Preachers and prayer

JI Packer with a few words that should make a big impact:

"A good rule for a preacher is that he ought to pray for people as earnestly as he preaches to them. In the same way that one talks to folk about God, one should talk to God about those folk. A compassionate preacher ought to be a compassionate prayer.

Those who do not talk to God about men in the same way that they talk to men about God will very soon become victims of their own role and, to that extent, hypocrites.

It is very easy for those of us who minister the word of God to become hypocrites in this way, and I am afraid many of us do."

JI Packer "Honouring the Written Word of God" p 245