The Problem of the Gifted Speaker
Stephen Perks
Narrated By: Nathan Conkey
Topics: Ecclesiology
Library: Kuyper Foundation Library
One of the problems facing the Church in the Western world today is the problem posed by the “ministry” of those who are considered “gifted speakers” and consequently idolised by the Church. Stated in its most simple form this is the problem posed by the prioritizing of the personality, charisma, “profile,” popularity, stage presence and ability of the speaker as an orator and entertainer over the content of the message being delivered—in short, the triumph of style over content, the consequence of which has been the creation of an intellectually feeble-minded and theologically malnourished generation of churchgoers who are over stimulated by sentimental and mindless entertainment worship masquerading as spiritual edification.
The problem has a long history, but it is made particularly problematic today by the intellectual dumbing down process that currently afflicts British culture generally and has produced a semiliterate society. That the Church should also have fallen into this ditch is particularly problematic because her role in providing spiritual, moral and intellectual leadership for society is vital to the health of the nation. Without the leadership of the Church the nation cannot recover from its present descent into cultural degeneration and the neo-paganism that is its inevitably accompaniment. While the Church is obsessed with the mindless prioritising of style over content that is vitiating the cultural life of the nation as a whole she will remain useless and irrelevant to society, and therefore unable to provide the leadership that the nation so desperately needs