Why should expositional preaching include biblical theology?

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Bibilical theology is necessary in order to understand the text. We can truly understand a text of Scripture only by situating it within the overall narrative of redemptive history.

Why should expositional preaching include systematic theology?

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Is there a contradiction between systematic theology and faithful preaching of the text? Can we faithfully do both?

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Recently, some people have begun to argue that systematic theology inherently distorts the meaning of scriptural texts. They argue that any “system” imposes foreign thought-structures onto biblical texts, necessarily tampering with their meaning.

What should a pastor do whose people don’t like expositional preaching?

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Spend more time preparing excellent sermons. Spend more time studying the text, meditating on it, praying over it, making sure you understand it. Spend more time praying for the members of your congregation by name, asking God how the text might apply to them. Sacrifice other items in your weekly calendar so that you can prayerfully prepare excellent sermons.

Why don’t people like expositional preaching?

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They have no appetite for it. Non-Christians typically have little desire to hear God’s authoritative Word. Yet we who are Christians can have weak spiritual appetites, like children who want only junk food, when the meat and vegetables of expositional preaching will do us far more spiritual good. We may not like expositional preaching because we’ve never been trained on solid foods.  

Should expositional sermons be evangelistic?

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Absolutely! Why?

Why doesn’t expositional preaching require a verse-by-verse approach?

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Some people associate expositional preaching exclusively with an approach that plods through books of the Bible one verse at a time. While this is certainly one way to preach expositionally, it is by no means the only way.

How does expositional preaching differ from other kinds of preaching?

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Topical Preaching: Topical preaching is preaching in which the preacher picks a topic he wants to address and then finds biblical material to fit that topic. Topical preaching is driven by the preacher’s agenda—what he wants to talk about. Expositional preaching, on the other hand, begins with the Bible. A preacher does not decide what to preach and then look at Scripture; rather, he looks at a text of Scripture and allows Scripture to determine what he preaches.

What do people wrongly assume expositional preaching is?

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Many people wrongly assume that an expositional sermon is

What is an “expositional” sermon?

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An expositional sermon is a sermon that takes the main point of a passage of Scripture, makes it the main point of the sermon, and applies it to life today.

In other words, an expositional sermon exposes the meaning of a passage of Scripture and shows its relevance to the lives of one’s hearers. That’s it.

This means that an expositional sermon does NOT

What can we learn from Fundamentalists?

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From Fundamentalists, we can learn

To contend earnestly for the faith once for all delivered to the saints (Jude 3). To evangelize. To insist on the importance of penal substitutionary atonement. To vigilantly guard against false teaching. To work for the moral and doctrinal purity of the church. To separate from those who teach a false gospel.

Why should churches draw doctrinal boundaries?

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False teaching harms the church. Paul calls right doctrine “sound” or “healthy” (1 Tim. 1:10; 2 Tim. 4:3). False teaching, by contrast, is spiritually destructive (2 Pet. 2:1). False teaching spreads. The New Testament warns us that false teaching spreads like gangrene (1 Tim. 2:17). Churches should draw boundaries for the sake of their health and even their very lives.  

How do we determine which doctrines are more important and which are less important?

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The answer to that question depends on how closely related to the gospel a doctrine is and how much practical impact it has on the Christian life.

Is systematic theology biblical?

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Certain academics argue that systematic theology inherently distorts the meaning of the Bible. They argue that any “system” imposes foreign thought structures that necessarily tamper with the meaning of biblical texts. Such scholars often argue that the biblical documents contain irreconcilable diversity, which is to say, contradictions. Hence, they argue that systematic theology is at best unbiblical, at worst impossible.

So is systematic theology biblical or not?

Why is expositional preaching that ignores biblical theology unsound?

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Expositional preaching that ignores biblical theology is unsound because:

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