It’s Monday. I know preachers can experience the Monday blues when there’s a rough or difficult Sunday at Church.
Note I’m not going through anything right now but I want to write this post as a help for myself and/or others in the future.
Posted in Bible, Christianity, Church, expository preaching, God, Reformed, Theology, tagged Bible, Christianity, Expository Preaching, God, Reformed, Theology on March 2, 2020| 13 Comments »
It’s Monday. I know preachers can experience the Monday blues when there’s a rough or difficult Sunday at Church.
Note I’m not going through anything right now but I want to write this post as a help for myself and/or others in the future.
Posted in alex montoya, Christianity, expository preaching, Pastor, Pastoral Ministry, Preacher, Preaching, Reformed, Theology, tagged alex montoya, Christianity, Expository Preaching, Pastor, Pastoral Ministry, Preacher, Preaching, Reformed, Theology on January 15, 2019| 21 Comments »
Pastor Alex Montoya has been instrumental in God shaping how I preach and also with wisdom concerning pastoral ministry. He’s to me the Hispanic Charles Spurgeon and I lament that he’s retired from teaching in seminary.
Last week he’s recently taught for a Seminary Winterim session on the passion of preaching. In a one week intensive course he taught a future generation of those entering ministry on homiletic (how to preach).
I thought I share them with viewers to help preachers and those who are teachers.
Here are the videos:
Posted in Christianity, expository preaching, Preaching, Reformed, Theology, tagged Christianity, expositiory preaching, Preaching, Reformed, Theology on May 17, 2018| 16 Comments »
Sometimes people think of Expository Preaching as preaching from the Word of God that is “boring” because it is so heavily based upon the Word of God. I disagree. I think there is a difference between exegetical data dumping and expository preaching.
What is something helpful and practical that can help those teaching the Word of God not end up just go on like a run-on vocal Bible commentary?
Posted in Bible, Christianity, expository preaching, Reformed, Theology, tagged Bible, Christianity, Expository Preaching, Preaching, Reformed, Teaching, Theology on March 18, 2018| 15 Comments »
Since it is Sunday and most of the blog readers no doubt will be attending church I thought it would be helpful to have this post on how to teach the Bible.
This is applicable for preachers, Bible study leaders, Sunday school teachers, etc. Even if some things might not apply to you there are nevertheless truths and principles about teaching the Bible that would be helpful.
Actually even if you don’t teach the Bible in a church or ministry context this is still helpful for you to listen to in order to better know how to listen to God’s Word being taught, to pray for those who feed you from the Word and also how to teach from God’s Word should the need arise later in life.
Posted in Christianity, Church, expository preaching, Preachers, Preaching, Reformed, Theology, tagged Christianity, Church, ministry, Preacher, Preaching, Sunday on May 28, 2017| 7 Comments »
It’s Sunday Morning. Here’s a little motivation for preachers before you enter your pulpit from the Word of God.
1 Timothy 5:17-19 states
The elders who rule well are to be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who work hard at preaching and teaching. 18 For the Scripture says, “You shall not muzzle the ox while he is threshing,” and “The laborer is worthy of his wages.” 19 Do not receive an accusation against an elder except on the basis of two or three witnesses.
Note in verse 17 that Paul’s intention in writing this is so that those who serve in the church as Elders/Pastors to “work hard at preaching and teaching.” Verse 18 tips us that he’s going to give us the reasons for this with the use of the word “for” which shows the motivation. I want to look at one of the motivation for this Sunday and Lord willing another next Sunday.
Posted in Christianity, Church, expository preaching, Preaching, Reformed, Theology on January 5, 2017| 23 Comments »
In Charles Spurgeon’s Lectures to My Students the famous Victorian Era preacher he has a chapter on “Earnestness: Its Marring and Maintenance.” I appreciated how Spurgeon talked about how the preacher could have his zeal or earnestness marred through various predicaments. Among them is the lack of studying.
I’ll let Spurgeon speak for himself as he said it better than I could:
Posted in Christianity, expository preaching, Preaching, Reformed, Theology on July 7, 2016| 21 Comments »
Yesterday over at the Blog for The Master’s Seminary there is a post titled, “Preachers and Prepackaged Sermons” in which the author outlined the reasons to resist “prepackaged sermons.” This led me to think more that the bigger undercurrent is the issue of pastors’ and their studies of God’s Word. So preachers, how are your studies?
One of the qualification of a Pastor is that he is “able to teach,” according to 1 Timothy 3:2.
This is a great verse to meditate on:
Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth.
(2 Timothy 2:15)
Posted in Al Mohler, Christianity, expository preaching, John MacArthur, Ligon Duncan, Paul Washer, Preaching, Reformed, SHEPHERD'S CONFERENCE, Steve Lawson, Theology on March 12, 2016| 6 Comments »
The Shepherd’s Conference is officially over. This was one of the most encouraging conference I’ve been to in the last 8 years. As people are waiting for the audios and videos to be uploaded online for now we’ll make do with the notes from The Master’s Seminary Liveblog of the Conference.
Here’s the list:
Conference Liveblog: Wed. Morning (MacArthur)
Conference Liveblog: Wed. Evening (Duncan)
Conference Liveblog: Thurs. Evening (Mohler)
Conference Liveblog: Fri. Morning (Pennington)
Conference Liveblog: Fri. Afternoon (Washer)
Conference Liveblog: Fri. Evening (MacArthur)
If you watch the conference, which sermons did you enjoyed?
Posted in Bible, bibliology, Christianity, expository preaching, Inerrancy, Inerrancy Summit, John MacArthur, Miguel Nuñez, Reformed, STEPHEN NICHOLS, Theology on March 7, 2015| 27 Comments »
I’ve been to nearly a decade worth’s of Shepherd’s Conference and this one was definitely the best personally. I really enjoyed the Inerrancy Summit.
Here are the videos!
There are some more videos they haven’t had it up yet but I will put it up as soon as they make them available.
Enjoy!
Posted in Bible, Bible Commentary, Book Review, Christianity, Daniel, Devotional, expository preaching, Gospel, tagged Bryan Chapell, Daniel on July 28, 2014| 6 Comments »
To purchase the book on Amazon, Click HERE
The introduction to this commentary makes it clear that the author is not trying to give an exegetically detailed commentary on the book of Daniel; rather the purpose of the book is to show how the book of Daniel points us to the Gospel and then to apply Gospel truths that is found in Daniel to our lives. To this end, I think the author accomplished his stated purpose.
My first knowledge of the author Byran Chapell was from his book on preaching that was the textbook for an introductory course to preaching when I began seminary; that particular work helped me a lot in laying the foundation to become an expository preacher. It was with great expectation that I picked up this book wanting to learn and see how Bryan Chapell would preach through the book of Daniel.
I appreciated the many stories that the author shared throughout the book; they were wonderful examples of how preachers should “illustrate to apply” to the listeners’ lives. I appreciated seeing how Chapell avoided making Daniel the object of our hero worship but instead points us towards God, Jesus and the Gospel. One highlight reading this commentary is the discussion on Daniel chapter three about what true faith means. Here Chapell also points out to the reader that just because one has faith does not mean that everything will go all well in life without trials and tribulation. This directly contradicts the “health and wealth” gospel and similar beliefs popular in some Christian circles. At the same time, for those who are in biblical churches the discussion would nevertheless be quite encouraging since it put our suffering in perspective.
There were times I wished that the author could have gone more in-depth with the exposition of the passage especially with the latter part of the book of Daniel. I must add that this is a gentle criticism because one must applaud the author for his honesty in admitting what he does not know or don’t want to be dogmatic with.
Both exegetes and lay readers will benefit from this commentary; this book serves as a great devotional read while for expository preachers this commentary will balance out some of the more technical commentaries to help the preacher thinking about how to deliver and apply the text.
NOTE: This book was provided to me free by Baker Books and Net Galley without any obligation for a positive review. All opinions offered above are mine unless otherwise stated or implied.
Posted in Bible Commentary, Book Review, Christianity, discourse analysis, exegesis, expository preaching, Jonah, Kevin J. Youngblood, old testament scholarship, Theology, tagged Kevin J. Youngblood on July 6, 2014| 38 Comments »
To purchase the book on Amazon, Click HERE
Jonah is one of my favorite books in the Bible. I preached through this book two years ago and I learned a lot from it. So in picking up this new commentary that just came out, I was looking for a work that can get more insights from the text beyond what previous commentaries have pointed out. This commentary didn’t disappoint—as a matter of fact, I learned a lot of new things about the book of Jonah as a result of reading this book. At this time I would say that this commentary tops them all.
The author interacts with other major books and articles on the book of Jonah. The author did a good job with the introduction which on my Kindle indicates that it made up eighteen percent of the book. There is a lot that is pack in those eighteen percent! This is the first volume in a new Old Testament commentary series published by Zondervan and the editor aims to make it not just a typical exegetical commentary but one that engages with the text using the tools of discourse analysis, analysis of literary forms, canonical criticism (specifically, the canonical significance of a passage) and insights from inter-textuality. This commentary is also immensely rich with exegetical insights one expect from a traditional exegetical commentary such as lexical details and grammatical observations.
What were some of the things that I learned from this commentary? Since there are too many examples I will stick only to some of the highlights in the first two chapter of the book of Jonah. One literary device the author noted that I haven’t noticed before in the book of Jonah was the use of suppression of historical and geographical detail as a rhetorical device. Two years ago when I went through Jonah 1:3 in the Hebrew I was stuck with why there is a third person feminine singular suffix for the word fare when I was thinking of Jonah as the referent (therefore should be third person masculine singular) but the author made a good point that this was referring to the ship and therefore one must not miss that Jonah was so desperate to leave God that he paid for the whole ship’s fare. The author also made the observation that the Hebrew verb for “go” (boa) is used in the story for opposing the movement of God as oppose to other verbs of motion which serves to imply Jonah’s unrighteous heart whenever the word appears. Youngblood also noted that the adjective “big” appears in the book twelve times and always with reference to obstacles to Jonah and his wishes. The author also advanced the latest view that Hesed which is typically translated as “loving kindness” actually does not refer to covenantal love but instead to action and attitude of love beyond the call of duty. The book also made me change my position concerning the prayer of Jonah in chapter two which I originally believed was a prayer of repentance; but the author Youngblood argues that it’s otherwise and quite conclusively I must say.
Whether one is a season exegete or a new student to Biblical Hebrew, this work will be fun, challenging and informative. If you are going to go through Jonah in great details you need this work.
NOTE: This book was provided to me free by Zondervan Academic and Net Galley without any obligation for a positive review. All opinions offered above are mine unless otherwise stated or implied.
Posted in Bible, Book of Jonah Exposition, Christianity, expository preaching, Reformed, tagged Jonah on May 17, 2014| 9 Comments »
For Exposition of Jonah Part 3 click HERE
Jonah 1:17-2:10
Introduction: Last week we looked at one verse in Jonah 1:16, and we asked the question: If you say you believe in God, does your attitude, action and words show this to be true? We saw that if we truly believe in God, it would lead you to fear Him, offer your service to Him and keep your words to Him. This week we will look at Jonah 1:17-2:10.
Establish the need: Have you ever sin so badly that you wonder if God will ever take you back again? And what does a prayer of responding to God’s grace look like?
Oscar Wilde once put it, “It’s so easy to convert others, but oh so difficult to convert oneself.”
Purpose: To see the four characteristics of what a prayer responding to God’s grace looks like so we can truly commune with God.
Background:
Jonah has been running away from God.
The last time we saw Jonah in chapter 1, he was thrown down to the sea.
What follows in chapter two is a Psalm/poetry.
Q: Why the shift to poetry?
A: All this time the narrative has been one action after another, but here we slow down in time to hear a prayer of Jonah.
According to verse 1, this is Jonah’s prayer to God while in the belly of a whale.
IRONY:
Few words are recorded of Jonah the prophet speaks to people.
Most of Jonah’s words are spoken to God rather than people.
Jonah will teach us what a prayer to God will look like. Let’s look at the Chiastic structure of this Psalm:
Great fish swallow (v.17) -SUBSCRIPT (v.1)-
Jonah’s voice: Cry for help (v.2)
Forsaken: Jonah (v.3-4a)
Temple hope: Will look at it again (v.4b)
Dire circumstances and remembering the LORD (v.5-7a)
Temple hope: Now prayers are getting there (v.7b)
Forsaken: Idolators (v.8)
Jonah’s voice: Sing thanksgiving (v.9)
Great fish vomit (v.10)
OUTLINE
Grace driven prayer begins with remembering God in your trials (v.5-7a, 1:17)
Grace driven prayer desires God’s presence again (v.4, 7b)
Grace driven prayer confesses sin (v.3, 8)
Grace driven prayer involves involve our will (v.2, 9)
God’s mercy and salvation before our prayer of confession (v.17, 10)
(NOTE: We will be going over points 1-3 in this post with next week focusing on points 4-5)
I. Grace driven prayer begins with remembering God in your trials (v.5-7a,1:17, 2:10)
Passage: 5 “ Water encompassed me to the [f]point of death. The great deep [g]engulfed me, Weeds were wrapped around my head.6 “I descended to the roots of the mountains. The earth with its bars was around me forever,But You have brought up my life from [h]the pit, O Lord my God.7 “While [i]I was fainting away, I remembered the Lord,”
Proof:
i. Jonah’s difficulties
Subject Action Object EXTENT
“ Water encompassed me to the [f]point of death.
The great deep engulfed me,
Weeds were wrapped around my head.
a. These three lines are synonymous.
b. They convey the terrible and frightening scene of drowning.
c. Some of your version says “neck” instead of “head,” and the Hebrew word there is literally soul, but can refer to neck or head of a person that is the center of life.
2. Verse 6 indicates how down Jonah has gotten.
a. RECAP: Beginning in chapter 1, there’s been this theme of Jonah escaping God by going down.
b. “Descended” echoes the same verb used earlier of Jonah’s escape to Joppa and going on the bottom of the boat in 1:3, and in verse five.
c. Note the language conveying Jonah at the bottom:
i. “the roots of the mountains.”
Jonah is going down to the bottom of the sea floor!
ii. “the pit,”
d. Yet there was hope (6b-7): “But You have brought up my life from [h]the pit, O Lord my God.7 “While [i]I was fainting away, I remembered the Lord,”
i. “But You have brought up”—This points to a dramatic change in direction (Kohlenberger, 52).
ii. This was done about by “O Lord my God”
iii. Just when Jonah was almost dead: ““While [i]I was fainting away, I remembered the Lord,” (v.7)
iv. It is significant to note that Yahweh took the initiative in saving Jonah here first (Kohlenberger, 52).
v. “Remembered” is more than just not forgetting, but act on the basis of a commitment (Kohlenberger, 52)! Remember that God knows all things, and it shows more that we act upon our commitment as He did with the Hebrews in Egypt seeing their suffering and going to the Abrahamic Covenant in Exodus 2:23-25.
Practice:
i. Note Jonah’s extreme trials that led Him to know the Lord. What are the trials that God might be bringing into your life to turn Him back to Him?
ii. Are you going through trials right now in your life? Note the transition from verse 6 to verse 7 of Jonah shifting his focus at the circumstances to the Lord.
iii. Be careful of misapplication: Don’t think you can just wait until you are about to faint into your death and then repent. We are never promise tomorrow.
II. Grace driven prayer desires God’s presence again (v.4, 7b)
Passage: “4 “So I said, ‘I have been expelled from [e]Your sight.” Nevertheless I will look again toward Your holy temple.’”
AND
“And my prayer came to You, into Your holy temple.”
Proof:
i. Twice in this psalm, Jonah mentions God’s “holy temple.” God’s Holy Temple is where God’s presence is.
ii. Verse 4 begins with Jonah’s confession that he is currently away from God’s presence: “4 “So I said, ‘I have been expelled from [e]Your sight.”
1. Literally, ““So I said, ‘I have been expelled from [e]Your eyes,”” with the phrase “eyes of the Lord/God” is frequently used in the Scriptures such as in Psalm 34:16-17 in reference to divine benevolence (Sasson, 178).
2. The verb “expelled” here is used only in two instances in the Old Testament, both in Psalm 78:55 and 80:8 to show that the nations were the ones cast off from God, but now used somewhat ironically, since this is what is happening to Jonah (Kohlenberger, 49).
iii. Jonah here gets what he finally wanted: escape from God’s presence, but does he like it?
iv. The second half of verse 4 signals a transition of Jonah’s desire with the word “Nevertheless.”
v. NASB translates “will look again toward Your holy temple,” but I would translate from the Hebrew “I want to look again toward Your holy temple,” to bring the idea of Jonah’s wish because of the Hebrew imperfect.
vi. Does God hears Jonah’s wish to be back before God’s presence?
Answer: After Jonah remembers the LORD in his troubles, he said these words in verse 7b, “And my prayer came to You, into Your holy temple.”
Picture: A friend of mine got into an argument with his father and it was really bad. Finally, after several weeks of awkwardness, he calls his father and says he’s sorry. As he shared with me his remorse, I think we can say that if you were to listen in to him speak, you would say, there’s sign of true repentance because he saw what he did was wrong, and also because he wanted to restore that relationship and presence of his father. The same also with us and God, if we are going to really pray to him to repent of our sins.
Practice:
i. When you pray to God and confess your sins, do you do it mechanically? Do you do it automatically with no feelings of remorse?
ii. One of the quickest way of knowing your prayers of repentance is genuine is to see if you spend more time after confessing of sins, to talk to Him in prayer about other things, and also if you find time to absolutely adore and worship God!
III. Grace driven prayer confesses sin (v.3, 8)
Point: Confession means admitting that the other person’s perspective is correct. In this case, confessing our sins to God means you will see your sins the way God sees it.
Passage: “3 “For You had cast me into the deep,Into the heart of the seas, And the current [d]engulfed me. All Your breakers and billows passed over me.”
AND
8 “Those who regard [j]vain idols Forsake their faithfulness,”
Proof:
i. Both section, verses 3 and 8, discusses about being forsaken.
ii. Verse 8 gives this pronouncement: “8 “Those who regard [j]vain idols Forsake their faithfulness,”
Not just idols, but anything that takes the place of God is a sin!
2. “Forsake their faithfulness,”
Some of your version will say loving kindness instead, and it refers to God’s enduring love in passages such as Psalm 110:5 and 106:1 (Limburg, 70).
iii. In verse 3, Jonah gives a vivid description of how he is forsaken by God. Thus, he’s saying that he’s among those who had forsaken God and himself also a sinner.
Practice:
Learn to identify false apologies and real apologies to God:
Picture: Here are some of the ridiculous words people say to apologize when they really are not sorry:
FORMER PRESIDENT: “If the remarks on the tape left anyone with the impression that I was disrespectful to either Governor Cuomo or Italian-Americans, then I deeply regret it.”
A typical scenario: “I am sorry that what I said offended you. Next time, I’ll keep my thought to myself. By now, you should know that I have the tendency to say the truth as it is. I’m like the kind of guy that gets in trouble when the wife ask, “Honey, does this dress makes me look fat.”
We will continue Chapter two next week.
Posted in Bible, bible study, Book of Jonah Exposition, Christianity, expository preaching, Jonah, tagged Book of Jonah Exposition on April 19, 2014| 10 Comments »
For Introduction to Book of Jonah click HERE
Jonah 1:1-3
Establish the need: Do you think you can run away from God?
Purpose: To see three reasons why a child of God cannot outrun God, in order to see that it’s folly to do so and obey God today.
Passage:
The word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amittai saying, 2 “Arise, go to Nineveh the great city and cry against it, for their wickedness has come up before Me.” 3 But Jonah rose up to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. So he went down to Joppa, found a ship which was going to Tarshish, paid the fare and went down into it to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord.
Outline
Overview: The story is going to go very fast—all the characters are all introduce already in the first three verses—Yahweh, Jonah, the people of Nineveh and the sailors (Limburgh, 37).
I. If you are a child of God, you cannot outrun God because of your personal identity involves God (v.1)
o Passage: “The word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amittai saying,”
o Proof
o Picture: (I tried to act in life at one point of not being a Christian; but being genuinely born again, it was impossible to do.)
o Practice:
II. If you are a child of God, you cannot outrun God because of His presence (v.2)
o Passage: “2 “Arise, go to Nineveh the great city and cry against it, for their wickedness has come up before Me””
o Proof
o Picture: (Story of boy walking to school alone for the first time but really behind him several steps was mother hovering over and nearby. In the same matter we can’t out run God)
o Practice:
III. If you are a child of God, you cannot outrun God because of His providence (v.3)
o Picture: (I like Silent film; what it lacks in media of sound it makes up with emphasis on visual of facial expression; Point: Bible is an amazing literature in the same way,where there are rhetorical devices to emphasize certain points despite not being a “movie”).
o Passage: “3 But Jonah rose up to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. So he went down to Joppa, found a ship which was going to Tarshish, paid the fare and went down into it to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord.”
o Proof
Q: Is there any significance that this is the first verb of what Jonah did with the fact that this same verb is also the first command Yahweh gave to Jonah?
A: It leads the readers to think at first Jonah was going to do what Yahweh does, but there’s going to be a twist: Jonah is going to do the opposite! Implication of it is that how many of us do the same thing by doing what seems to be at first doing the right thing, but then in our hearts we treasure and plan to do otherwise?
Hebrew infinitive to show the purpose of Jonah was to flee to Tarshish!
A: The direction of down begins here with going to Joppa, but will appear again to emphasize the wrong direction of Jonah, as oppose to Yahweh being up (Kohlenberger, 31).
o Practice:
CONCLUSION
Highly Recommended Commentary: Judges by Dale Ralph Davis
Posted in Bible, Bible Commentary, Book of Judges, Book Review, Christianity, Dale Ralph Davis, expository preaching, Reformed, Theology on September 26, 2016| 12 Comments »
Dale Ralph Davis. Judges: Such a Great Salvation. Ross-Shire, UK: Christian Focus Publications, March 20th, 2006. 240 pp.
Rating: 5 out of 5
This was a very edifying and enjoyable bible commentary through the book of Judges. The work is authored by Dale Ralph Davis who previously was a professor of the Old Testament at Reformed Theological Seminary (RTS). This is an outstanding work that helps explain what is going on in the book of Judges. The commentary divides Judges into three parts with a total of twenty one chapters. I think anyone who is studying the book of Judge will find this commentary as an indispensable resource. The great thing about the way the author writes is that it is accessible for preachers as well as the person in the pew. I learned a lot from reading this book and below are some of the highlights:
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