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A fact-checked false sermon does untold spiritual damage to both souls and the Kingdom of Christ.
A true preacher of Christ Jesus’ Gospel should not have anything new to say, although each time he preaches it is a “new” moment.[1] This is because of two things: (1) What constitutes a Christian sermon (and, therefore, preaching) is the commissioned content from our Lord Jesus; and (2) as Bernard of Chartrés (circa 1124 AD) said, “We stand on the shoulders of giants.”[2] In other words, a sermon advances into our current milieu Christ’s Kingdom message, employing insights from the great saints, theologians, and apologists of the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. What may be new, then, are expressions, idioms, parlance, and even geopolitical and social circumstances. So, while a preacher may illustrate with contemporary stories and experiences to introduce or cast light on the transmitted Gospel and Kingdom ethics (further illumined by the “giants” of the Church) the one thing their stories and experiences have to be is true, never more so than in our fact-checked world.[3]
Nothing undermines a sermon quite like a purportedly true contemporary story that turns out fact-checked false. In fact, an untrue sermon illustration posited as true does double damage: Not only does it upend rhetorical purposes, but it also undermines confidence in the Gospel itself and, by extension, undermines the truth of Christ and His means of grace.
Today’s political and social commentators who joust over the truth or falsity of policies and statements from elected officials usually effect a zero-sum outcome. Rarely does a fact-check on something, like what the President does or says, sway persons from one party to another. It has just become part of the social (media) landscape and, more frequently still, the din of partisan echo chambers.
A fact-checked false sermon, however, does untold spiritual damage to both souls and the Kingdom of Christ. In fact, it is a sinful practice that needs to be altogether excised from authentic Christian preaching.
Recently, I learned of a sermon where the principal illustration concerned a heart-warming, moving story of a man in modern times whose Christian faith yielded extraordinary generosity. The man’s character and largesse appeared and reappeared throughout the sermon, weaving a tapestry that gave real-world expression to biblical munificence, and purposed to inspire the preacher’s auditors toward reprioritization and imitation. The problem was the man, and his much-lauded benefaction, was perfectly unreal.
During the sermon, that is “in real time,” the illustrative figure proved so incredible and his charity so extraordinary that parishioners were “bookmarking” his name and life for further reading. But they were met with immediate disappointment and even a sense of betrayal. It was not true, and the sermon was, in fact, not credible. The preacher’s foil for the sermon spoiled the sermon. And then it had the opposite effect the preached intended: His listeners called into question motives, red-flagging matters of trust. Moreover, they openly questioned the vehicle for such a story, the sermon, the platform by which the Holy Word of God is to be heralded. Who or what was being preached? If this so troubled faithful parishioners, then what of skeptics or the lapsed who may have fact-checked the fictional subject of the sermon?
A fact-checked false sermon, however, does untold spiritual damage to both souls and the Kingdom of Christ.
No, this was not a matter of hyperbole or embellishment for rhetorical purposes, for which we by custom and common understanding grant latitude. Instead, the preacher either did not do due diligence to ensure the authenticity of the illustration’s content or there was duplicity involved. Either way, the preacher stood at fault. It was an inauthentic homily illustration and, in the minds of his auditors, an inauthentic sermon. In fact, the point of the sermon, namely illuminating the biblical text and bringing God’s people to Christ in the Eucharist, was altogether despoiled. Matters of generosity, as indicative of a Christian spirit or Kingdom-of-God ethics and responsible stewardship, is and should always be implications of prioritized gospel proclamation.
What is said about illustrations that are actually false, also applies to statistics and research outcomes. Preachers must get the facts right before getting them out, lest damage befall the uniqueness of the preaching forum in which auditors sit passively. God has established a forum for people to respectfully receive the Word of truth,[4] not be deceived by illustrations and data.
But let the reader be warned: With cell phones close at hand, such passivity may give way to activity; parishioners fact-checking the sermon.
In nearly all sermons, preachers cobble quotes from Scripture with paraphrases from a wide array of “giants” who have been for them resources through books, commentaries, and mentorship. The insights and illustrations of these “giants” are endlessly quoted and adapted to yield “patchwork” for preachers and sermons. This is not a bad thing. Most preaching, both in content and delivery, comes by way of imitation. It is a good thing so long as the content is biblically and confessionally sound and well-aligned with the purpose of our Lord. There are many excellent preachers yesterday and today from which to resource and imitate. They range from the author of the book of Hebrews to Saint John Chrysostom, from Saint Bernard of Clairvaux to Martin Luther, and from Charles Spurgeon to Philip G. Ryken. Where true to Scripture, Creeds, and Augustana, their work is to be pilfered, appropriated, and reappropriated again.
At the same time, contemporary preachers must exercise caution, because story-illustrations are far more the norm today than in the days of Chrysostom or Henry Melchior Muhlenberg. This is a result of widespread and increasing biblical illiteracy among the baptized. Stories are needed for relatability of the Scriptures and their doctrines, as statistics have evidenced since the late 1990’s,[5] since auditors and society as a whole are doctrinally bereft and unlearned in biblical references. Here, we find another good reason to employ the entirety of the inherited sacred liturgy of the Church. I am referring to the substantial portions of Scripture read, sung, and liturgized during Mass. The liturgy provides overlapping content for doctrinal illustration and Christic illumination.
Consequently, sermons dependent upon outside-the-Scriptures illustrations will always be inferior to scriptural and liturgical illustrations to substantiate and correlate the onus of the sermon. This is because (1) no one and nothing enlightens the truth of the Bible like the One who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, our Lord Jesus Christ, and (2) all illustrations (analogies) break down at some point and fail to bring the truth home. But there are other reasons. Consider how the promise of illumination by the Holy Spirit of God is founded on the Word of God (John 16:4), such that we may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and have life in His name (John 20:31). Elaborate illustrations and sermons dependent on those examples can supplant the Word of God and leave listener’s merely with the feeling or sentiment that the illustration engenders and, well, never really get to Christ and Him crucified, Him resurrection, Him reigning, Him present, and Him sacramented. If that is the case, then the sermon has failed to be a Christ-commissioned sermon.
Christ is sufficient to illumine all biblical doctrine because all theology is, in the end, Christology. Hence, the Apostle Paul’s standard is to “preach Christ and Him crucified” (1 Corinthians 2:2). Using the lectionary lessons and the liturgized Scripture to illumine Christ Jesus never fact-checks false.
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[1] See John J. Bombaro, “The First Principles of Preaching: A Forum Like No Other.” 1517.org. 06/20/2021. https://www.1517.org/articles/first-principles-of-preaching-a-forum-like-no-other-part-1. Accessed 30 November 2025.
[2] The phrase was popularized in 1675 by a letter of Sir Isaac Newton, who said: “If I have seen further [than others], it is by standing on the shoulders of giants” (“Letter from Sir Isaac Newton to Robert Hooke,” Historical Society of Pennsylvania. https://digitallibrary.hsp.org/Detail/objects/9792. Retrieved 30 Nov. 2025.
[3] Leaving aside the notion of hypotheticals, similes, and rhetorical analogies.
[4] See John J. Bombaro, “The First Principles of Preaching: A Forum Like No Other.” 1517.org. 06/20/2021. https://www.1517.org/articles/first-principles-of-preaching-a-forum-like-no-other-part-1. Accessed 30 November 2025.
[5] See, Gary Burge, “The Greatest Story Never Read,” Christianity Today (Nov. 1999). https://www.christianitytoday.com/1999/08/greatest-story-never-read/. Accessed 30 November 2025. And John J. Bombaro, “The Book that Isn’t Rally There: Digital Texts and Declining Discipleship, Modern Reformation (May/June 2013). “https://www.modernreformation.org/resources/essays/the-book-that-isn-t-really-there-digital-texts-and-declining-discipleship. Accessed 30 November 2025.
