The gravity and gladness of preaching

 I have been reading The Revd Dr John Piper on this subject in The Supremacy of God in Preaching. I think he is on to something, you know. Drawing on Jonathan Edwards, he warns against preaching which is cold or in which we speak of the great things of God to sinners as if it were an ordinary conversation about indifferent matters. None of Edwards' 1200 surviving sermons contains a joke, but they do express an earnest passion for souls. He sought not to entertain his hearers with notions but to preach the Word of God with a certain seriousness of purpose. Even when Edwards read from a full manuscript with few gestures, his sermons could have a powerful effect. He would not raise his voice, but he would present an overwhelming argument with an intense sense of the presence of God such that the congregation were overcome with a great solemnity. 

Piper argues the great lesson we can learn from Edwards is to take our calling seriously and not to trifle with the Word of God or the act of preaching. 

Thomas Chalmers was said to be in bondage to his manuscript, even following along with his finger on the text as he read it, and given to long sentences but he had one thing: "blood-earnestness". 

Preaching should not be morose, boring, dismal, sullen, gloomy or unfriendly but it should arise from and seek to mediate a deep and reverent encounter with God.

Away with light-hearted, chipper, talkative preaching. The pulpit is not the place for trivial levity, flippancy or carelessness.  Don't forget: something eternal and infinite is being done there.