To Preach a Book: Analyzing
Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.
~ 2 Timothy 4:2
He pulled a VHS tape from the shelf and put it in the player. I can’t remember the name of the movie. I want to say it had the word “ninja” in it. It was a low budget action flick with a rice paper thin plot that was mostly an excuse to string together a bunch of martial arts fight scenes. I had seen some of the old, overdubbed Kung Fu pictures and always enjoyed the action. I don’t remember much about it, but I’m sure it was every bit as cheesy as it seems it would be.
We began watching, me for the first time and my friend for the nth time. He really liked the movie and had watched it over and over for who knows how long. Seeing it repeatedly had not dulled his enjoyment of it, but it had sharpened his perception of it. As it played, he added bits of commentary. Many of his comments were pointing out discontinuities in the film. At different points in the same scene there would be differences in the actors involved, costumes, props, etc. Of course, I hadn’t noticed it until he pointed it out.
I’m sure he hadn’t sat down with a clipboard and deliberately analyzed this straight to VHS movie. He had watched it so many times he began to notice these problems. I’m sure, after he had noticed a few, he began to look for them more consciously. While I wouldn’t recommend investing time in analyzing low budget actions flicks from the 80s, the act of repeated viewing, or reading in our case, is necessary to analyze any work.
Repetition
Before I am ready to begin working on a passage or a sermon, I have to analyze the book and identify aspects of it that will help me find the overall controlling theme. Repeated readings are necessary, but it helps if I have some idea of what I’m looking for.
I chose the book of Ruth, so I immediately know the biblical genre of the book. It’s an Old Testament book and that means it is one of four main genres—law, history, poetry/wisdom, or prophets. Ruth is a book of history, but what kind of a book of history? I am ready to start reading.
On the first round of readings, I am not deliberately trying to notice anything. I want to read the whole book in one sitting, mainly to get a feel for the story. I may notice something or think of some questions in these readings. If so, I will write it down and go on reading. I’m not ready at this point to start researching and investigating. I first read Ruth in the KJV. I preach from the KJV and it is the translation I have predominantly used and am most familiar with.
I also read the book in other translations. Every reading helps me see the book as a whole. Different translations help me see it differently. The KJV was translated into very early modern English and uses archaic words and idioms. I sometimes assume I know what a word or expression means, when further study shows me I wasn’t right. I read the book of Ruth in the CJB, NASB, ESV, and NIV translations. I may like or dislike what a translation says. I may agree or not, but they are like first order commentaries on the text because they are what various scholars believe the original words to mean. I also read Robert Alter’s translation of Ruth in his collection titled, Strong As Death Is Love.
These readings were helpful in getting the big picture of the book in mind. I didn’t notice anything major among the translations that warranted further study. I’m likely to come across some translational issues as I do the deeper, line level study of the book, but I’m still not there yet. I am now ready for the next step.
Divisions
Earlier, I asked what kind of historical book Ruth is? Several readings confirmed that Ruth is one story and not a collection of stories, like Judges for instance. If I were classifying the book of Judges, I might call it episodic history. All the events in Ruth are connected and interdependent as one leads to the next from the beginning to the end, so Ruth is one story.
I am realizing as I try to describe my process, I am explaining some things I’ve never tried to explain to anyone before. I am using and going to use a bit of shop talk that I will try to explain. We should’ve learned much of this in high school literature class. Maybe we did, but have forgotten it. I may need to spend some time working on terms I use. There are various methods of literary analysis and I’ve noticed a number of terms that are inconsistent among different uses. I will try to explain the terms and the way I am using them as I go.
What do I mean when I say Ruth is a story? I am referring to the form of the book and not whether it is fiction or nonfiction. In Aristotle’s Poetics, he defined a story as a narrative that has beginning, middle, and end. He arrived at this conclusion from analyzing ancient stories to his day. He meant that a story is unified and cohesive, leading to a resolution. The beginning starts the story, giving an opening image that gets out of balance in some way and leads to the middle. The middle continues the story as resolution of the imbalance is sought and leads to the end. The end is the resolution where the imbalance is overcome and the closing image of the story is typically a reverse, or mirror image of the opening. Ruth definitely fits this description.
At this point, I need to start dividing up the text of the book. I am not referring to preaching units at this point. I am analyzing the story, so I want to divide the book into the different scenes of the story. A scene is a smaller unit of the larger story. Just as the whole story has beginning, middle, and end, scenes also have beginning, middle, and end. A scene has an opening image and inciting action that causes change leading to a resolution of the scene. I am looking for the smallest unit of the story, which satisfies that description.
I started this process for Ruth by taking the Word document of the AV text of the book and removing all chapter numbers, verse numbers, and spacing. I ended up with a document of the text of the whole book that looks like one long paragraph. You can find that file here. I printed the file on a single sheet of 11×17 paper. In this case, the book is short and I could fit the entire text on the front of an 11×17 sheet.
I took that sheet and read the text over and over and over again. I don’t know how many times, but it was certainly several times. I read and looked for scenes and began marking the text up to identify the scenes and the components that made up the scenes. Here is what that sheet looked like when I was done. You can click on the thumbnail to enlarge it.
I identified six scenes that satisfied the beginning, middle, and end form of story. You will notice the marks and notes I put on that sheet. I will explain those later, but for now I want to talk about finding the controlling theme. During this process, I identified the controlling theme as finding rest, and noted that in the upper right hand margin. I circled the word rest twice in the text. It actually occurs a third time, but I didn’t realize the significance of that third occurrence until later.
In the AV text, the word rest occurs three times (Ruth 1:9; 3:1, 18). Each time, the Hebrew word is different. The two main occurrences (Ruth 1:9; 3:1) capture the concept of rest as what is found in the home of a husband—love, peace, security, abundance of provision, continuing life through children and grandchildren, etc. The ideal of rest is present throughout the entire book and works on the different levels of want and need for the main characters. I will explain more about that later.
I have a lot to work with as I move forward in studying the book. I don’t consider my initial decisions to be final. They will need to be tested and refined as I continue to work through the book. I realize I could open up commentaries and other books on Ruth and get all this already broken down for me. At this point in the study, I haven’t opened any of those books and it will be a while before I am ready for them. First, I need to know what I think and understand about the book before I ever hear what others think about it. Second, you will notice when you read some different commentaries and books that they don’t all agree on how to break a book down or even on what the primary message of the book is. I will refer to other books as a check on my work later, but I’m not ready for that at this point.
Up Next
In the next post, I will write more about the scenes and how I divided those up.
This post is part a of series. To read the entire series from the beginning, go here.
To Preach a Book: Preparing
Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.
~ 2 Timothy 4:2
Most of the instructions that come with the flat pieces and little bags of hardware advise the assembler to first layout and identify all the pieces to ensure you have everything you need. We never do that, of course. We dive in and put it together halfway and then realize we’ve got it wrong, or that we are missing something. I’ve done it before and will probably do it again.
Selecting the book I’m going to preach through is the crucial first step, but I’m still not ready to start studying the text and preparing sermons. I like to follow the assembly instructions and make sure I have all the bits and pieces I’m going to need to get through this book from beginning to end. I’m trying to make this list as complete as I can.
Over time, I have gathered a library and have a number of resources I go to repeatedly. Some of these are hard copies and some are digital. I will not get to all of them over the course of the study. Some I will read very little and some will be read entirely when preaching through a book. I like to have more available than I’m going to need and you never know when you may come across something requiring a great deal of study and you want to have the best resources available you can.
Books
Books are the preacher’s business. Ebooks have their benefits and uses, as do hard copies. I have and use some of both. Some books are also part of Bible study apps. I will talk about these technologies later, which have more to do with utilization. Here I am more concerned with the content of books. I want to layout books in several different categories to help in preaching through a book of the Bible.
Study Bibles
I have a large number of study Bibles, so this is a good place to provide a disclaimer that holds good for the rest of the lists. I am not going to list every book I own, but rather those I am most likely to use, whether seldom or frequently, in the course of this study. I may end up using a book while studying Ruth that I did not anticipate and so it is not on the list. If that happens, the book will most likely be mentioned in a later post.
Study Bibles typically have articles or notes on the text of the book, an outline of the book, and an introduction to the book noting author, date, themes, etc. Study Bibles can be general or have some focused perspective, e.g., biblical theology. I like to have a range of these. I mostly use these for the book introductions. Here are the study Bibles for Ruth, in no particular order.
The MacArthur Study Bible
A general study Bible with brief notes on the text and good book introductions.
The Complete Jewish Study Bible
A study Bible which focuses on Jewish custom and tradition.
The Gospel Transformation Study Bible
A study Bible that focuses on the gospel in each book of the Bible.
The Biblical Theology Study Bible
A study Bible focusing on the biblical theology of the books that connects to the overarching redemptive story of Scripture as a whole.
The Literary Study Bible
A study Bible focusing on literary analysis of the Bible books, which includes information on genre, literary motifs, rhetorical devices, and contribution to the master story of the Bible.
The NET Bible Full Notes
A Bible with extensive translation notes, including translation decisions, meaning, and usage.
Commentaries
Commentaries vary widely in their format, style, and depth, and, therefore, their usefulness. I haven’t found much help from commentaries that are mostly formatted sermon manuscripts. Commentaries are not infallible, but I use commentaries to help check my work.
Expositional commentaries can be helpful is discerning if I have captured the main point of a passage, or if I have missed something important. I use exegetical commentaries to check for information on original languages, nuance of meanings, or translational issues that may need further investigation. I refer to theological commentaries to check for themes in a passage and connections with other texts and themes. I use literary commentaries to check on genre specific structures, motifs, and themes. I use practical commentaries to check applications and bridges from the text to today.
There is no one commentary that does it all, but often a single commentary will actually cover several of those areas. Of course, I want to work through these issues with the passage for myself before referring to commentaries to help check my work. Here are the commentaries I have laid out for Ruth, in no particular order.
The Story of God Bible Commentary—Ruth and Esther
If you follow the link, you will notice this volume is not available yet, so I don’t have it. I include it because I would definitely have it and use it if it were available. I have some of these commentaries and really like what I have used so far. The commentary focuses on overarching redemptive history and placing books and their passages within that framework.
Zondervan Exegetical Commentary—Ruth
I have used other commentaries in this series and found them helpful. I was surprised by how extensive this commentary is on Ruth. The single volume is around 300 pages. This commentary covers literary structure, language, themes, theology, and application.
New American Commentary—Judges, Ruth
I haven’t used any commentaries from this series yet. This was written by Daniel Block, who also wrote the Zondervan Exegetical Commentary above. The NAC is laid out quite differently from the ZEC and seems to have a different focus. I’m not sure how much I will use it, but it’s available.
Teach the Text Commentary—Judges and Ruth
I haven’t used any of this series before now. This commentary focuses on big picture themes and ideas in the text and presents historical and cultural background information. It also includes sections for each unit in the book on teaching and illustrating the text.
The NIV Application Commentary—Judges, Ruth
I have used other volumes in this series and really like these commentaries. It is a good blend of exposition, literary, and theological commentary. Each section ends with application and bridging contexts.
The MacArthur Bible Commentary
This is a single volume commentary of the whole Bible. It doesn’t necessarily have comments on every verse. The comments are brief and useful.
New Bible Commentary
This is another single volume commentary on the whole Bible. It doesn’t go verse by verse, but rather section by section. The comments are brief but helpful.
Dictionaries
General Bible dictionaries can be handy for looking up names, places, and terms. I have a bunch of them and most of them are in the Bible study apps I use. I’m not going to list them individually, but if I refer to one and find it useful, I will mention that in a later post. I also use language dictionaries for help with the original languages. Here are those that I have laid out for Ruth.
Strong’s Concordance & Vines Expository Dictionary
These are usually readily available for free in various digital formats. Strong’s give root definitions and Vine’s gives definitions and distinguishes for usage.
Brown Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon
Lexical definitions and usage information.
Englishman’s Hebrew Concordance of the Old Testament
This is keyed to the Strong’s numbers and shows every verse where the Hebrew word occurs, regardless of how it is translated.
Mounce’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words
More up to date than Strong’s.
Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament
Articles explaining the meaning and usage of different words.
The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament
This was originally published in a five volume set. It is a more up to date lexicon, which also covers the Aramaic. It has in-depth articles on meaning and usage.
Overviews
These are books that are treatments of the biblical book as a whole. This would include book introductions. I use these most in the early part of the study. Here are the books I have laid out for Ruth.
The MacArthur Bible Handbook
This is a book by book survey of the whole Bible that gives an introduction and overview of each book in a few pages. It is concise but typically covers the author, date of writing, background, setting, historical and theological themes, a section on the Christology of the book, an outline, and ends with answering a number of challenging questions about the book.
Old Testament Survey
This is a book by book survey with literary and narrative analysis and a focus on canonical context.
The Message of the Old Testament
This book is sermons preached on each book of the Old Testament. It is a brief introduction and overview of each book. This is a case where printed sermons are helpful. The beginning, after the opening illustration, and ending of the sermons are what I found most helpful. The book focuses on the big picture and is also helpful on practical applications of the book as a whole.
Theologies
These are books that generally do not provide verse by verse commentary but focus more on the theology taught in the book, whether systematic or biblical. Sometimes they are laid out to go section by section and sometime they are laid out to go more topically in a thematic arrangement. I tend to use these more in the early part of the study. Here are the books I have laid out for Ruth.
The Theology of the Book of Ruth
This book focuses on certain words and themes to connect Ruth with other historical narratives and reveal the theological message of the book.
From Famine to Fullness
This book focuses on the Gospel and Gospel implications in the book through focusing on major themes in the book of Ruth.
Unceasing Kindness
This is a biblical theology treatment of Ruth. It seeks to read Ruth in the wider context of Scripture and trace big picture themes such as redemption, famine, and covenant kindness (hesed).
God’s Glory in Salvation Through Judgment
This books go through each book of the Bible and focuses on the biblical theology of the books, which connects them together in the overarching story of the Bible.
He Will Reign Forever
This book goes through the Bible from beginning to end to trace the theme of Christ’s kingdom. Some books are covered in greater detail than others.
Special Issues
Each book of the Bible has special issues attached to it. These may be controversial issues, cultural issues, theological issues, etc. If you dig much into resources for the book of Ruth, you will find issues such as postmodern interpretations of the book as a feminist or minority/foreigner polemic. Our own ministry context will help us discern how much we need to speak to such issues.
There are perennial issues we do need to study. The book of Ruth is a part of the history of Israel and particularly during the period of the judges. Aspects of Old Covenant law are crucial to the book, such as the law of redemption, levirate marriage, inheritance, and gleaning. These are important issues in the book and though they will probably be touched on in the commentaries and such, they will probably require further study. Here are the books I have laid out for Ruth.
Leviticus
Commentary on Leviticus with helpful comments on the law.
Deuteronomy
Commentary on Deuteronomy with helpful explanations of the law.
Institutes of Biblical Law
Three volume work on the Old Covenant law more extensive than the commentaries. Rushdoony was a scholar and he was also a covenant theologian and postmill reconstructionist. His explanations of the law in its original context are clear and helpful, but you obviously need to be careful with his contemporary application.
Digital Tools
If you are a young preacher and not computer literate, you need to invest the time to get literate. Digital tools save time and help organize your study. They can also help to build an easily searchable library of your own work for future use. I started out by hand but quickly transitioned to digital and am only glad I did. Today we have various devices and can have apps that sync across all those devices. I realize technologies can present their own problems, but if we discipline ourselves to use them well, they can be a tremendous blessing
I use a Kindle reader as well as the Kindle app on my phone and computer. You can truly have a library in your pocket and with you all the time. The portability means you can read in those little snatches of time while you’re waiting on the doctor or your wife, or something else. You can highlight and make notes in the app and have them sync across all devices. I always have the Kindle app open on my computer when I am studying. The app also gives you the ability to search the text of the books. The vast majority of books I have on Kindle were either free or less than $3.
I use three different Bible apps for studying. Each has its own strengths and weaknesses. I primarily use Olive Tree with numerous resources I’ve added through the years when they were on a good sale. I use e-Sword with a host of free resources I download from the web. I also use Logos, but that is mainly for commentaries and books I got for free for the app. All those apps can be downloaded for free and come with varying free resources.
I use Microsoft Office apps and have for many years. There are alternatives out there, but I haven’t used very many of them. I use Excel spreadsheets for making charts and otherwise organizing information. I don’t use Word a whole lot, but I probably like outlining on Word the best.
I also use Evernote, which has a host of capabilities I don’t use. I primarily use this app to clip articles from the web I want to save. The app syncs across all devices and is very handy.
My primary sermon writing app is Scrivener. This app was developed first as a novel writing app, but it has expanded through the years to be useful for any sort of long form writing. In the app you can create documents and drag and drop them to rearrange them how you want. The app has a research folder for storing notes, articles, outlines, or whatever you want. You can also attach notes to a document that stay with it but don’t print out unless you choose to do so. All my digital papers are in one place in this app. I have a project entitled Ruth. I have various study notes and relevant documents in there along with my sermon notes I will print and take to the pulpit. Everything for Ruth is there in one app. It has a word processor, but it is much more than a word processor. It does have a fairly steep learning curve, but I have considered it well worth the time.
Analog Tools
For all my commending of technology, I still work with analog tools to accomplish my study. I use a blend of both. For marking up, scratching down notes, and so on I find nothing beats a pencil and paper. A lot of what ends up in the digital documents I produce during the course of studying a book starts out as furious markings and scribblings on paper closely approximating the copywork of a pre-kindergartener.
I have been using Scripture Journals for a while in the study of books I’m preaching. These journals are 5.75×8 with a lay-flat binding and flexible card stock covers. One page has the biblical text and the facing page is a ruled blank page for notes. There is also marginal space on the text pages for notes as well. As I study a book, I will use this journal through the whole process. I will underline, circle, bracket, draw arrows, and write notes during the whole process. These are very handy for keeping notes in one place that is tied to specific verses. As I read books or commentaries, I will make notes. As I study the passage I’m going to preach, I will make notes. These journals have become indispensable to me and an improvement over my old system of printed or copied Bible pages for this purpose.
I still use printable Bible pages, but for a different purpose than I use those journals. I have a printable Word document for each book of the Bible. You can find the one for Ruth here. That document will actually be my starting point, which we will get to in another post. Sermon Audio also offers PDF files of their Paperback Bible you can download and print. It is a similar layout as the Scripture Journal, but it is loose-leaf. The biblical text is on the facing pages and there is a wide outside margin that is ruled for notes. You can find those here.
Last of all, I need pens, pencils, highlighters, and paper. This is a long post, so I will make this short. You need to find what is serviceable for you and cheap. You want to avoid preciousness, because you actually need to use these supplies. You can spend a lot of money for fancy pens and paper, but those resources have so much preciousness that you don’t want to waste them and you’re inhibited from the free marking you need to do. If you’re going to write full sermon manuscripts by hand, then you need better pens and paper. If you’re going to think on paper, mark, and scribble, you need cheap stuff that works.
Up Next
In the next post, I will get to the actual beginning of the study to preach through a book.
This post is part of series. To read the entire series from the beginning, go here.
The School for Fantastical Interpretation
For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little:
~ Isaiah 28:10
Limited time offer
Preacher, are you feeling blue? Do your sermons lack a certain spark? Are you preaching, but not wowing the crowds and holding them in awe? Are you passed over for the best spots at the conferences? Do the remarks you get after your sermons feel mostly like sympathy? Well, today is your day.Announcing: The School for Fantastical Interpretation (TSFFI). We’ve all been there in the pew as the preacher read his text, which seemed to be a straightforward passage with nothing fresh or new in it. However, by the time he finished, the crowd was spellbound and afterward you could hear many exclamations of wonder at how a passage could have been read hundreds of times but those readers never saw what that preacher found in it. How did he do that? Is it a special gift only few are blessed with? Or, is it a skill that any preacher could learn?
You’ve seen a text become clay in the hands of a master sculptor and been amazed at what he could fashion from it. You’ve probably been exasperated after you’ve tried and failed to reproduce his effects. Now, for the first time ever, the curtain is being pulled back and preachers can learn the skills of fantastical interpretation of the Bible. I know the questions you have. How much? How long? And, where do I sign up? Patience, my friend. Remember that Isaiah said, “he that believeth shall not make haste” (Isaiah 28:16). Everything is a hustle and bustle in the world today.
I’m willing to give away for free this preview of TSFFI. This is a sample of the valuable lessons you will receive. While I cannot guarantee individual results, I do guarantee you will be introduced to the tools you need. After that, it’s all up to you. Let’s listen in on a class already in progress. This class is Foundations for Fantastical Interpretation.
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Be a Mentee
Extremely rare are the birds that can soar to the greatest heights apart from some help. Before the dove could pluck the olive branch and return to the ark, Noah had to open the window and let it out. Preachers need to learn at the feet of masters, especially when it comes to the skills of fantastical interpretation. Ideally, you will find a living master of the art who will take you as an apprentice and let you in on all his trade secrets. I have to admit this would be a rare opportunity and not one you can count on. What’s the next best option?
You can sit at the masters’ feet in different ways. For one, you need only to identify such a preacher and then listen to his sermons or read his writings repeatedly. After a while, you will pick up some clues as to how he does what he does. Obviously, taking this course will greatly aid you in this pursuit, but you also must not neglect the fantastical interpreters of yesterday. Read their writings and study their methods closely. You can learn much from them. For example, you can read the wealth of writings left behind by A. W. Pink, especially his earlier writings and the Gleanings series. He was peculiarly adept at finding types and figures under every rock and bush. Granted, you cannot expect to equal his effects, but imitation will bring you a long way.
Build Imagination
Many preachers fall into the trap of merely taking the text at what it says, as though the Bible were written to be sufficiently understandable. That is fine if you want to remain among the lower ranks who take the easier road of preaching, but if you want to ascend, you need to fuel your creative fires. For instance, if you assume the tree Elijah sat under merely refers to a particular type of tree with roots, trunk, branches, and leaves, you are not thinking fantastically. You need to let go of and let your mind wander to see what you can come up with. Sometimes you need to let go of your conscious thoughts and see what comes.
In fact, to stoke your imagination, you need to practice in passages that provide pluckable produce for fantastical interpretation. It’s harder going in some passages than others, so you want to focus on the easier places as you’re starting out. Parables are a productive playground for the imagination. The Old Testament stories and poetry sections are ready made for fantastical interpretation, and just wait until you get to the prophets.
Here’s an exercise to work on and turn in next class. Find a passage in the Bible that mentions something relevant to a wedding. It can be in the Old or New Testament. It can be an historical narrative or a parable or whatever you choose. Think about all the weddings you’ve been to or seen. Don’t be afraid to supplement your knowledge by learning about wedding customs in different cultures and times. Unleash your imagination and see what symbols, types, figures, and representations you can come up with. How many connections to various doctrines can you find?
Be Obsessive
You may struggle with that exercise because you’re not used to thinking that way. You read “stone” in the text and your mind thinks, “stone,” or “rock,” or some igneous mass. Don’t despair. You just need to train your mind in fantastical interpretation. You have to learn to be obsessive over particular points. If you get your mind always thinking about a few things, you will start seeing them everywhere. At first you will be seeing analogies, but stay at it and you will soon be seeing pictures, symbols, and types all over the Bible. The weeds around Jonah’s head will become a crown of thorns. The food and drink David gave the Egyptian in the field will become communion. The widow of Zarephath will become the faithful church in the last days. The nation of Israel will become the church today.
You get the idea. Once your mind has been trained to obsess over a few things, you will be able to find proof texts and pictures where people never thought to look. As your skill increases, you will be able to do this in harder and more obscure passages. You will preach to much greater effect.
Build Reinforcement
Care must be taken lest some become skeptical. There are always naysayers who will object to fantastical interpretation. They see it as taking liberties and complain about white spaces and filling in the blanks. Sadly, you will never convince some and you don’t want to expend too much energy on the recalcitrant. You have to let it roll off you and realize it’s better to head off these kinds of objections and build reinforcements into your messages ahead of time. How do you do that?
Don’t get lost in the pictures and symbols and such. You need to remind people often that you’re preaching the truth and preaching the Bible. A bold choice here is to tell them if they don’t like what you’re preaching, they can take it up with God because you didn’t write the Bible. Remind them fairly often that you are preaching like Isaiah said it must be done: “For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little” (Isaiah 28:10). It’s extremely important to talk about context often, not the actual context of the passage, but rather saying the word context often. You can change it up at times by referring to people critically who take things out of context. Keep a stock of informative words handy and insert them into your sermons at opportune moments: exegesis, exposition, expository, context, truth, doctrine, etc.
Optionally, you can occasionally remind them they are hearing good preaching. But I must warn you: that is an extremely difficult move to pull off. Even the most generous crowd can easily interpret that move as self-serving on the part of the preacher. Yes, some few get away with it, but TSFFI thinks it’s best avoided. If all else fails to remove you from a jam, remember to explain that you’re not being dogmatic. That’s the get-out-of-jail-free card. Keep it up your sleeve for such a time as this.
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Conclusion
Let me break back in now. I hope you’ve enjoyed this generous preview of TSFFI. Your appetite has been whetted. Your curiosity has been piqued. You have questions. How much? How long does it take? Where do I sign up? Friend, can you really put a price on learning skills generally seen only among the elite? Can you really measure time in months or years for acquiring abilities you never before thought possible? As far as signing up, as they say in the show business, stay tuned.
If you’re interested in this topic, you should also read and learn about the Cheap Liquidator.
Preaching in the Can
Meditate upon these things; give thyself wholly to them; that thy profiting may appear unto all.
~ 1 Timothy 4:15
Absolutely no selling involved …
What if I told you I could tell you how to turn $100 into $310,867.82? You might be suspicious. I assure you it can be done, and is done more often than you think. Yes, it is completely legal and ethical. It doesn’t even involve ocean front property or bridges. It’s actually pretty simple.Interested? I have two words for you: compound interest. Simply put, compound interest is the way investments grow at an increasing rate. If you invest $100 every month for forty straight years at 8% interest compounded annually, you will have $310,867.82. However, if you bank $100 every month for 40 years in a standard savings account earning 2.25% interest, you will have $77,880.75. That’s a nice little sum. You will have put $48,000 of your own in during that time and received a profit of $29,880.75, but it is considerably less than the investments. If you stuff a Benjamin Franklin every month into a coffee can for forty straight years, you will only have $48,000. Forty-eight large is nothing to sneeze at, but that is a difference of $262,867.82 less than from investing, and that’s the beauty of compound interest. It multiplies your effort.
Preaching Investments
Paul told Timothy that his profit in the ministry should be obvious (1 Timothy 4:15). Paul wasn’t referring to his financial portfolio. Jesus used the pictures of financial investments and profits to portray the gains that should be made in service while we wait for the kingdom in the Parable of the Ten Minas (Luke 19:11-27). Two servants invested wisely and made a profit (Luke 19:15-19). One servant followed the coffee can plan and offered back the original capital. He was chided for not at least putting the money in a savings account, or CD, and at least earning some return (Luke 19:20-23).
As preachers, our pulpit ministry, and all that is involved in it, is being invested in some way and our gains are made according to the method of investment. If your preaching is a scattershot, random string of one-off sermons, your profit will approximate the profit with the coffee can plan. Over 40 years of preaching, you will have preached a handful of sermons about angels, various sermons on prayer, recurring sermons on tithing and church attendance, some parables, some miracles, a bunch of the life of Bible character sermons, various doctrinal topics, a bunch of repeats, etc. You will have done some good for those you’ve ministered to and will have grown yourself in some small ways over such a length of time.
If your preaching follows a more topical expository method, your profit will be akin to the savings account or high-yield CD. Over 40 years you will have produced a sermon catalog of numerous series of expositions of lengthy passages. You will likely have preached through Genesis chapters 1-3, the ten commandments, the life of David, numerous Psalms, the Sermon on the Mount, the Upper Room Discourse, some short books like Jonah and some epistles, chapter by chapter through Romans, etc. You will have covered an array of biblical doctrines and preached passages from different genres of Scripture. You will have done good for those you’ve preached to and you will have grown yourself from your studies all those years.
If you are committed to expositional preaching through whole books of the Bible, your profit will be more like the compound interest from smart investing. If you are very disciplined, over 40 years of preaching at least twice every week and covering at least 7.5 verses per sermon, you could actually preach every verse in the Bible. That probably won’t be your approach, but you could certainly preach most of the books of the Bible in that time, as well as topical expository sermons on various doctrines, different series of studies, etc. You will have done much good for those under your ministry and you will have personally grown leaps and bounds in your understanding of Scripture as a whole. Your preaching will grow richer over time and the work you do in one book will pay dividends in other books afterward.
Anyone Can Do It
Do the math with a bunch of twenty-year-olds to show them how $100 can become over $300,000, and you have their attention. It is so simple that many might be skeptical, but they are the youngest and last of the millennials, so skepticism is to be expected along with snarky comments. You explain it really is that simple and assure them that anyone can do it. Compound interest is completely unbiased. But that does raise a question. If it’s so simple and anyone can truly do it, why doesn’t everyone do it? Why doesn’t everyone invest $100 a month for 40 years?
Factors vary from person to person, but we can generalize to four reasons why people don’t save and invest this way.
- Inability to think in a long-term perspective. Retirement is so far off and spending $4 every day at Starbucks is so much more enjoyable than brewing coffee at home and putting that $100 a month to work in investments. Besides, all that math is just too hard to figure out. Everybody told me I would never need algebra again after getting out of school anyway.
- Laziness. It takes hard work and discipline to do something consistently over such a long time period. The key to compound interest is not magic, but consistency over time. If you double the monthly amount to $200 but only invest it for 20 years, your return will be $109,828.71. That’s a lot of cabbage but less than half with the 40 year plan and only half the monthly amount. It also works the other way for you. If you work harder and are more disciplined to invest $400 a month for 40 years, your egg will be over $1.2 million. Everybody wants a million dollars but very few will be that consistent for that long to get it.
- Presuming Social Security and other government programs will be there in the future. Many see no need to deny themselves and work hard to save like that because they believe the government will be there to take care of them.
- Assuming they will always be healthy and energetic and able to work until they die. There is no need to plan for the future when the income will always come in from working. Many also assume they will have enough, though they do nothing to ensure that.
What about preaching? I am not here advocating the “one right way of preaching.” I am persuaded from Scripture and experience that the most profitable way of investing your ministry is in the committed exposition of books, just like the most profitable way of investing for retirement is consistently over a long time. Someone may submit Charles Spurgeon as a refutation of my contention, because he didn’t preach that way. Honesty requires me admit that Spurgeon didn’t preach expositionally through books and it’s hard to argue with his profit. If I am allowed a rejoinder, I submit that some people also win a million dollars by playing the lottery, but wisdom recognizes that is not a reasonable retirement plan or expectation.
If that is the most profitable way of pulpit ministry, why aren’t more preachers doing it? Once again, we can generalize to four reasons why preachers don’t preach expositionally through books.
- Inability to preach through books. Some who occupy pulpits lack the essential gifts for preaching and teaching in such an orderly and systematic way. I am not referring to those who have the necessary gifting but choose not to preach that way. I am referring to those who are not “apt to teach” (1 Timothy 3:2; 2 Timothy 2:24), as Scripture requires.
- Laziness. Preaching expositionally through books is hard work and requires consistent, disciplined study over time to maintain. In short, it ain’t easy. Some preachers simply don’t want to work that hard at preaching. It’s easier to preach in the can and rehash old sermons, come up with three points of what you want to say and then find a verse for it, build a straw man you can burn up, etc.
- Presuming in the preacher’s authority. A preacher is given a deal of respect and credibility for occupying the pulpit. The preacher can trade on that by presuming his words carry the necessary authority for the people to believe him. They ought to believe it because I said it and I always preach the truth. They might also presume upon a legacy or tradition that preceded them.
- Assuming their congregation knows the Bible better than they really do. When a preacher assumes his people really know the Bible, he sees no need to do the hard work of exposition. He thinks he can merely read a text and make truth statements without actually showing how the text makes that truth statement. Even if the preacher’s statements are true, that’s not exposition. Exposition is simply exposing the meaning of the text. Exposition is explaining the meaning of the passage in its original context and then connecting that meaning to the reality of the text and applying it to your people.
Before You Know It
Retirement will be here before you know it. When it comes is not the time to prepare for it. It’s too late by then. It can be hard to get twenty-year-olds to see that, but that doesn’t change it. Likewise, preachers all have a day coming when their ministries will be over. Age, health, or something will take us out of the pulpit. If nothing else, the grave will end our work (Ecclesiastes 9:10). A day of reckoning is coming. The foundation has been laid and preachers are required to build on it. Paul said we can build on it with “wood, hay, stubble,” or with “gold, silver, precious stones” (1 Corinthians 3:12). We are going to be tried and receive reward or suffer loss (1 Corinthians 3:13-15). Of course, you can preach in the can if you want to, but remember the servant and his napkin (Luke 19:24).
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Over the Hill
Take heed unto thyself, and unto the doctrine; continue in them: for in doing this thou shalt both save thyself, and them that hear thee.
~ 1 Timothy 4:16
I would again be reminded of junior high when the doctor came in and asked me questions I didn’t want to answer and scolded me about stuff I didn’t want to do. At least there was no paddle. The doctor came in and spent more time looking at the infamous chart and typing on the computer than making eye contact or giving me visible assurance I was being heard. As the doctor shuffled the file and the computer, I glanced at the chart. I don’t know why I felt so guilty about it, as if I were cheating on a test or something. I noticed my chart with my name on it was marked, “Prime of Life.” I almost laughed. I wanted to ask, “Does that mean this is the best it’s going to get for me?”
Have you ever noticed a lot of doctors don’t have much of what us civilians call a sense of humor. I suppose it’s the rigors of the work and all that. Once again, I’m back to junior high when the principal has serious concerns about my actions and I try to point out the funny in the business. Inevitably, they, and I quote, “Failed to see the humor.”
Middle Age is Also Middle Danger
Prime of life sounds nicer than middle-aged, but it doesn’t soften the realities that come with it. We could also say I’m at the top of the hill looking down the other side. I appreciate the attempts at positive spin, but I’m not bothered by it. Middle age frightens me, but not because of reduced energy levels, increased blood pressure, gray overtaking what’s left of hair, or more time spent in that little room with the doctor. Middle age is dangerous, particularly for a preacher, because being over the hill means it’s effortless to coast down the other side. The allure of easy chairs, TV sports, warm beds, and food and drink becomes stronger, or maybe the man is weaker.
As a young preacher you cannot easily see this fork in the road coming up. You’re full of fire and energy and can never imagine having to make a choice between leisure and work. You have so many things to learn and do you can’t imagine a strong desire to relax and do nothing. What’s unimaginable at 25 can become a daily battle at 45. Several years ago an older preacher asked me what hobbies I enjoyed. I don’t remember my reply, but the one in my head ran on this wise, “Hobbies? I ain’t got time for no hobbies. I got work to do.”
Young preachers all know older preachers they do not want to be like. They’ve seen the preacher who might as well advertise, “Have sermons, will travel.” He has his kit of sermons he’s preached hundreds of times and has warmed over so many times he could deliver them comatose. Young preachers see the cranky, bitter, ill-spirited old preacher who can instantly rain on any parade. They’ve seen the greasy salesman preacher always buttering everybody up and, as C. S. Lewis once said, if the biblical text had smallpox, his sermons would be in no danger of catching it. They’ve seen the politicking old preacher who is always calculating and being in the right place at the right time with the right people. They’ve seen the weeping preacher who’s not like Jeremiah, but rather is weepily pouting in the corner and continually licking his thirty year old wounds. They’ve seen the Elijah-under-the-juniper-tree preacher. He’s convinced he’s the only one faithful left and all these whippersnappers ain’t much.
Young preachers see these older specimens and don’t want to be like that guy. I doubt most of those older preachers started out that way. They probably weren’t so different from the young preachers today. I venture to guess that decisive turn came in middle age for them. That’s the time when it’s easy to think you’ve laid up enough goods that you can relax and live off the store. That’s the time when it’s deceptively easy to stop making progress in the ministry.
A Call to Preach is a Call to Work
In the interest of Fair Use, I disclose I’m about to paraphrase and fool about with something John Stott said somebody else said in his book on preaching, Between Two Worlds. When men stop making progress in the ministry, stop reading and thinking, it begins to show around the age of 45, or middle age. Their coasting typically deposits them on one side or the other. They become a bigot or a sentimentalist. The bigot resorts to the points of his dogma and hammers those nails until the heads are shiny at first, but soon they’re worn clean off. The sentimentalist is a widower who can’t let his deceased wife named Tradition rest in peace. He’s always digging her back up and bemoaning how they don’t make ’em like they used to.
Whatever you or I think about Stott’s thoughts about somebody else’s thoughts, there’s something there. A call to ministry is a call to serious, strenuous work marked by progress (1 Timothy 4:15). Paul told Timothy to give himself “wholly” to this work and continue to do so (1 Timothy 4:16). Paul explains what it takes to be “a good minister of Jesus Christ.” Spoiler alert: it takes a whole lot of continued, really hard work (1 Timothy 4:6-16). Just like the guy riding the pine wants to the be the star of the game but doesn’t want to practice, everyone wants to preach well when in the pulpit, but not everyone wants to work hard every day in the study.
Middle age comes and brings a lot of dangers, but it should not be the top of the hill for the preacher. He should continue to climb and make progress until death comes, or he is no longer physically able to climb. Young preachers will face this Hill of Difficulty at some point. It will be tempting to coast. Remember the warnings and persevere, brothers, persevere.
Adrift
And the LORD God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou?
~ Genesis 3:9
Twenty-two and a half minutes in, I didn’t know where we were. I didn’t know how we got there and I didn’t know where we were going. No, I’m not describing a senior moment. I’m not talking about an ill-fated hiking excursion, nor a road trip. I’m talking about being in the middle of a sermon like you are in the middle of a windless and waveless ocean, adrift.
You’ve been there. Whether you were behind the pulpit or you were a pew weight, you’ve been there. The sermon started with promise, but lost its way. Some preachers recover better than others, but it’s still a tough spot. As a preacher, what do you do? How do you recover?
The Best Way to Right the Ship
Writing experts teach you should hook your readers and pull them in by building suspense or curiosity. Most ad copy promises you a vital solution, but you have to keep reading and reading. It takes a long time to finally get to that solution. Since you’re not paying for this advice and I have nothing to sell you or sign you up for, I’m going to go straight to the single best solution. The best way to fix being adrift in the middle of your sermon is to never begin to be adrift in the first place. See, if you never start to go adrift, you will never be adrift.
Are you disappointed? It really is the best way to not get lost in your sermon. I see what you mean though. That’s not extremely helpful. Maybe I can do better, but we will have to take this in two parts. First, if you are adrift in the midst of a sermon, there’s not a lot that can be done to save it. I think it’s best to cut off whatever you’ve been babbling and get straight back to the sermon, like when you’ve shanked one into the woods off the tee. The best thing to do is get back to the fairway with the least strokes possible. It makes for an awkward transition, but it’s better than trying to do some weird turnaround and tie-in of your irrelevancy to the sermon you’re supposed to be preaching. That only confuses people more and you might accidentally preach some heresy. If you’re quick witted, you might be able to make a joke and smooth it out a little, but it’s best to get back to the sermon with the least words and time spent possible.
The second part is where I can be more helpful to young preachers. That’s the part about not beginning to be adrift in the first place. As much as possible, you want to avoid getting lost in your sermon. What I mean by getting lost is not just the occasional turning to the wrong reference or momentarily losing your place in the outline. I’m talking about when you have drifted off into irrelevancy from the the point of the sermon. It’s not just a minor rabbit trail.
How Not to Get Lost
I can give three steps here that are most beneficial to keep you from getting lost in the middle of a sermon. Sure, exceptions always exist, but don’t worry about exceptions. There is no one right way of preparing and preaching a sermon, but all biblically faithful sermons will have some things in common. My point is that qualifiers do exist for this list, but I’m not going to give a hundred qualifiers.
- Outline
Avoiding getting lost in a sermon is mostly going to depend on your preparation for the sermon. Some form of outline is needed, even if you want to preach without any notes at all. In making an outline, you are working through the message and arranging points in a logical order. Putting an outline together makes you think through the sermon and it should become obvious to you where you’ve not given proper support for a point, where you’ve transitioned from one point to another that does not follow, where you have a point or subpoint that is not relevant to the point of the sermon, and if you’ve worked yourself into a corner. These kind of problems in a message can set you adrift, but if you identify them ahead of time, you can fix them before you ever get up to preach. - Stick to the point
If you’ve worked through the sermon ahead of time with an outline, then you should know the material well that you are going to preach. For the most part, you need to stick to what you have prepared. Don’t be slavish. I’m not suggesting you have to write down every word you’re going to say and then only say what you’ve written down. The farther away you get from your notes, the farther you are getting from the point of the message, and the closer you are getting to drifting off. Many thoughts will come to mind while you’re preaching. Some of those should be said and some of them shouldn’t. It takes experience and discernment to navigate that.Young preachers have a struggle here because they’re tempted to try to say everything every time they preach. Let me relieve some pressure here. You are not preaching the definitive sermon on your subject. Even if you think you are, you’re not. Furthermore, don’t try to do that. Take a manageable point and preach it well. Stick to it. Don’t try to say everything.
- Exposition
One of the best things a preacher can do to avoid getting lost in a sermon is to preach expositorily. You can and should do this by preaching through books, especially if you are preaching regularly. Even if you are preaching on a subject, it’s best to take a passage that addresses that subject and do an exposition of the passage in its context. That doesn’t necessarily mean that you will preach word-by-word through the text, but you will get your points from the passage and preach them from the context. This makes for a richer and more powerful topical sermon. You’re not taking a word or two from somewhere, or worse, using a verse out of its context because it seems to say what you want to say.Even in preaching a topical message, if you’ve studied the passage expositorily, you know the passage well. You know how and why the verses say what they are saying. You are not relying on being clever or your wit to make your points. You’re bringing them from the text. This keeps you tethered to the text and provides much less opportunity for going adrift in the middle of the message.
There are different types of sermons and they each have their strengths and uses. I’m not saying these three steps will keep you from ever going adrift, but they will reduce the likelihood. One of most common ways preachers lose their way in sermons is by telling stories. The story may have started out as an illustration, and maybe it was even a good one, but one story reminds you of another, and that one reminds you of something else, and so on. Those stories and jokes may be interesting, but somewhere in there you’ve gotten lost and are no longer preaching the Bible. Maybe you’ve entertained people for a while, but you’ve wasted however long you had to actually feed them.
