John A. Broadus (1827-95)

John A. Broadus served as one of the founders of Southern Seminary and he became Southern’s second president (1889-95) upon the death of his good friend and colleague James P. Boyce. Broadus’ resting place is just a few feet to the left of Boyce’s grave.

You might notice the odd looking cross-grave just behind Broadus’ tombstone. That cross covers the grave of famous Greek scholar A.T. Robertson who married John Broadus’ daughter. Robertson so admired his father-in-law that he asked to be buried “in his shadow,” believing that he could never attain the same level of devotion to Christ as Broadus.

Broadus was best-known for his preaching. He was an expositor who labored over the Greek or Hebrew texts before delivering passionate sermons. He worked for twenty years on his famous Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew, but Broadus’ most popular work was his preaching handbook, The Preaching and Delivery of Sermons. Even today, students will find a wealth of helpful information in Broadus’ books.

Charles Spurgeon named John Broadus “the greatest of living preachers.” Preaching was Broadus’ passion, and his words on preaching have become his legacy. Broadus wrote:

“In every age of Christianity, since John the Baptist drew crowds into the desert, there has been no great religious movement, no restoration of Scripture truth, and reanimation of genuine piety, without new power in preaching, both as cause and as effect.”

Broadus sets a good example for Southern Baptists. He was a passionate evangelist who baptized the famous Southern Baptist missionary Lottie Moon. When offered a hefty salary by J.D. Rockefeller to pastor a church in New York, Broadus turned him down. He knew what God had called him to do. Money wouldn’t change his mind.

I leave you with two more quotes from Broadus, the first regarding the importance of doctrinal content in our preaching and teaching. The second is my personal favorite from Broadus – a maxim I hope to live up to with every sermon I preach.

“Brethren, we must preach the doctrines; we must emphasize the doctrines; we must go back to the doctrines. I fear that the new generation does not know the doctrines as our fathers knew them.”

“Be willing to let the Scripture mean what it wants to mean.”