Exegital Exemplar

From Gospel Translations

G. Campbell Morgan once described a remarkable sermon on 2 Samuel 9:13: “So Mephibosheth dwelt in Jerusalem; for he did eat continually at the king’s table; and was lame in both his feet”:

“My brethren, we see here tonight,first, the doctrine of human depravity — Mephibosheth was lame. Second, the doctrine of total depravity — he was lame on both his feet.Thirdly, the doctrine of justification — he dwelt in Jerusalem.Fourthly, the doctrine of adoption — he sat at the king’s table. Fifthly, the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints — he did eat at the king’s table continually.”

We may well smile at such a mixture of human ingenuity, systematic theology and hermeneutical confusion! Clever points, a wide range of doctrines, wonderful spiritual blessings — biblical truths, but not biblical exposition. There is a fundamental transgression of this wise principle: “In raising doctrines from the text, his [the preacher’s] care ought to be,first, that the matter be the truth of God.Secondly, that it be a truth contained in or grounded on that text, that the hearers may discern how God teacheth it from thence” (The Directory for the Publick Worship of God, 1645, emphasis added).

Our failures here are not harmless; they multiply in their impact over the long haul on those who hear us preach. This is because most Christians learn how to study the Bible by a process of osmosis. The principles filter through to them, not from books, but by example, by what they experience as they listen to the working models they see and hear.
Those who hear us preach ought to be able to go back to the Scriptures, Berean-like (Acts 17:11), tracing the same truth we have brought out from them, and see that what has been preached is not only true in general, but truth drawn from the preaching portion we have used.

What, then, is demanded by what Paul describes as “setting forth the truth plainly” (2 Cor. 4:2)? We may need a mental “cold shower” to alert us to our weaknesses. These principles will help us:

1. Exposition of Scripture must exhibit Paul’s motto for preachers: “Do your best [the verb is spoudazein, which suggests strenuous effort] to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth”  (2 Tim. 2:15).

We must apply to our handling of Scripture the apostolic principle that in Christ we always “put off” and “put on” (Col. 3:1, 5, 11). We repent of our tendency to mishandle Scripture, and our minds are renewed by the Scriptures themselves to use them properly, discerning the will of God (Rom. 12:1–2 applies to preaching as well as “real life”!).

2. Exposition of Scripture must never be replaced by either illustration or application.
Both of these are essential parts of good teaching and preaching. It should concern us if we find that preaching narratives appeals to us far less than preaching on doctrinal propositions.

Nevertheless, the modern homiletical passion for stories and illustrations (not to mention feel-good funnies and jokes) must be unbiblical in character and ephemeral in its fruit. Apostolic preaching involved “setting forth the truth plainly” (2 Cor. 4:2). Our aim is to see the Emmaus Road experience duplicated and our hearers say, “My heart was strangely warmed as the Scriptures were opened today — now I see what these Scriptures mean.”

3. Exposition of Scripture should include Scripture’s application of itself.

Do we expound the meaning of a passage, then, for application, scrape around for personal experiences, moving stories, or modern psychological counsels to explain the “how to”? The basic instinct here is faulty. We shortchange our hearers by failing to show how the application of Scripture arises from and is usually given with the very passage we are expounding. The application does not always present itself in a surface, obvious way. But if we are not workmen, we are not really fit to be preachers.

4. Exposition of Scripture should always function with some basic controlling principles.

We preach Scripture in terms of the particular kind of literature from which we are preaching. First, we preach from each part of Scripture in terms of its place in the whole and its relationship to God’s ongoing, progressive revelation. Second, we preach in such a way that we draw the line from our passage to Christ; and third, we preach so that every imperative is rooted in the indicatives of grace. In technical terms, our preaching is genre-sensitive, redemptive-historical, Christocentric and carries gospel-grace application.Every sermon!

5. Exposition of Scripture should never move too quickly from the objective to the subjective, from God to man, from grace to sin, from Christ to the sinner.

This is still a great contemporary weakness, even in Reformed preaching. We invest much energy and legitimate imaginative creativity in speaking about man, sin, need. We are weak and poor in explaining, expounding, and exalting God, Christ, grace, glory. We are often too much in a hurry to get to application.

Where can we go for help? Nowhere better than to Paul’s preaching grid in 2 Tim. 3:16–4:5. Here he connects what Scripture is for and what preachers are to do with it. Since it is for teaching, rebuking, transforming, and training (2 Tim. 3:16), those must be the four things our preaching should exemplify and accomplish (2 Tim. 4:2). Go to it!