At our church, probably John Piper, Don Carson and Paul Washer are the favourite preachers. But Efrem Buckle (from Calvary Chapel South London)told me I had to start listening to Eric Mason, I did, and I'm very glad I did.
Eric Mason preaches at Epiphany Fellowship in Philly. You can listen to his sermons here:
http://www.epiphanyfellowship.org
Here's what i like about Eric:
1) His many cultural references in applications and illustrations.
In Eric's illustrations he will mention things like L.L. Cool J's "Around the way Girl" These are the kind of things that put me at ease. I feel like, I used to have that record - this dude knows me!
I love it when preachers use illustrations from everyday life: Waiting for the bus, in the supermarket line, etc. These things help us to identify with the preacher.
Often in Britain, sermon illustrations will ruin something like this: "the Guardian newspaper had an article the other day that said ......"
- now that probably works well for a lot of people, so I don't wanna knock that. But some of us Council estate Christians, we're longing to hear preachers that have the same experiences as us. We wanna hear about preacher's who are applying the Bible when there's trouble on the streets, or their car gets nicked, or their neighbours are disturbing them, or they get robbed, or when they're just working hard trying to provide for their family, or trying to get educated.
So I like what Eric's doing.
2) His exegesis:
Eric clearly spends time on his exegesis of the text. Every church deserves a good preacher. Even if its on a council estate, it deserves to have someone who can rightly handle the word of God.
3) He shows his exegesis:
This doesn't seem to be fashionable these days, but Eric does it, and I respect him for this. Not only does it work as a good memory aid when he does things like say the Greek word in the original, and spends time explaining his reasoning, But also it helps us to see if he's really getting his points from the text or not. Sadly the Prosperity Gospel has affected Council Estates in London more than Jesus' Gospel. But thanks be to God, sometimes when people see a legit preacher show his exegesis, they realise that the prosperity gospel stuff is wrong, and they start listening to the good stuff instead.
4) He tackles the idols of street culture
I might write more about this in another post in the future.
5) He's glorifying Jesus
Nuff said.
Thank God for Eric Mason.
