By the way, my two favourite commentaries on the book of Ruth were…

• Robert L. Hubbard Jr: Book of Ruth (NICOT)
• Iain M. Duguid: Esther and Ruth (REC)

The first was excellent on exegesis and historical context: arguably the best technical commentary on Ruth. The second was underpinned by such scholarship, but added a layer of application that generated good ideas for the preacher.

Also, I’m reposting those links from yesterday. Some of them were not working:

1. Astounding Grace (1:1-6)
2. Three Women At A Fork In the Road (1:7-22)
3. Under the Shadow of His Wings (2:1-12)
4. The Kindness of Boaz (2:13-23)
5. Will You Marry Me? (3:1-18)
6. Marriage and Children (4:1-17)
7. The Genealogy of David (4:18-22)

I’ve just completed my first series in Ballymoney. Entitled “Astounding Grace”, it was a consideration of the book of Ruth.

Ruth is a short, suspenseful, and ultimately spectacular (Ruth 4:18-22!) story, showing how the grace of God can work in the most unlikely of situations. Despite sin and suffering, God blesses the small and endangered household of Naomi, all while providing the greatest King in Israel’s ancient history.  Key themes covered include providence, redemption and kindness. Here is the audio:

1. Astounding Grace (1:1-6)
2. Three Women At A Fork In the Road (1:7-22)
3. Under the Shadow of His Wings (2:1-12)
4. The Kindness of Boaz (2:13-23)
5. Will You Marry Me? (3:1-18)
6. Marriage and Children (4:1-17)
7. The Genealogy of David (4:18-22)

Luther:

I will preach the Word, will declare it, will write it. But I will never force or press anyone with violence, for faith can only be willingly, unconstrainedly nourished…I have done nothing; the Word everything. If I had so wished, I might have deluged Germany with blood; yea, I might have started such a game at Worms that the Emperor himself would not have been secure. I have only let the Word act.

(Christian Preachers, p 56)

Exiled Preacher has some helpful notes on a recent lecture: “Tools for Sermon Preparation.”

Commentaries are generally commended in the lecture, but 9 potential  dangers are also pointed out:

1. Redundant material
2. Vain discussion
3. Weak exegesis
4. Weak in biblical integration
5. Failure to point to Christ
6. Often weak in application
7. Concessions to unbelieving theology
8. Dull!
9. Turn the handle mentality

Its been a spur to my preaching to read Nigel Clifford’s “Christian Preachers.“ The following quote about Augustine is interesting. If true, it suggests that Augustine was really a topical preacher:

“His sermons were biblical rambles: biblical, for they were exclusively concerned with the words of Scripture, with Christ and His Church, with Christian belief and behaviour; rambles, for they rarely fully explained any one text but passed quickly to many others drawn from all over the Bible, so that his talks were littered with hundreds of quotations. In this way his hearers acquired a knowledge of Scripture, for many could not read and very few possessed one of the bulky manuscripts of the Bible. He did not prepare the content of the messages in detail, nor keep to one subject, nor divide up his talks by clear headings, nor even tell Bible stories. His sermons were strictly spiritual, applying the word of God to the hearts of people.”

(Nigel Clifford, Christian Preachers, p 25)

The Gospel Coalition website just seems to be getting better and better. At this rate, its getting very close to becoming becoming my homepage!

Take for example this excellent article by Tullian Tchividjian, How To Identify a Reliable Preacher. He has five helpful question to help us discern:

1. Does the preacher ground everything he says in the Bible?

2. Does the preacher freely emphasize that because of sin, a right relationship with God can only be established by God’s grace alone?

3. Does the preacher stress that salvation is not achieved by what we can do, rather salvation is received by faith in what Christ has already done?

4. Does the preacher underline that Christ is the exclusive mediator between God and man?

5. Does the preacher exalt God above all?

The unpacking of each of these points is well worth reading.

The Cornhill Training Course is an excellent introductory course in handling the bible well and then presenting it in understandable fashion. It originated in London, then branched out to Glasgow, but has most recently leapfrogged the water to Belfast, Northern Ireland. 

(Moore Casement, Director of Cornhill Belfast)

It was a joy for me to spend time at Cornhill yesterday. Leading feedback sessions for five minute expositions, I was stimulated by the simplicity of the areas we were evaluating. Surely, we should look for these four hallmarks in any clear exposition:

1. The Big Idea: Did the talk have one? If so, what was it? And was this  idea faithful to the text?
2. The Context: Did the expositor pay adequate attention to literary context? Were the verses under consideration being taken ‘out of context?’
3. The Content: Was the scope of the passage covered, or was something important missed out? Was the content simply explained and easy to follow?  Did the content reflect (and prove) the big idea ? Was anything unclear?
4. The Implications: What might the relevance of the passage be for Christians, churches, and even for unbelievers today? (note: this fourth area actually isn’t covered in the earliest Cornhill expositions, but is a component added later)

Since taking up my new charge, I’ve found the following quote to be true:

“To be a true minister to men is always to accept new happiness and new distress…The man who gives himself to other men can never be a wholly sad man; but no more can he be a man of unclouded gladness. To him shall come with every deeper consecration a before untested joy, but in the same cup shall be mixed a sorrow that it was beyond his power to feel before.”

(Philip Brookes, quoted in R Kent Hughes, Success Syndrome, p147)

(HT: Grace Dependent)

John MacArthur explains his preaching prep in terms of the ask, seek, and knock principle:

“I mean, I don’t just sit at my office and say, “Lord, I want to preach a great sermon Sunday. Please, I ask you, give me a great sermon.” No, what I do is I ask the Lord all week for that, and then I seek that by going through the Word of God and reading and reading. And then I begin banging on the Lord, in a sense, by saying, “Lord, I’m struggling with this thing and I want to understand it,” and this one this morning, which isn’t so hot, anyway, I rewrote three times. And on and on you go, struggling with it. But the point is, I realize that God is the only one who can produce through me, but at the same time, I’ve got to be involved in that.”

(from the sermon: “Loving people“; Matthew 7, 7-12)