Brief autobiographical note: When I was studying at SBTS, my sweet wife worked in Dr. Danny Akin’s office, so we got to know him a little bit. He is the real deal. I respect him so much that I’m honored if he asks for my help. So last fall I was approaching the deadline when I needed to get a manuscript to Crossway, and Dr. Akin contacted me about contributing a chapter on “Biblical Theology and Preaching” to a volume he was editing entitled Text Driven Preaching. I still had a good bit of work to do on my book, and he needed a pretty tight turn around himself.

I didn’t think about it long. In fact, I don’t think I thought about it all. I’m pretty sure I replied immediately. My love for Dr. Akin made the answer yes.

Thankfully, I had worked through every book of the Bible as it relates to biblical theology for my work on God’s Glory in Salvation through Judgment: A Biblical Theology, and God has graciously given me the opportunity to serve his people by preaching at Kenwood Baptist Church. In God’s kindness and mercy, the chapter on “Biblical Theology and Preaching” came together pretty quickly.

This autobiography is intended to entice you to let me serve you, too: are you interested in biblical theology? Are you trying to incorporate it into your preaching? If you’d like to read an essay on the topic, let me recommend one by Tom Schreiner: “Preaching and Biblical Theology.” If you want to read another, the essay I wrote at Dr. Akin’s invitation is linked below.

In my attempt to address the subject, I approached the topic by seeking to ask and answer these questions:

Do I need this to preach?

What is biblical theology?

How do I do biblical theology?

How do I preach biblical theology?

Can God’s people handle this?

How do I get started?

Thanks to the generosity of Broadman and Holman, you can read the whole thing here: “Biblical Theology and Preaching.” 

May the Lord bless our study and proclamation of his word.