I’ve not read much by Tim Keller, pastor of the Redeemer Church in New York, but I am definitely a fan of his most recent blog entry, “Preaching to the Collective Heart.”

In the entry, Keller writes about how some have taken his use of culture references as a way of “engaging culture” through his preaching.  While I’ve never preached to a crowd like Keller, I have tried to engage people (primarily students) through the use of cultural touchpoints.  It’s not something I see or experience anymore: I live in a religious culture entrenched in local culture and “safe for the whole family” Christian culture.  And while those things are culture, they are not things that connect with me much.

According to Keller, preachers are to “preach the truth, preach the news, and preach to make the truth real to the heart.”  Whatever cultural references he uses, he says he uses them as part of his “effort to reach the heart.”  And by heart he means going “right for the commanding commitments of people’s lives that drive their desires, thinking, feeling, and action.”  Mix that with his definition of culture, a collective heart, and you’ve got an interesting way of looking at the task of preaching to those both Christian and not.

I don’t want to steal Keller’s thunder by quoting it all here; I encourage you to read the whole article (check out the link at the top of this entry).  The final nugget, though: I seek to make plain the foundations of our city’s culture in order to help people understand themselves more fully and imagine what it means (or would mean) to live a Christian life here.

God, give our preachers hearts that can speak to the heart, and make our hearts open and ready to respond.