Stage 4 – Passage Idea

Multiply the Fruit of Your Study

/ Peter Mead / 2 Comments

To really study a text takes time and effort. It involves a lot of thinking, reading, original language work for those that can, note taking, diagramming, plot analysis, word studies and so on. If you’ve really studied a passage well, let the fruit be multiplied. Here are some ideas:

1. Preach more than one sermon. As a pastor it is possible to preach the sermon on Sunday morning, then come at the passage again in the evening. Perhaps the evening could focus less on explanation, and more on fleshing out the possible relevance and applications of the idea. If we’re honest, how much do people grasp on a “once-only” schedule? Why not double up the dose, more will stick!

2. Produce study notes. Perhaps for a home group study, but not just for that. Why not produce a sheet of notes that will help your listeners think through the passage again during the week? The fruit of your study can be a guide for them in exegeting the passage, arriving at the main idea and points of application.

3. Participate in a forum. Some preachers would run a mile from this idea, and some probably should. However, if you have the mind and the grace to handle this, consider offering a forum, a Q&A time on the passage. Let people ask questions and interact with the subject or passage, you be the resource to help people think clearly. This may be more appropriate on some subjects than others, but if a group of people would come and benefit from your study, why not?

4. Publish it in some way. Perhaps your study would yield a magazine article? Maybe this would just go in the church newssheet, a denominational publication or maybe one of the big Christian magazines. Perhaps your work has what it takes for a journal article, or for a one-page handout you can make available at the back for the next few weeks. Publishing doesn’t have to involve contracts and massive time commitments. If you’ve done the work, perhaps there are ways others can benefit. How about the recorded message? Then there’s the wild world of the internet. It is full of all sorts of stuff (who am I to talk?), so if you think your notes or article will help, then add them to the mix. However, remember your goal is to bless and help others, not drain away your own time for the benefit of none (easy to do with internet or self-publishing).

5. Preach it again. If the sermon is still fresh as you re-work it, preach it again. Perhaps to the same people after a significant delay. You’ll be both excited and disappointed by the fact they may not even notice! Or you could preach it somewhere else. Switch pulpits with a pastor friend and both preach an old message – less preparation, but possibly great blessing for the two churches.

The Message and the Text

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The relationship of a message to the Bible text is clear. We are to begin with the text, derive the message from the text and bring it to our people today. Van Harn emphasizes the importance of the “from” in the following quote:

“Preaching is from Bible texts. Not on Bible texts – although some sermons stay right there and never seem to leave the text. Not about Bible texts – although some sermons seem that distant and detached. Not around Bible texts – although some sermons seem to move in circles. Not above Bible texts – although some sermons travel in thin air. Not under Bible texts – although some sermons seem to be hiding. The word is from.”

Van Harn, Preacher, Can You Hear Us Listening, 61.

How Being a Preacher Can Kill Your Bible Study

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

The stages of sermon preparation are not a hard and fast series of steps. It is possible to have a useful thought for the introduction, conclusion, illustrations, and so on, very early in the process. Yet these are all stage 7 elements – message details. So even though it is possible to have thoughts at any time, it is usually better to note them and leave them until later. This is especially important in stage 2 – passage study. A commitment to expository preaching requires that we keep stage 2 unpolluted by stages 5-7.

1. As you are studying your passage you are not looking for a sermon. If you collapse stage 6 – sermon shape, into stage 2 – passage study, you will undermine the whole process. It is critical to study the passage first, to understand it, rather than to form it into a sermon.

2. If your mind creeps ahead, make a note and get back to stage 2. We’re all tempted to see our points as we study. Write them down and put them aside. That is not yet. We easily look for our sermon structure, will there be two points, or three? Inductive or deductive? Don’t. Write down any thoughts and then put that aside.

3. Be clear on your goal in studying a passage. What is the goal of studying the passage? It is not to find the sermon. It is not to determine the points of the sermon. It is not to utilize our Greek or Hebrew until we feel we have fulfilled some sense of duty. It is not to parse verbs endlessly, or do word study after word study. The goal of studying the passage is to find, with some degree of confidence, the passage idea. The goal of stage 2 is stage 3 (and part of stage 4). The goal of studying the passage is to know what the author’s idea was, and why he wrote it. Seems obvious, but we easily forget. In fact, many of us have never been told that. I don’t recall my seminary profs training me to exegete a passage so that I grasp the author’s main idea. But that is the goal. All the Bible study skills we have are there to work towards that.

Determine the main idea of the passage, with as much confidence as you can achieve in the time you have. Then you are ready to start considering the purpose of your sermon, your sermon idea and your sermon outline. Do these things too soon and you may abort your Bible study.

Manipulation in Proclamation

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As preachers we are called to do more than inform the mind.  We are not lecturers.  We are not called to achieve a stated goal by any means possible.  We are not salesmen.  So how are we to navigate the pulpit so that we fulfill our calling, but don’t overstep the mark and take on tasks that are not ours?

1. Preach to the heart.  It is important to understand that people are not just mind and will, but first and foremost are heart-driven.  The Bible teaches this, even with all the gymnastics some teachers go through to avoid what the text says.  The heart is more than mere emotions, but it is not merely the mind as some suggest. In Ephesians 4:17-18 Paul urges the believers not to function like the unsaved Gentiles.  They do not act well because of their minds, thinking, and understanding.  But there is another issue.  Their minds are the way they are because their hearts are hardened.  The heart is central, critical and very much in control.  So, as preachers we must address the heart and not take a short cut to just the mind or will.

2. Don’t stir the emotions and then attach spiritual content to that.  Since the heart includes emotions, it is tempting to merely stir the emotions and then attach our message to that emotional reaction.  You can tell a moving story about the little boy who finally hit a home run (for Brits think of a boy hitting a six), then as people feel themselves filling up, drive home the application of the sermon.  “You too are standing at the plate, Jesus is asking you to commit to this challenge this week, will you commit?  Will you swing the bat?”  This is riding on the back of imported emotion to “achieve” something while preaching.  This is manipulation.

3. Allow the text to reach the heart. The solution is not to merely preach an intellectual sermon and avoid the heart.  The key is to preach the text well so that the text itself and the message of the text can do its job.  If the passage is moving, let it move people.  If the passage is stirring, let it stir people.  When the text itself and the message itself stir the emotions, great.  Don’t feel you have to import a moving story to get the job done.  Make sure that emotions are stirred by the text, the message, the idea itself.

That Message from That Text?

/ Peter Mead / 4 Comments

It is vital that the listener be able to see how the message comes from the text they are looking at. The credibility of the speaker matters, but the credibility of the Bible matters more. It matters that people listening to a sermon can look at the text before them and see how the message flows from that particular text. It is not good enough to preach truth, or to preach a sound idea. It matters that the truth and the idea come from the text presented to the people.

Some years ago my wife and I sat in church as the visiting preacher preached the gospel. The message was true, the gospel was clear. But the message was not true to that text, and the gospel was not clear from that text. His “clever” presentation of the gospel undermined the very credibility of the gospel he proclaimed.

Since you’re wondering, he preached the gospel using the three phrases from Job 41:8. First point was that we must identify with Christ (lay your hand on him). Second point, that we must remember what He did for us (remember the battle). Third point was that our salvation is not dependent on us, but on Him, there is no need to keep “getting saved” again (and you will do it no more). The text is not presenting the gospel, it is God telling Job to get in the squared circle and slug it out with leviathan.

May our listeners never leave saying, “Great message, but I don’t see how he got that message from that text!”

Peter has responded to comments on this post.

Focus on the basics

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

Great preaching always involves the “effective execution of elementary ideas.” (Attributed to Eugene Emerson Jennings)

It is tempting to give attention in preaching to the clever and intricate subtleties of the art and craft of preaching, but subtleties work best when built on a foundation of good solid basics. A clearly derived and cleanly defined Biblical idea. A definite and specific purpose. A logical and orderly structure. Good pastoral relevance. Effective introduction. A clean finish. Most, if not all preachers would preach their next sermon more effectively if they would focus on the basics.