"We need to gain in the church today a clearer view of God's revealed ideal for the preacher," says John Stott in his preface to
The Preacher's Portrait. In order to gain this clearer view, Stott presents brief studies of five words used in the New Testament to describe preachers and their task:
steward, herald, witness, father, and
servant. In the course of these five studies, Stott considers the message and authority of preachers, the character of their proclamation, the vital necessity of their own experience with the gospel, and their motives and moral qualities. Together, these five New Testament words reveal the preacher's portrait, says Stott-- "a portrait painted by the hand of God himself on the broad canvas of the New Testament."
