Expository Preaching

Time Wasted When Time Is Short

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It’s easy to waste time you don’t have when you’re preaching.  For example, as we start our message, it is tempting to say that if only we had longer we could do a better job of preaching the passage.  We waste time by saying this and achieve nothing other than a vain attempt to protect our reputation from a negative reaction to our preaching (aka an excuse).

Don’t tell people you wish you had more time to do justice to the passage.  Use the time you have to the full.  I won’t take any more of your time on this post!

The Challenge of Narratives 2: Gospels – Part I

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Peter has extended comments on this post.

When we come to interpreting the narratives in the Gospels, we are faced with a couple of potential difficulties.  I’ll call it the double challenge of more than one:

1. More than one “author” of the parables. Our goal in interpretation is to grasp the author’s intended meaning.  But which one?  There’s Jesus telling the story in the first place, around AD30, in Aramaic, somewhere in Galilee or Judea.  What did Jesus intend for those original hearers to grasp and learn?  But then there’s Luke, for example, retelling the story, around thirty or more years later, in Greek, to a reader somewhere in the Greek speaking world.  Primarily our concern is with what Jesus intended, but we’d be naïve to think that Luke’s intent was unimportant.  Luke did not struggle to focus, and thereby put together a random gospel.  No, he sequences his material with precision and skill.  We see this when different gospel writers frame the same content in a different sequence of material.  But that is another challenge again.

Next time I’ll give the other half of the challenge, the other “more than one!”

The Challenge of Narratives 1: Old Testament

/ Peter Mead / 2 Comments

Note – Peter has offered a clarifying comment on this post.

I’d like to offer a series of posts on the particular challenges for interpreting the major narrative sections in the Bible.  Today, the Old Testament.  In parts 2 and 3, the Gospels.  Then in part 4, Acts.

There are many challenges when interpreting Old Testament narrative passages.  These include the greater distance between the story and today (culturally, linguistically, historically) and the simple fact that we tend to lack a broad understanding of the sweep of Old Testament history.  However, the greatest challenge I see is:

Accurately grasping the enduring theological truth of a story.

This is a major challenge.  After all, we are not preaching a story about Jacob to his twelve sons.  A lot has changed since the story was written.  We have to wrestle with matters of continuity and discontinuity:

1. There are significant elements of discontinuity between the Old Testament and now.  Early OT narratives occur pre-Sinai, or pre-exile.  All OT narratives occur before the first coming of Christ, before the cross, before the resurrection, before Pentecost, before the founding and growth of the church.  The characters had less of the Bible to know and trust, they had a different relationship to the Holy Spirit than we do, their perspective on the world and history was different.  Whatever label you put on it, some things have changed.

2. There are some critical elements of continuity too. I’d like to mention two key elements of continuity.  Having taken into account all that has changed between those times and these times, some things don’t change.  Human nature doesn’t change.  God’s character doesn’t change.  While so much may be different, we continue to face the same two paths before us as the biblical characters faced: the path of trusting God, and the path of unbelief.

All Scripture is not written directly to us, or even to people whose situation was the same as ours.  But all Scripture is useful, applicable, relevant.  It’s our challenge as preachers to figure out how.

Don’t Undermine Trust

/ Peter Mead / 2 Comments

NOTE – Peter has replied to helpful comment on this post.

Different versions translate some things in slightly different ways.  One version says “healed” where another says “saved.”  Sometimes a footnote points out an alternative reading to the one in the text, but other versions choose the alternative reading.  What do we do when we are preaching a text with a textual variant in it?

1. Recognize that the listeners may be using different versions. This means that it might be worth a brief passing comment that “your version may have it this way…”  Generally it is probably better to affirm both as possible, or express a preference for one over the other in a gracious manner that does not tear down the alternative.

2. Recognize that your listeners are not experts in textual criticism. (Incidentally, be honest with yourself too.  Just because you can pronounce a Greek word in a dictionary does not mean you are a Greek scholar.)  So we should be very hesitant to overwhelm people with textual critical issues.  In reality, most of the time this will achieve a double goal.  First it may show how much work you’ve done, what skill you have or perhaps add confidence in your understanding of the passage.  More importantly, second of all it almost certainly will undermine their trust in their own Bibles.  People don’t understand how their version came to exist, they don’t grasp the process from inspiration to translation, and so your textual critical observation may very well cause them to distrust their Bible.  “If my version is wrong in this verse, why should I trust it anywhere else?”

3. Do your work in preparation, but think carefully what you say while preaching. The last thing we want to do is inadvertently undermine peoples’ trust in the Bible sitting open in their lap!

Preaching One Text – Part II

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Yesterday I addressed why it is generally best to preach on a single text.  Today I’d like to address a possible misunderstanding that might result from this suggestion:

This emphasis on preaching a single text does not mean that I advocate preaching biblically naive or theologically unaware messages.  To really understand a particular passage usually requires us to study (or at least be aware of) other passages that feed into it.  For instance, can we grasp what is going on with the marriage issues in Ezra/Nehemiah without being thoroughly informed by the Torah?  Can we understand the prophets as they seek to enforce the covenant if our awareness of that covenant in Deuteronomy is lacking?  Can we grasp New Testament teaching built on Old Testament paradigms if our Old Testament pages remain clean and stuck together?  Walter Kaiser speaks of the “informing theology” of a passage.  We must be careful not to miss critical elements for understanding our preaching text when those elements are recorded earlier in the Bible.

Having studied to the full extent of our resources (time and skill), we then need to consider what our listeners actually need to hear.  A sermon should not be an information dump in which every detail of our exegesis is piled onto the ears of our listeners.  Perhaps no “informing theology” is necessary to communicate this passage.  Perhaps only a brief summary will do.  Sometimes we need to have them turn the pages and see it for themselves.   We must do everything we can to fully understand the passage, but remember that all our work cannot be squeezed into the minutes available for preaching, or squeezed into the minds and hearts of our listeners.  We study at length, then cut out everything unnecessary for preaching the main point of the message.

We may preach one passage, but let us not preach biblically naive or theologically unaware messages.

Preaching One Text

/ Peter Mead / 1 Comment

I emphasize the need to preach a single text in most sermons.  There are exceptions, but generally one text is the way to go.  I want to be clear why I make this suggestion (today) and address a possible misunderstanding (tomorrow).

I strongly suggest preaching on one text most of the time, because it is so easy to scratch the surface of a passage and yet fail to preach the text.  Multiplying texts only multiplies the likelihood of missing the point and failing to really preach the text at all.  It takes a lot of work to wrestle with a text and have a text wrestle with you.  It takes a lot of prayerful thought to engage with historical and written context, to recognize rhetorical structure, to analyze each detail of content, to ascertain authorial intent (purpose as well as meaning) and to synthesize the core idea of a passage.  I don’t think I’m being lazy when I suggest taking multiple passages multiplies the workload beyond what most of us can bear (if we are to really preach rather than scratch the surface, or scratch some itchy ears).

Beware Special Revelation Preaching

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I need to be careful how I phrase this post.  Depending on our theology, we all have slightly differing views of how much God directly communicates with us.  Some are very hesitant to hint that God “spoke” to them, while others freely assign such labels that give the impression of a hotline from heaven.  I don’t intend to weigh in on the issues of guidance or prophecy, etc.  My concern is with biblical preaching.

We need to be careful that we don’t undermine our approach to preaching by means of a “special revelation” approach to sermon preparation.  The process is fairly simple to explain: you spend time prayerfully considering the text and the occasion until you sense that God has “given you something to say.”  Then you preach that.  I am not dismissing this approach out of hand, but I do want to raise some warning flags.  First though, let me affirm the intent in this approach:

Affirmed – The desire to say what God is saying. This should be the desire of every true preacher.  We want to say what God wants us to say, nothing else.

Affirmed – The reliance on God through prayer. May we never advocate or practice prayerless preaching.

Affirmed – The desire for contemporary relevance.

However . . .

Warning Flag – There is an inherent risk that the text God inspired will be abused as merely a point of departure for other thoughts, which may or may not be from Him.

Warning Flag – The process can be a shortcut taken to avoid the prayerful work of understanding the passage and planning how to best present the truth found there.  (Perhaps also a safety measure to avoid feeling personal inadequacy in the area of Bible study, preaching, etc.  It is better to bring our inadequacy to God, rather than finding ways to avoid the issue.)

Warning Flag – This approach can undermine the congregation’s view of the Bible. It fails to demonstrate that when the Bible is understood properly, God is speaking.  It gives the impression that we need something new and fresh, rather than the “old stuff” in the Bible.  A truly dangerous impression to give.

The reality is that we can and must commit to prayerful study of the Bible in order to understand its meaning and then present that meaning emphasizing its relevance for our listeners on a particular occasion.  Perhaps Don Sunukjian’s simple definition of expository preaching is a good place to end – “Listen to what God is saying . . . to us!”

Shifting from Passage to Message – Idea

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Two days ago we considered the move from passage to message in relation to the purpose statement.  Now let’s look at the other core move at the apex of the process, the move from passage idea to message idea.

Many rightly point out that really there are three steps.  To use some Haddon Robinson terminology, you begin by finding the exegetical idea (back then), then move that to a theological idea (timeless), before finally making the move to homiletical idea (contextualized for these people now).  This is absolutely right.  By simplifying the process I do not discount these steps.

The move to message idea involves several elements:

Recognize and remove historical markers – The passage idea should really be historically specific – Paul told Timothy that in the Ephesian church such and such should occur.  Details like Paul, Timothy, Ephesus, etc. are all historical.  The first step is to recognize these and remove them from the idea.  At this point the resulting half-way idea is really the theological idea in the three step process described above.  This will need testing.  Is the idea representative of the timeless teaching of the passage?  If not, adjustment will need to be made.  As ever, application is a minefield and so you should tread carefully – is this the lasting main point of the passage?

In a sense this first move is a negative one, removing historically specific ties.  Now there are two positive moves:

Take into account audience analysis and adjust the idea – Since the message idea is supposed to be specific to these listeners, how can the idea be contemporized in a manner that will register with them and be memorable to them?  This may be pithy, clever, contemporary, etc.  Often the best you will manage will be biblically accurate and relatively clear – don’t despise biblical and clear!

Consider the message purpose and adjust accordingly – The audience analysis and message purpose are both influences in the positive adjustment of the idea.  The passage idea and purpose may be rebuking in nature, but your message purpose may not be rebuking in light of the need of the listeners (my mind goes to the person who rebuked a meeting of hyper-faithful elderly ladies with Ezekiel 34 – evil shepherds of Israel!)  So the message purpose and tone influence the idea statement.

With these three considerations, you move from passage idea to message idea.  It may be that the result is exactly the same (biblical timeless truth preached in the terms of the text).  It may be that the result is different (but not so different: given the idea, someone who knows the Bible should be able to recognize which text it is representing!)

A formula for the engineers?  (Stage 4 minus historical markers)+Audience Analysis Adjustment+Stage 5 adjustment = Stage 6!

Most Important Element in Introduction?

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We’ve considered the various elements of an introduction before. The need to grab attention, build communication rapport, surface a need, move listeners into the text and the message. I’d like to underline the one that is probably neglected more than the others, yet it is the one we should never forget.

Another way of thinking about the “surface need” element of the introduction is to call it relevance. In the introduction, as a listener, I want to know …

This speaker is relevant to me. I don’t want to listen to somebody that is out of touch with the real world. Please give me confidence that you are a relevant speaker.

This message is relevant to me. If I am a normal listener, I have not come to church excited for a historical lecture. Please give me confidence that this message will be relevant to my life. If you leave application and relevance until the end of the message (traditional approach) then I may well miss it (to be absent from the body may not mean being present with the Lord, if you see what I mean?)

This passage is relevant to me. I would be thrilled to open up my Bible with expectation and motivation, hungry to understand it and be changed by it. As the preacher you need to create that motivation during your introduction.

Relevance in the introduction really is a great ingredient!

Necessary and Possible

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In simple terms, how much of a message should be spent on explaining the passage, and how much should be spent on applying it?

Spend as much time as necessary explaining the passage. If you don’t explain the passage, your application will lack authority.  People need to understand the meaning of the passage, they need to see how the details of the text work together to convey the main point.  They need to see how it fits in the flow of the section.  They need to have confidence that any application you present is built firmly on the teaching of the passage.

Spend as much time as possible applying the passage. Once people understand the meaning of the passage, they need to see how it relates to their life.  In fact, don’t fall into the trap of explaining and then applying as two sequential elements in the sermon.  Certainly application will show up at the end and be significant in the conclusion, but it should also present itself right at the start, in the introduction, in the wording of the main idea and in the phrasing of the main points of the message.  However, proportionately, this guideline is important to bear in mind – give as much application as possible.

Don’t reverse these guidelines! It is easy to get this backwards and end up giving as much explanation as possible.  After all, you may have spent hours digging in the text.  You were excited by all that you learnt.  You enjoy Bible study.  Therefore it is easy to make a sermon an exegetical information dump.  Don’t.  Select carefully and give what is necessary, but don’t over-prove, don’t overwhelm.  Make sure you never skimp on connecting the truth of God’s Word into the nitty gritty of real life.

Simple guidelines, but I find them helpful.