.  It was so compelling that I ended up transcribing it and preaching it on Sunday here in Dothan.  We rarely hear this kind of content being preached from our pulpits these days.  There were times in the past when the fear of the Lord used to be a very common subject.  I can remember being deeply moved by O.R. Fauss, Curtis Spears, and A.D. Spears preaching at the Alabama camp meetings at the old Pike Road schoolhouse back in late 1970’s and early 1980’s on the matters of the fear of the Lord and subjects like that.  They were incredibly convicting and sobering messages to hear.  I look back and perhaps some of it is nostalgic feelings but at the same time, those messages impacted me in such a way that I understand now they were greatly directional for me.      

I have only knowingly preached another minister’s sermon one other time.  Obviously, if you are preaching on a regular basis there are things that other preachers say that you will incorporate into your own notes and delivery, and you may not even recognize that you have done it.  That is the nature of good preaching.  Years ago, I heard a message that Brother J. T. Pugh preached entitled, “Don’t Fool with a Fool” and I transcribed it and preached it but told our congregation that I what I had done.

I don’t believe this was a coincidental thing for me to hear this message by Brother Holmes because about six weeks ago, I was over at my parents’ home, and my dad expressed concern that we are a generation that has lost the fear of the Lord.  My dad is 83 and has been in church his entire life.  In fact, the church he grew up in was the result of a tent meeting that D. L. Welch and W. E. Gambling led in pecan orchard sometime in the early 1950’s around Andalusia, Alabama.  After he said that to me, I went home that night and started doing a thematic Bible study on the fear of the Lord.  I did not type out the notes, because they were handwritten in one of those cheap marble notebooks that you can snag for 0.50 cents during the back-to-school sales.  Those notes were nothing fancy, just quite a few verse references and some notes and observations on those Scriptures and cross-references sitting at the kitchen table.

Brother Holmes opened his message by relating that at a past Christmas, one of the assistants from his grandfather’s church, Pastor Murray Burr, had found some of the elder Burr’s sermon and Bible study notes.  I am guessing that this assistant was probably in his elder years now as well and he had given the notes to Brother Holmes.  He related about how he had started going back and reading and studying some of his grandfather’s notes.  He said that a few weeks prior he had preached about some of the things the church needs, one of them being conviction—and now he was going to preach on the need of the fear of the Lord.

Here is the catch with being able to preach messages that are conviction-filled and heart-felt, you must have some spiritual disciplines to back up what you are relaying from the Lord.  Public anointing NEVER exceeds private devotion!  I have been saying that and writing that for a long time now.  I am certainly aware that this concept is not something that has originated with me, in fact I know I heard some elder say that and it got literally grafted into my own mind and spirit when I heard it.  Conviction preaching has a price tag on it, and it will not be the price that a preacher prayed for an advanced theology degree.  Those matters are a dime a dozen and frankly all it does mainly show me how smart a man might be.  Eloquent, erudite, lofty, oratorical, and polished preaching might be the description of the sermon, but very rarely does it move the soul into action.  For those who know me, I have been very encouraging toward ministers going to Bible schools, Bible colleges, and seminaries because I have gone to all three of these places and they are helpful.  However, it is beneficial for you to get a good education and then get over that said education because somebody said that all knowledge will do is puff us up.  Nonetheless, get a preacher who is filled with the Spirit, the Word, private prayer and some fasting mixed in with it and you will not only hear what that man is preaching but you will feel what that man is preaching.

There are some preachers that you want to hear because they are gifted, some you don’t want to hear because they are dull, and some that you must hear because they are so compelling!  I am doing my best to try to get into that last category.  Lord, please let the fear of the Lord remain an anchor point in my life! 

I will be exploring this thought in the next few days.  In the meantime, go watch/listen to Brother Holmes preach on the fear of the Lord, not once or twice but three times and see what it does for you.            

Thanks for reading. . .

Philip Harrelson