Biblical Preaching (Homiletics) | Lecture 10 : BC204-BP-20260915

Okay. Yeah. Um I just want to read one scripture and then we'll pray. Right. Okay. So, uh I'm just reading from 1 Peter chapter 4. Okay. 1 Peter chapter 4 and verse verses 10 and 11, right? 1 Peter 4 10 and 11. Verse 10 says, "As each one has received a gift, minister, minister it to one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God." Right? So you've received the gift, you minister, serve one another with it because you've received it through the grace of God. Right? Then verse uh 11, if anyone speaks, let him speak as the oracles of God. If anyone ministers, let him do it as with the ability which God supplies, that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ to whom belong the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen. Right? So it says uh talking about speaking, right? If you're going to be speaking, if you're going to be, you know, particularly in our context of biblical preaching, if you're going to be preaching, if you're going to be serving, it says let him speak as the oracles of God. So, which means that you're speaking the message of God. You consider that that is what oracles means, right? Whatever God is speaking, you are speaking, right? Let him speak as the oracles of God. the message that God wants us to speak. The message that [clears throat] God wants people to hear, right? So you speak in such manner which means that you don't uh speak um you know about yourself or or pointing to yourself or you know focusing of course we share our testimonies of God what God has done in our lives but without you know bringing too much attention or elevating ourselves but you speak as the oracles of God and if we are ministering we minister with the ability which God supplies that In all things God may be glorified. In all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. Right? So this is this is something for us to keep in mind as we prepare, as we, you know, learn, as we minister, right? So let's uh so let's pray, right? Father God, this morning we we come before you, Lord. We thank you for the this reminder Lord that we speak when we minister Lord that we are stewards of your grace Lord something that we don't deserve something that you've empowered us with Lord divinely and so Lord we pray and ask Master that you would give us that same mind that same heart oh father god that we would speak as the oracles of God which means that we'll be careful to lean in to listen to receive Lord what you're speaking what you're giving us and also Father God as your word says that we would minister as with the ability which you supply Father God so physically emotionally spiritually Lord we just want to be strengthened today with your ability Father God and so that we can minister Lord and the glory and the honor Lord everything Lord belongs to you and you alone Lord yes as in everything that we do, in everything that we speak and say and do and think, Father God, Lord, may we do it as unto you, Lord. May we do it as unto the Lord. Lord, let our hearts posture be in the right place, Father God. Lord, enable us, Father God, to focus on you, Master. Even this morning, Lord, we pray and that even as we draw near to you, Lord, enable us to, Lord, be wholeheartedly, Lord, focused on you to receive from you, Master. We thank you in Jesus matchless name we pray. Amen. Amen. Okay. So, um we've been studying about um how to study the word, right? The word of God. We looked at how important it is for us to have the word of God as the content, right? As the main focus of a message. Um so this morning let's um let's look at continue and see what are the different ways by which we can study the word of God. Right? The first one we saw was word study. Right? So what does word study mean? How does we how do we do a word study? How did you do the word study? Reading the Bible. M >> but in a simple way what does word study mean? pastor uh yes getting to know about the uh actual meaning of the word like using strongs >> and the Hebrew meaning. >> Yeah. Can you repeat that again please? >> Yeah. Getting to know about the actual uh meaning of the word >> actual meaning of >> the word the word. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Exactly. So >> knowing the Hebrew meaning of that word >> like that. So we look at the scripture, we look at the Bible and we see, you know, we see several chapters, we see several verses, right? And the focus of a word study is to just take one word, right? That's the thing. Uh so here word doesn't mean word of God. We're talking about one word, right? So you have a sentence and it's made up of many words. >> [snorts] >> So you take one word and study that word. Wherever that word appears in the New Testament, in the Old Testament and we we find out we study more about that word, right? We also looked at that example, right? For example, the grace of God. Grace of God has three understandings to it and three meanings to it, right? Grace of God means unmmerited favor. Something that we did not deserve, God gives into our lives. That's grace. Grace of God also means divine character where we are where we are called to grow in the grace of God. Grace of God also means divine empowerment or his power where we we when we study about the gifts of the spirit it is called the gifts of grace. Right? It's the power of God but it's given you know uh as a as a favor or without um any striving or performance. It's given freely. Right? So care is gifts of grace. So, so we see that understanding comes only when we study the word word grace, right? Similarly, we looked at the word the word love itself, right? It has some in in Hebrew, I'm sorry, in the Greek, there are four usages of Greek, right? We looked at that word agape, filio, iOS, and sto. So these four words all are translated into the English language as love but maybe in the vernacular it could be different right but the fact is that um when we study the Greek when we study the word then we get a deeper meaning deeper understanding so that is the uh you know and that is the that is how we go about that is the focus of the word study right and we also saw how we can do it we can use a concordance we can do strongs concordance We can use um you know digital tools like ESOD or MSOD right all these are very useful and um it's uh when we do a word study we can also use certain Bibles like uh uh some Bibles actually have the words mentioned there meaning of the words mentioned there right both in the Hebrew and the Greek there is a Bible called the spiritful life bible right I I started using somebody gifted it to me and so [snorts] I started using that uh like from the time I became a believer. So there these words are Greek words, Hebrew words are actually given in the side by side. Um certain words not all the words like certain words are given and uh you get to understand the meaning of it right. [snorts] Um so for for example you know earlier on uh I studied about the word worry. The lord Jesus says right don't worry about anything. Don't be anxious. Don't worry about what you will eat, what you will drink. And that word worry, it means uh the Hebrew word mem. Okay, that means uh a a mind that is preoccupied, a mind that is divided. It's like you know if something you cut into different pieces, it's like that a cake you cut into different pieces. Now each slice is pointing to some thought, some worry. So that's the word which is used there. So you get that understanding when you do a word study. We can actually use uh you know Bibles like that. But um ESOD and MSOD are good tools as well. Okay. So let's look at the next one uh how can we study the word of God. Okay. The uh the second manner in which we can study the word is when we study a topic. Right. So it's called a topical study. When we study a topic. So what is the difference between word word study and topical study? Word study is about a word but topical study is about a subject. It's about a topic. Right? >> [snorts] >> It could be about u uh you know something like uh you know the gifts of the spirit for example it's a topic gifts of the holy spirit right so it is not a word but it's it's a topic so wherever the gifts of the spirit occur in the bible or whatever the bible mentions directly or indirectly right as the gifts of grace gifts of the spirit so that's how we go about studying so It's about a theme. It's about a topic, right? It could be about sin. It could be about salvation. It could be about faith. Right? Now, uh a topical study could be also a word study. Like for example, let's say salvation. Salvation is both a word and it's also a theme, right? You are getting saved and it's also a topic, right? So, it could be something similar. It could be like that. So what does the Bible talk about that particular topic, right? It could be uh uh you know anything like um for example you know uh are women allowed to minister you know can women be ministers of God right so topics like that that's a theme so what does the Bible say what does the Bible talk about this right so we look into the word and we study right so how do we go about choosing uh or how do we go about doing a topical Bible study first thing is to choose a topic IC, right? So any topic that you want to choose, anything that you want to study about, you choose that topic, right? Maybe life after death, right? Or um it could be um you know the worship in the Old Testament, any topic, anything that because there are, you know, there is no limit, right? So you pick a topic and then we go through the Bible. What does the Bible say? You know, we don't restrict ourselves to only the New Testament. We look at the Old Testament also, right? We look at the entire the Bible in its entirety [snorts] and we study, okay, what is this theme? This theme of faith, how is it in the Old Testament? This the theme of faith, how is it in the New Testament? Okay, the move of the Holy Spirit, how is in the Old Testament? How is in the New Testament? So we we study that topic and as we find out verses as we find out you know Bible portions which talk about this topic and also you know certain uh um let's say certain incidents that happen [snorts] about the topic so we we make a note of that right. So it can be a lot of things you know the the advantage is that we learn about a particular topic what does the Bible say about this right it is not just the verse that we read okay in context of course you know maybe we read one where are the gifts of the spirit mentioned 1 Corinthians 12 134 right those three chapters we read about the gifts of the spirit but We also see other portions where it talks about these gifts, right? Uh not particularly the gifts gifts of the spirit but the gifts of grace that are given to the body of Christ to that given given to the believers. So where else can we find you know if you look into the Bible you look at uh Romans chapter 12. Okay. Romans chapter 12 verse 6. Romans 12:6. Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, let us use them. Right? Is it there? Romans 12:6. Right? Having their gifts and then it lists a lot of things. It talks about prophecy. It talks about faith, ministry, uh teaching, leadership, uh generosity, so many things, right? So that is also a passage which talks about that. Then if we look at the book of um Ephesians, right? Efficience also talks about the gifts that are some of the gifts that are mentioned there and how we should use it and all that. Um so similarly we go to every passage which talks about the gifts. Okay, we go to every passage that talks about the usage of the gifts. Um the how it how we should use it, how we should apply it and we learn right. So we give get a full complete picture about this topic gifts of the spirit. So it's not just one verse. It's not just one chapter but wherever this theme occurs in the Bible. Right? So now it compared to a word study this would be more effort. Right? a word study. Uh well, it it that also requires effort. But when you do a thematic study or a topical study, it would require more effort and more time, right? And again, a concordance would help and uh certain other tools will help. Um now, of course, we can go online, we can, you know, uh just type in the uh theme and then you get everything. you can use AI tools and that also you will get like we'll get the entire scripture but it is up to us to to read to study to understand and to apply it right so this is the uh this is another very important and very useful way of uh studying the word of god right so see we we continue with our daily devotions right we we don't have to stop that maybe you're reading a passage maybe you're reading a few chapters uh Maybe you're going verse by verse and uh you know many different ways right your personal devotions you do that but alongside that know if we can do a word study for yourself and if you can do a topical study for yourself now that's going to be really enriching you get you a a thorough understanding of several topics you know even as we do that it might be slow no problem right but the thing is that you understand certain certain things and we get grounded in certain um certain themes that are there in the Bible, right? So where it talks about faith, where it talks about grace, when it talks about judgment, you know, all those things are important themes that we need to get a firm grounding on, right? Okay. Then the third ma manner, third way in which we can study uh the word of God is through uh a character study. Right? So what do we mean by character study? It means that we um it which means we study people in the Bible, right? People in the Bible. What what do uh so we have people several you know uh so that that is what we mean by character. We have several people in the Bible who are mentioned in the Bible whom God used in many interesting ways and um so we are going to we we can study look into their lives and uh and study about them right so many characters right from you know sorry what anything right right from the old testament we have uh you know so many characters u in fact uh one person um did a very interesting study He did a study of the characters who were unnamed. The names are not mentioned, right? But they have done some important work, right? So he did a study of the unnamed characters in the Bible. Their names are not mentioned. Like for example, um Antioch, the church in Antioch was actually planted by people whose whose names we don't know. Like the church in Samaria, we know Philip went there. He preached the gospel. They all got saved. Right? But the church in Antioch which is a thriving church which had so many you know prophets and teachers and Paul and Silas were commissioned from there. Paul and Barnabas were commissioned from there on the first missionary journey. We don't know right. So he did a study on who are these people why did they go to Antioch you know uh things like that. So character study. Now from the character uh when we do a character study it is um we get to learn about the good things that people did. See the people are not perfect. We need to understand that right? They might have been used by God in powerful ways but they still had personality flaws right. They still had uh certain character flaws in them, right? Uh certain limitations because they are human, right? But they empowered by the power of God, empowered by the grace of God to carry out and do some extraordinary things, right? Um so when we learn about that, we also learn we so we learn about how to do it, right? How to do how to live, how to relate to God, right? But we also learn about how not to do certain things, right? That's an important lesson that we learn also like in church for example. Uh on Sundays we are doing a character study on David, right? We started with uh in two Sundays. The first Sunday we looked at you know his early stage and then second Sunday we looked at you know visibility you know how he rose to prominence and and so on. We have been looking at that right. So, but as we study David's life, we were we are going to reach a place where we study about his mistakes, right? The great great blunders that he did um as a king, the blunders, the the the mistakes that he did as a father, right? Some of the things that he ignored in uh in correcting his son uh Abselum. And so we we read about we study about that. So what is this? When we study character, it is very applicationoriented, right? Meaning, you know, you can apply it in your own life, right? Okay. What are the lessons? What did he do right? Okay, let me learn, let me try it. What did he do wrong? Okay, let me learn, let me avoid. Let me not let me also not follow that same path. So, that is something that we can do right now. Um when we study when we do character study one thing we need to you know uh keep in mind right is the dispensation in which they lived right that is a very important thing right right did they live before the cross did they live after the cross it's a very important you know um it's a very important distinguishing factor right why is it important because the way in which God dealt with them, right? The way in which the Holy Spirit ministered to them, came upon them in the Old Testament is different or before the cross is different from how it was after the cross. Right? So we need to understand that we are people who are living in a period time period after the cross. Right? So that is a very important u distinction because if we if we don't understand that then certain things we would apply in our lives certain you know certain teaching or certain doctrines we begin to be grounded in which which may not really apply to us. Like for example, we know King David >> [snorts] >> uh you know he made that mistake uh of adultery and murder and and then he repented and then he writes that psalm where he says you know take not my holy take not your holy spirit from me right he's repenting and [snorts] he's saying take not your holy spirit from me right so now that's a that's a beautiful psalm and so if we study that and then say okay this is what happened in David's life and then we also begin to apply it saying okay god you know the repentant repentance part important right and um him wanting to uh know and and experience the presence of god very important but him saying don't take your holy spirit from me will it be applicable for us it will not be right the reason being the holy spirit is here to convict us. The Holy Spirit is here to indwell us. The Holy Spirit is here to sanctify us and teach us. Right? So there's no question of God removing because we fell. There's no question of God removing the Holy Spirit from us. Right? So he wants to [snorts] actually mold us and shape us to be like Jesus. And that is why he has come. And that is why the Lord Jesus in John chapter 14 very clearly said that I will send the you know I will send the promise of the father that he might be with you forever. Okay. [snorts] Um and that's the reason and we are called the temple of the holy spirit. We are called the indwelling uh of the holy spirit the habitation of the holy spirit. And Paul is writing that to the corinthian church. Right? 1 Corinthians I think chapter 6 and chapter 9 talk about how our body is the temple of the Holy Spirit. And he's writing to believers who are carnal, right? Who are fighting against each other. He's writing to believers who are sinful. He's writing to believers who are also, you know, who are very very charismatic in the sense that they were hungry for the power of God, hungry for the gifts of the spirit. All that was true. But Paul writing to them and saying your temple, your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit. He's warning them, you know, you cannot use it for immorality and all that. So, so the thing is this that we cannot apply certain aspects of what happened in that time and before the cross uh to our lives, right? because we are people who are living after the cross uh where God deals with us with grace where God deals with us uh in a very different way um but the same God right so so that is a very important um differentiation that we need to understand so how do we do it you know we pick a character find out all the passages in the Bible where this person is mentioned and if you look at King David we know 1 Samuel 2 Samuel He's mentioned he's also mentioned in in I think 2 Chronicles, right? [snorts] He's also mentioned in the book of Psalms, right? And he's also mentioned in certain New Testament scriptures where it refers to the Psalms, right? So we see in all these places in the Bible, King David is mentioned, right? He was he's even mentioned in the book of acts where James talks about how the tabernacle of David is now being you know is being restored and the gentiles we seek the lord no so in several places king David's uh life and whatever he did is mention right so we need to find out wherever it is mentioned it may not be in one chapter it not it may not be just in one book it will be spread out across right sorry so where certain people will mention where refer to those scriptures or mention those names right so that will help us so we can uh again concordance will help [clears throat] sorry um one thing that we can do is to make a timeline line. Okay. So when we say timeline, we're talking about um we're talking about the birth if it is mentioned there. Sometimes the birth is not mentioned, right? It's not mentioned as uh okay, he was born in such and such a place and such and such a time, you know, especially when you're looking at David. It just mentions that David Jesse had these many sons, right? And David was the youngest of them all. And that is how you know the 1st Samuel 16 I think it just starts off like that right when they mention about David. So >> [snorts] >> um so sometimes it's not mentioned like that but we can find out okay make a timeline okay um how does it start this the per the story about this person the narrative about this person how does it start and several stages of the person's life is also mentioned right in in David's case okay how he was as a shepherd uh what he did as a shepherd as a giant killer what did he do what happened after that right he's serving the uh he's serving as a uh as a soldier and uh and what happens after that. So you see several phases or stages in a person's life when we study characters. Now it's important it's uh it's it's interesting and it's very important. Okay, in this stage what is what are some things good things that are happening there in this stage? What are some difficult things that are happening for this person? Right? Uh in this stage um how is this person relating to God? Right? and uh how is God dealing with this person right all that we get to learn and so it's important to have in our minds like a timeline right and how does this person's journey end right um so several things we can find out right what are the major events what kind of um you know trials that they go through temptations etc right and um yeah so like we mentioned we can also talk about character traits. What is about their personality that uh that you find out what is strong, what they are strong, what they are weak in, um you know what are the things that they do right, what are the things that they uh do wrong and all that. So sometimes when we study the character of a person, we can actually see that certain traits of character you are able to relate to. You're saying hey um you know I see this in me you know these are some things these are some good things that I see in me which I see in this person right but you can also see there are some flaws you know there are some limitations that I see in me which I see in this person right and so I need to work on those things if I don't work on it then I see that the same flaws the same kind of mistakes that this person makes you know I I could potentially make those same kind of mistakes. So I need to you know change certain things about my life. So um so these are ways by which we can study the character. Okay. Okay. Then so those are three things that we looked at word topic character. Then the fourth way that we can study the word of God is to do a book study. Now this is fairly a simple concept but difficult to implement in the sense. So we take a book right. Um how many books are there in the Bible? [snorts] 66. Right? So we take a book and we study a book. Now when we study a a book in the Bible, it is challenging in the sense we will actually use all the three methods um that we used earlier. As we study a book, we will end up doing a word study because there are certain words mentioned there in certain ways we need to study about. As we study the book, we will learn about some themes, right? As we because certain themes are mentioned there. As we study the book, we also learn about the people in the book, certain characters. So, we might be end up we might end up doing a character study. So, all those three methods of book study will be in the of study of the word will be in uh a book study. Right? Now, again, book study requires a lot of time, a lot of commitment. Right? Halfway through we might feel like okay I'll I'll do later know I it's it's getting to be a little tiring it's getting to be you know a little boring or you know it's I I want to do something else I want to read something else something else exciting no I I think if we persist right there's much value in it right so what are some advantages when we do a book study when we do a book study we will actually understand some of these themes and some of the verses which are there in context. Okay, the background of why it is there. So we will not take a verse out of context and quote it out of context and make a doctrine out of it. Right? For example, if you look at uh you know one Corinthians itself, right? If you look at one Corinthians and chapter, okay, let's look at Okay, let's um Okay, let's look at chapter 11. Okay, if you look at chapter 11, it's a it's kind kind of a controversial or know much misused um you know some of these verses even today, right? It's talking about head coverings. Okay, so it's a it's it's a it's a verse or it's a passage that is, you know, used to ensure that people or women cover their heads okay in in the church right now as we look at that we understand that he's also he's talking about two different things I mean you'll you'll actually do a very detailed study of one Corinthians in the third year but as we study if you go through this um through this passage you will see that you know in the context of head covering he's talking about headship. Okay, which means divine authority or uh he's talking about uh the way in which God has actually designed the flow of authority um in the church or in in in a set like a or in a you know set up like a family. Okay. So we understand about that and also we see that he's also talking about literal head covering because it has a cultural context to it right there in Corinth it had a cult a cultural context right because there were women who were getting saved and who were serving in you know as the temple prostitutes right so there there was a there was a you know it was known for that there was the temple of Diana and then uh you know there was all kinds of immoral activities happening there as part of their worship ritualistic worship right now people were getting saved and coming into the church and here he is talking about addressing those kind of women right so they they would typically have their head shaved who are serving there the women so he's talking about mentioning about that it's shameful for a woman to be shown on or shaved, let her be covered, etc. He's talking about that and and this entire passage, this theme, he ends it by saying in verse 16, but if anyone seems to be contentious, we have no such custom, nor do the churches of God. Okay, so what is he saying? saying, "Hey, this this whole thing of covering we we don't have as a custom, but it's a cultural thing and typically for Corinth, it is something that was necessary, right? For for the sake of modesty, for the sake of uh you know uh for the church congregation. So he he had to give those instructions. So when we do a book study, we learn about all this, right? So we're not just looking at one verse taking it and saying okay this is what you need to do right we're looking at the entire context. So when we do a book study, we also end up looking at the history, right? Corinth, okay? What is it called today, right? Where is it today? Is is it there today? Is it part of any other place or you know what is it? And we also end up studying about like how did it develop over the years, right? Spiritually speaking, how was it? Economically, how was it? Right. So we learn about all those things. Um so we have some you know we learn about the geography of the place. We learn about you know how the place was established. What was it famous for right? Uh Corinth was a port city and so we know that there was a lot of trade. So economically you know that was how it it thrived business-wise. So people would come bring the produce, bring the you know some some of the goods and and they would there would be exchange of it happening. So it was a very thriving place. Corinth was also you know different nationalities would be there right and spiritually speaking because of this temple there were a lot of people who would come and be part of the worship of that temple in that temple and it was immoral. It was pagan. It was it was evil and what was happening in the temple was also a reflection of the society itself. Right? So just imagine for the worship of God of a a deity whom they considered God if they were willing to sell their bodies or if they willing to you know be immoral and considered that to be ritual to engage with God. Right? So you can understand how their normal family life and society would be right. So there was no concept of right and wrong in the society. Everything was very relative. Uh there was no concept of morality. Everything was very mixed up. So that was the society in which Paul went and planted the church. Right? And in one and a half years um you know there was a thriving church there which is just the grace of God you know he went and taught them and he taught them about the gifts and all that and then there was a very strong church right which was which was built up. So so then that gives us a context okay that is the kind of place Corinth was and that is why Paul is writing um you know all these things um to them and in order to establish them. So right so we we when we do a book study we understand all that so every verse uh you know we understand that this is the background this is the context right um so it's it's good if we can it can of course take a longer time to study a a book but it's something very important for all of us to do right some books are small we can just finish it but uh some books based on the length of the book it's it's going to take a uh a lot of time Right? So in a simple manner how to how to study the books of the Bible. Right? The first thing is to make an outline of the book. Now that is simple. If you let's say let's take the same example of first Corinthians. Okay. If you can turn your Bibles to one Corinthians. Okay. You so you will see uh if you're using you know a particular translation you know you will see that it is it is titles are mentioned there. There are some headings there. So that that that can be an outline, right? If you see uh in my Bible, you know, I I see greeting as one subheading. Okay. Um and then spiritual gifts at Corinth as one subheading. Sectarianism is sin. No, in your Bible, is there anything mentioned there like that? It's just uh anyone else it is mentioned there. Okay. In yours, anything it's mentioned, right? So we see this. Now this this can be a an outline by itself, right? Um it talks about Christ crucified. Um sectarianism is carnal. Um so so the thing is uh the translators when they put together this particular version of the Bible, they actually you know put some paragraphs or put some uh subheadings there so that it it can be easy for people to learn right. So uh that is a thing but we see like apart from these subheadings certain topics will run across certain chapters like for example when we looked at gifts of the spirit it is across three chapters 12 13 and 14 right okay so um so we make an outline we do an outline and then that will help us okay we'll take a break and then we'll come