Thomas Manton on Psalm 119

The series of sermons on Psalm 119 is, indeed, famous in the history of preaching.  It is remarkable for the fact that Dr. Manton was able to go through the 176 verses of the psalm in 190 sermons without becoming tedious or repetitious.  Only a man of tremendous intellectual vitality could have preached such a series, and yet maintain the interest of his congregation.  These sermons were delivered in the course of a bit more than a year.  Each week, he preached two sermons on the Lord’s Day and one during the middle of the week.

From: Worship: Reformed According to Scripture by Hughes Oliphant Old; 2nd edition (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2002 [1985]), p. 82.

At the time of publication, Hughes Oliphant Old was a member of the Center of Theological Inquiry in Princeton, New Jersey, and a former pastor.

 

Augustine’s Preaching

The sermons of Augustine are remarkable.  Here, we find one of the greatest intellects of history trying to make his profound teaching so clear and simple that the ordinary people of a small provincial city might hear with enjoyment and profit.  Today, we respect Augustine for his works on philosophy.  We highly honor him as one of the four doctors of the Western church, a theologian without parallel.  His reputation rests on the “City of God,” a profound work on the philosophy of history.  It rests, as well, on his “Confessions,” a work that treats the deep themes of how the individual soul comes to faith and is a classic in the field of religious psychology and a turning point in the science of epistemology.  The sermons are very different.  They show how a lofty mind grasped as well the simple basics.  If the biblical expositions of John Chrysostom most often instruct the faithful in matters of Christian conduct, the opening of the Scriptures was used, by Augustine, to teach Christian doctrine.  Augustine was a great doctrinal preacher and, yet, he simplified doctrine in his sermons.  He used rhetoric to clothe the most complex philosophical ideas in similes and figures of speech.  His artful allegorical interpretations delight, amuse, and cajole us into discovering the truth even today.

From: Worship Reformed According to Scripture by Hughes Oliphant Old; 2nd edition (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2002 [1985]), p. 67.