The Last Pulpit Prince: Gardner C. Taylor

He is the last pulpit prince. At 96 years old, Gardner C. Taylor has outlived almost all his contemporaries. The closest equivalent is Billy Graham, who (though better known than Taylor) self-identified as an itinerant evangelist.

In Taylor’s heyday as senior pastor of Concord Baptist Church of Christ in Brooklyn, N.Y. (1948-1990), his name was synonymous with preaching excellence. In fact, in 1996, Baylor University named him one of the 12 “most effective preachers in the English-speaking world.”¹

The age of the pulpit princes is gone, but the lessons we can learn from preachers of that era are like treasures on the ocean floor awaiting our discovery. Preachers such as Taylor have much to teach us about the task of preaching.

Taylor’s preaching teaches today’s preachers to elevate three values in particular: apprenticeship, language and gospel-centricity. Certainly much more can be gleaned from Taylor’s preaching such as his Christological focus, his commitment to lifting up the gospel’s relevance to the modern situation, and his insistence on crossing boundaries of racial and ethnic difference. However, this article focuses on these three values, highlighted as lessons we can learn from America’s last living pulpit prince.