The Fallen Condition Focus And The Purpose Of The Sermon

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Bryan Chapell is President and Professor of Preaching at Covenant Theological Seminary, St. Louis, MO.

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Notes

5. Adams, Preaching with Purpose, 27.

6. See the Greek term artios (complete) in v. 17.

7. Some exegetes understand the "man of God" in 2 Timothy 3:16 to refer to the Christian minister, in which case the "work" for which the Word equips refers to ministry rather than the sanctification of believers. This interpretation does not undermine the conclusion that God intends "all Scripture" to "complete" believers, since a minister's duties of "teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness"from "all Scripture"will convey God's perspective on the hearers' inherent need of the scope of biblical truth.

8. Haddon Robinson refers to this as the "depravity factor" in "The Heresy of Application," Leadership Journal 18, no. 4 (Fall 1997):24.

9. Sidney Greidanus, The Modern Preacher and the Ancient Text: Interpreting and Preaching Biblical Literature (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans,1988),128-29.

10. Ibid., 173.

11. See chap. 8 for a full discussion of application in preaching.

12. Michael Fabarez offers this additional insight: "It can be demonstrated that the common usage of the word 'doctrine' today is more narrow than in biblical usage. The words lequach, sbemuab, and mucar in the Old Testament, and didaskalia and didache in the New Testament (all of which are translated 'doctrine' in various English translations) represent both abstract propositions and practical directives" (Preaching That Changes Lives [Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2002], 215-26).

13. John R. W Stott, Between Two Worlds: The Art of Preaching in the Twentieth Century (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans,1988),140.

14. A "biblical need" may or may not be a "felt need."In recent years, much criticism has been offered of preaching that focuses on felt needs in order to make the gospel appealing (see Terry Muck, "The Danger of Preaching to Needs." cassette [Jackson, Miss.: Reformed Theological Seminary, 1986], responding to such works as Charles H. Kraft's Communicating the Gospel God's Way [Pasadena: William Carey Library, 1979]). Such criticism rightly assumes that a steady diet of preaching focused on felt needs can make faith and worship purely matters of self-concern. At the same time, the gospel often helps people to see their biblical needs through felt needs (John 4:4-26; Acts 17:22-23). Preachers should not be afraid to help others see their biblical needs in order for such persons to discern their biblical obligations.

15. Walter L. Liefeld, New Testament Exposition: From Text to Sermon (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1984),20-21.

16. Adams, Preaching with Purpose, 51; and reiterated with even more force by the same author in Truth Applied: Application in Preaching (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1990), 33-39. See also Jonathan Edwards, Religious Affections, in The Works of Jonathan Edwards, ed. Perry Miller, vol. 2, ed. John E. Smith (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1959), 115-16.