Posted in Christianity, Genre, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, New Testament, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, Stage 2 - Passage Study, tagged Expository Preaching, Harmonization, Harmony of the gospels, John's Gospel, Mark's Gospel, Preaching Gospels, Synoptic Gospels on January 19, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Note – Peter has extended comments related to this post, see previous in the series here
Last time we looked at the interpretational challenge of more than one “author.” Now, let’s see another challenge:
2. More than one “account” of the event. What are we to do when we find the same story told in two, three, [...]
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Posted in Christianity, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, Old Testament, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, Stage 2 - Passage Study, Stage 3 - Passage Purpose, Stage 5 - Message Purpose, Stage 8 - Message Detail, tagged Bryan Chappell, Christocentric, Edmund Clowney, Theocentric, Walter Kaiser on January 15, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
There is a lot of discussion about whether preaching is anthropocentric or theocentric (man or God-centered). Some like to get into the theocentric versus christocentric debate (God or Christ-centered). I am not getting into that one in this post (although I will mention a helpful category I heard recently from Walter Kaiser – christocentric is [...]
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Posted in Christianity, Homiletics, New Testament, Preacher's Personal Life, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, tagged Acts of the Apostles, Ben Witherington, Ben Witherington III, Church History, Pentecost, Speeches in Acts, Stephen's Speech, Walter Liefeld on January 3, 2009 | 1 Comment »
The book of Acts is a fascinating study. It is the only inspired account of the birth of the church and early church history. Yet like all of inspired Scripture, it goes beyond mere history. While some are quick to oversimplify their categorization of New Testament genre into stories of Jesus (gospels), instructions for the [...]
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Posted in Christianity, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, Preacher's Personal Life, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, tagged Affective Theology, Fruit of the Flesh, Galatians on December 29, 2008 | 2 Comments »
How are we to deal with a cold heart when we find one sitting in our own chest? How should we respond to a lack of spiritual motivation? I believe we need to think biblically and theologically about this very real challenge in our lives.
Effort of the flesh does not work. It is common advice. [...]
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Posted in Christianity, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, Old Testament, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, tagged 29:18, Planning, Pro 29:18, Proverbs 29:18, Vision on November 28, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Where there is no vision, the people perish . . . so starts a well-known, oft-quoted and usually misunderstood proverb (Proverbs 29:18). The second half of the proverb completes the thought and makes it clear that this is not about having vision statements, 5-year plans and strategic documents (good as those all are). It is [...]
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Posted in Christianity, Delivery, Genre, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, New Testament, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, Stage 2 - Passage Study, Stage 3 - Passage Purpose, Stage 4 - Passage Idea, Stage 5 - Message Purpose, Stage 6 - Message Idea, Stage 7 - Message Outline, Stage 8 - Message Detail, tagged Clausal Layout, Diagramming, Exegetical Outline, Syntactical Analysis on November 8, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Here in London you can visit the British Library and look at such priceless items as Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Alexandrinus. While it is a privilege to see them, they are not the easiest things to read and understand. Written in uncials, ITISNOTEASYTOREADTEXTWITHOUTGAPSORPUNCTUATION. Never mind the fact that it is in Greek, just the running [...]
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Posted in Christianity, Genre, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, New Testament, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, Stage 2 - Passage Study, tagged Gospels on August 27, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Here are four more suggestions for planning a gospel series:
Decide how many messages the series will last, then select accordingly. You might only deal with a part of the gospel (such as the Upper Room Discourse). You might select exemplary units that point to the flow in which they sit (such as Luke 19:1-10 with [...]
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Posted in Christianity, Genre, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, New Testament, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, Stage 2 - Passage Study, tagged Gospels on August 26, 2008 | 1 Comment »
It is a good idea to preach a series from one of the gospels, but it is not easy to plan. There are so many events, parables and teaching sections that a series which simply goes from one NIV heading to the next would last for years. Here are some suggestions:
Get to grips with the [...]
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Posted in Christianity, Delivery, Genre, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, New Testament, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, Stage 2 - Passage Study, Stage 8 - Message Detail, tagged Luke 18, Luke 19, Luke's Gospel, Pharisee, Tax Collector, Zaccheus on August 11, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
When preaching a narrative it is important to preach a whole story, but don’t wear blinkers. I am referring to the beginning and end of the specific narrative in question. We easily fall into the trap of believing that section breaks added in a contemporary version are actually inspired dividers that should separate two distinct [...]
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Posted in Homiletics, How to . . . ?, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, Stage 1 - Passage Selection, Stage 2 - Passage Study, Stage 3 - Passage Purpose, Stage 4 - Passage Idea, Stage 5 - Message Purpose, Stage 6 - Message Idea, Stage 7 - Message Outline, Stage 8 - Message Detail, tagged 1Peter 4, Spiritual Gifts on July 21, 2008 | 1 Comment »
Monday’s a good time to pause for thought. Perhaps you preached yesterday. Perhaps you’re preaching again next Sunday. Let’s always remember that God, in His grace, has given gifts to every believer. To some of us He has given “speaking” gifts. In 1Peter 4:10-11, Peter urges everyone to invest their lives in each other through [...]
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Posted in Christianity, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, Stage 2 - Passage Study, Stage 4 - Passage Idea, Stage 5 - Message Purpose, Stage 6 - Message Idea, Stage 8 - Message Detail, tagged crux, crux interpretum on July 8, 2008 | 1 Comment »
I’m scheduled to preach on of those tricky ones. You know, one of the crux interpretum of the New Testament. There’s the end of 1st Timothy 2, the end of 1st Peter 3, the end of James, the end of 1st John, Hebrews 6, etc. A passage that begs every exegetical skill you possess, or [...]
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In a general sense everything written in the Bible was written for our instruction (Rom.15:4). Yet as preachers we can fall into the trap of looking for a sermon in a text, rather than fully pursuing the process of allowing the text to be boss of the sermon.
Yesterday I was discussing Genesis 3 with a [...]
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It is easy to take the reading of the Bible for granted. It is easy to make a mess of it too! For example, consider Joshua 6:16-19. The narrative has built to a climax. The Israelites are about to complete their silent march attack strategy with the great shout. As you are reading through this [...]
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Posted in Genre, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, Old Testament, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, Stage 1 - Passage Selection, Stage 2 - Passage Study, Stage 3 - Passage Purpose, Stage 4 - Passage Idea, Stage 5 - Message Purpose, Stage 6 - Message Idea, Stage 7 - Message Outline, Stage 8 - Message Detail on April 15, 2008 | 1 Comment »
Nathan asked about preaching longer narratives, such as the narratives of Daniel. Last week I preached Daniel chapter 2 and the book of Esther (10 chapters!), so I’ve been thinking about this recently. Here are my thoughts, I’d love to hear anything you would add:
Even if it is long, preach a literary unit. Longer narratives [...]
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When you are preaching a narrative, I think it is healthy to begin with a default approach of tell the story, highlight the main point and then apply that main point. With many narratives, this approach works perfectly well. Last week I preached Luke 19:1-10 and found that telling the story of Zaccheus with explanation [...]
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When I teach preaching courses, I tend to refer to the three types of Scripture: discourse, narrative and poetry. The various genre fit within these categories and so they give a good overview of different Biblical text types. So the principles of narrative interpretation would apply in the Gospels, Acts, historical books and [...]
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Posted in Genre, Homiletics, Old Testament, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, Stage 2 - Passage Study, Stage 3 - Passage Purpose, Stage 4 - Passage Idea, tagged Genre, Proverbs, Psalms, Wisdom Literature on March 24, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Poetry is different from narrative and it is very different from discourse. How though is our preaching of poetry different from our preaching of narrative and discourse? To answer this question, today we will consider how poetry works and functions. Then tomorrow we’ll consider some implications for preaching poetry.
How Poetry Works – Besides employing literary [...]
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Posted in Delivery, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, New Testament, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, Stage 2 - Passage Study, Stage 5 - Message Purpose, Stage 8 - Message Detail, tagged 1Cor 15, 1Cor15, Corinthians, Easter, NT Wright, Raised, Resurrection, Tom Wright on March 19, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
NT Wright made an interesting comment this week. He suggested that the New Testament presents many implications that come from the resurrection. However, the one that most preachers tend to emphasize is not really presented in the New Testament. Namely, “Because Jesus rose from the dead, we can go to heaven when [...]
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Posted in Genre, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, New Testament, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, Stage 2 - Passage Study, Stage 5 - Message Purpose, Stage 6 - Message Idea, Stage 7 - Message Outline, Stage 8 - Message Detail, tagged Easter, Gospels, Harmonization, Harmony, Passion on March 18, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Whenever we preach from the gospels we need to be aware that there may be up to four accounts of the story before us. In the past a great deal of emphasis was placed on harmonizing the gospel accounts. That is to say, placing all four side by side and seeking to combine [...]
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Posted in Delivery, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, New Testament, Preaching, Religion, Specific text, Stage 5 - Message Purpose, Stage 7 - Message Outline, Stage 8 - Message Detail, tagged Calvary, Cross, Easter, Passion, Resurrection on March 14, 2008 | 2 Comments »
In some ways Easter is not like Christmas. The Christmas story tends to remain largely unmentioned for eleven months of the year. So when the advent season comes round again people expect to hear the basic Christmas story. But the events of the first Easter get mentioned and preached on throughout the year. So there [...]
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It would seem obvious that a written text, such as the one you will preach next Sunday, is made up of words on the page. Furthermore, we all know that words on a page convey information. So our task in preaching must revolve around the relevant explanation, proclamation and application of those words, right? Right, [...]
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Posted in Delivery, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, New Testament, Preaching, Specific text, Stage 6 - Message Idea, Stage 7 - Message Outline, tagged Acts 2, Evangelism, Pentecost, Religion on January 13, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Obed submitted a comment on The Full Meal Deal concerning the timing of presenting a controversial or challenging topic. I suppose we could complicate things, but it seems to me that there is a fairly simple principle here. Know your listeners well enough to know how they may react to a controversial idea. [...]
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Several days ago I suggested the image of preparing and preaching within a low fence. I’d like to suggest a reason for doing so that may not be immediately obvious. Very simply, you will enjoy the preaching process more. Let me give another example:
Almost four years ago the church I was involved [...]
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Posted in Genre, Homiletics, How to . . . ?, New Testament, Preaching, Specific text, Stage 2 - Passage Study, Stage 7 - Message Outline, Stage 8 - Message Detail, tagged Hebrews on December 31, 2007 | 1 Comment »
When you have a single text for a sermon, you also need a fence. The fence is there to keep you from wandering too far away from your focus.
Erect a fence for the passage – last night my preaching text was Hebrews 13:20-21, the final benediction. I erected a fence around the book of [...]
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So if narratives function through plot, how does that look in 2 Samuel 11 and following? What is the rhetorical impact of the story of David and Bathsheba?
Narrative affects the reader/hearer through association or disassociation with/from the main characters. The story contains five parts. Background/Introduction: David should be at war like the other kings, [...]
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Well yesterday’s post stirred more response than usual! Andy Stanley stated his point in strong terms, which probably sparked some response. While as an Englishman I might state the same point in a slightly more understated way, I do urge people who attend my preaching courses to stick in their primary passage most of the [...]
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You are preaching through a book, perhaps an epistle, and you come toward the end. How will you finish the series? There are several options available, none of which is always the best route to take:
1. Summarize the “end matter” in a sermon. You preach the last obvious preaching section and include a summary of [...]
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In part 1 we considered the importance of establishing and underlining the biblical authority of a message. We underlined the importance of a commitment to expository preaching and the need to reinforce that commitment through attitude and action throughout a sermon. Now some thoughts on reconsidering the traditional placement of the reading before or at [...]
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The second of two longer than usual posts. This time I will explain why I did what I did (see yesterday’s post for the transcription).
On paper this feels like a long introduction. The message lasted 39 minutes, and this introduction took 5 minutes, about 13% of the message. Maybe slightly longer than [...]
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Some weeks ago I mentioned the idea of retelling a parable in a contemporary setting. I preached Luke 18:9-14 and used a contemporized version for my introduction. In this post I will give the transcription of the parable. In part 2 I will share my explanation of why I did it this way.
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It’s amazing [...]
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