Category Archives: theology

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Preaching the Synonyms and Antonyms for Faith

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In Luke 7:18-35 Jesus responds to a question posed by John the Baptizer. In Jesus’ answer, He says in v. 23, “…blessed is the one who is not offended by me.” This is an example of using antonyms to define saving and sanctifying faith. Usually, we’ll spend a moment in the sermon explaining this statement. Our explanations will, no doubt, include synonyms such as being turned off by Him. However, this is a great opportunity to explain what faith is. The opposite of being offended by Jesus is embracing Him and His teachings. In this context, those who were not offended by Jesus were responding well to John and his baptism. They acknowledge their need to be cleansed from their sin. Another example of this is in verse 30: “but the Pharisees and the lawyers rejected the purpose of God for themselves.” Here’s another opportunity to explain faith. Synonyms will explain their unbelief; antonyms will explain the proper response intended for Believers who hear this narrative. See if your preaching portion for Sunday contains any synonyms or antonyms for faith.

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“My Preaching Portion Was Difficult to Preach Because…”

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Definition:

Preaching Portion: The amount of Scripture you choose to interpret and apply for a given sermon.

The past couple of weeks I’ve been conscious of how much easier post-Isaiah preaching is. In a prayer I worded for our congregation one recent Sunday morning I said to God that we needed His help even though the preaching portion wasn’t as difficult as Isaiah. I was feeling a bit of relief now that we had completed our study of Isaiah. But I was also feeling the need for Divine assistance because the act of preaching in general and, specifically, preaching any given preaching portion is beyond me and my abilities.

Would you be willing to share briefly with me why a particular preaching portion was difficult to preach and why? I want to begin to catalogue these issues for my learning, but also for future interaction with students and colleagues. How about your preaching portion for last Sunday? What made that Text difficult to preach? Thank you for sharing your insights with me. Here’s mine from Sunday…

1 Thessalonians 5:14 contains four Christian responses to four kinds of Christians. The instructions weren’t hard to preach. What made this sermon difficult was explaining why these instructions were vital for faith and the faith-family. As I’ve mentioned in earlier blogs, it’s easy at the end of an epistle to forget the Gospel foundation that appears at the beginning (in this case, places like 1 Thessalonians 1:3 and 1 Thessalonians 1:5).

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Two Angles in which to Explore Offensive Commandments

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I just recently completed preaching through Isaiah. Before beginning another through-the-Book study, I am spending several weekends on God and the Life He Gives. The short series will highlight key characteristics of God and also key aspects of living the Christian life. A proper study of the Christian life involves studying the God who grants it. At times, we struggle with God’s kind of life because we do not understand Him and His character.

Take, for instance, God’s difficult instructions to Hagar in Genesis 16:9. Why would God tell Hagar to return and submit to a woman, Sarai, who was dealing harshly with her (cf. Genesis 16:6). What kind of God would instruct a female servant to return to an abusive mistress? The answer is a God who has determined to save the powerless and afflicted. This concept applies equally to instructions in 1 Peter 2:13-14. See also 1 Peter 2:18 and 1 Peter 3:1. God is a God who saves those who depend on Him or rely on Him alone.

Another angle on this is to ask what it is about the nature of our salvation that would warrant such an instruction. In this case of Hagar submitting to Sarai, salvation, by nature, involves being delivered in the midst of a terrible environment (as opposed to being delivered out of a terrible situation). Saving faith involves dependence upon God, the opposite of taking matters into one’s own hand (in this case, taking matters into her own hands would be Hagar not returning and submitting to Sarai).

You might find yourself in conversations where someone asks, “Should so-and-so submit to that?!?” In other words, the particular circumstance seemingly cancels out the biblical instruction. Before you attempt to answer that specific scenario, try taking the person through these two angles: (1)What is it about God that He would require such actions? (2) What is it about the nature of salvation that would require such actions?