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Do not simply introduce a functional or dynamic equivalent of the parts of the CPT at this juncture of sermon preparation. Do not merely extract a moral principle from the CPT and work it into a generic proposition. Do not simply abstract a moral principle...

Do not simply introduce a functional or dynamic equivalent of the parts of the CPT at this juncture of sermon preparation. Do not merely extract a moral principle from the CPT and work it into a generic proposition. Do not simply abstract a moral principle from the CPT for preaching (read about this danger in appendix 5). The text is not just a case study or illustration of a timeless principle. It carries a proposition in itself that is unique in what it proposes. Here is an example from Psalm 2 of moving from the CPT to the EPT. CPT of Psalm 2 Theme: Since the King of heaven has installed his Davidic Son on the earth in Zion and declared his right to international rule, Thrust: the rebellious kings of the earth must worshipfully submit to this ultimate King of the earth. We know that the New Testament writers used Psalm 2 to point to Jesus as the ultimate King of the earth. So we can remove theocratic, Israel-related terms such as the Davidic Son and Zion and incorporate a theological interpretation from the New Testament. The rest of the EPT will reflect the CPT and remain intact, for this is how later believers understood the claims of Psalm 2. EPT of Psalm 2 Theme: Since the King of heaven has installed and declared Jesus as the ultimate ruler of the nations, Thrust: the kings of the earth must worshipfully submit to him. Now your purpose bridge (step 4) can be drawn from this unique, text- particular, expositional proposition. II. The Central Proposition of the Sermon In this advanced procedure, the central proposition of the sermon (CPS), like the CPT, will have two phases. A. Expositional Proposition of the Sermon (EPS). The mechanics here are the same as outlined earlier in this manual. Turn the purpose bridge into a question to provide the initial theme of the statement. Then contemporize the purpose facilitated by the EPT. Since the theme of the CPS is often initially in the form of a question, you would have to homileticize it for recall and impact. Pray, think, and work hard on the central proposition of the sermon. B. Central Proposition of the Sermon. We can also refer to the CPS as the homiletical proposition. This is a highly stylized version of the EPS. It takes into account the preacher's rhetorical strategy and purpose, the design structure of the sermon, the mnemonic restatement of the homiletical proposition, and logical/emotional/ethical issues in the audience. At this stage of stylization, it will be driven by audience, communication, and application factors. Recognize, however, that if you stop short of this stylized and specific proposition, for lack of experience or time, you still will have a viable proposition to preach in the expositional proposition of the sermon. Let me illustrate the entire process from a short, narrative passage. 1 Chronicles 12:32 And of the sons of Isaachar, men who understood the times, with knowledge of what Israel should do, their chiefs were two hundred; and all their kinsmen were at their command. Central Proposition of the Text CPT or Exegetical Proposition: I took into consideration the biblical and theological context of the divine appointment of David as the next king of Israel (v.-23) and came up with Theme: The characteristics of the two hundred leaders of the sons of Isaachar during the transition from Saul to David... Thrust: understood the times with knowledge of what Israel should do. EPT: The expositional proposition of the text is facilitated by making theological connections from the exegetical proposition. Theme: The characteristics of spiritual leaders of God's  people during times of divinely permitted change Thrust: must have understanding of the times with knowledge of God's revealed expectations of his people. Notice the connections I have made: "sons of Isaachar" to "spiritual leaders," for spiritual leaders play the same role then and now; "Israel" to "God's people," for monarchical Israel does not exist now. The "transition from Saul to David" is connected to "divinely permitted change," for we know that all change is under God's control and permission. But monarchical change in Israel does not link to sociopolitical changes in the world, just to sociopolitical changes that God's people experience. There are other Old Testament passages on how Israel dealt with changes in the nations. "Understood the times" is changed to "understanding the times," for this is a call to God's leaders. "What Israel should do" is linked to "what God's revelation expects of his people," for the nature of revelation includes God's expectations. The sons of Isaachar knew what God wanted them to do from God's revelation. Purpose Bridge My audience is made up of future Christian leaders. Since we live in a period of massive change, my purpose bridge becomes: "to motivate future Christian leaders to understand the times and know what to do during the changes that their churches experience." Central Proposition of the Sermon I turn the purpose statement into a question for a preliminary and unpolished expositional proposition for my sermon. EPS: Theme: What does it take to become effective leaders during changing times in our churches? Thrust: Sensitivity to culture (cf. understanding the times) and application of Scripture (knowing what God expects us to do). I now sculpt a more stylized proposition. CPS or Homiletical Proposition: Theme: Effective spiritual leaders of congregations moving to the future. Thrust: Exegete the world and execute the Word.  Advanced Procedure Chart If you find this addition of an expositional proposition tedious or ambiguous, don't do it. It is better that you pursue the method as it is laid out in the main section of this manual. There I have applied just the core method on nonepistolary texts such as Isaiah 19, Revelation 4, and Matthew 18. You would be more confident of faithfulness to the text in that way. As you gain more awareness of and experience in the core method, you may attempt what I suggest in this appendix.  APPENDIX 8 UNDERSTANDING YOUR AUDIENCE Exegeting Culture Biblical preaching without application leads to frustration in the audience even as application without authority leads to the eventual distrust of the preacher. But application that is not pertinent and oriented to the audience can lead to a dangerous notion. The audience leaves with the idea that the Bible does not relate to them or that it is good only for isolated instances in life. As we know, the Bible has a comprehensive reach. Therefore, the preacher must promote the integration of biblical truth with life. The only way to integrate truth with life in preaching is by exegeting culture. Understanding one's audience is the second phase of sermon preparation (the first is to understand the Bible). The third is understanding one's self. Exegeting culture is as much a discipline as exegeting Scripture. I like to duplicate step 1, Study the Text, in studying our audience. We must see life's details and interpret those details to give us the context for our preaching (and theologizing). I shall give you some guidelines as you develop this necessary ingredient of impacting preaching. Seeing raw material in life's details. Great insight and material for illustration and application can be gained by observing your audience in the following arenas of their lives. The ways people communicate verbally and nonverbally How they live: their lifestyles, occupations, income, and spending Relationships: the roles of husbands, wives, children, extended family, and community  The premises of their beliefs: their worldview, their values, their motivations Finding resources for your preaching. You can find insightful resources to enhance your sermon by asking the following questions about your audience: What do they believe? What do they value? What do they need? What do they do? or How do they behave? Find these resources in any expression of contemporary culture- newspapers, magazines, movies, the Internet, etc. Connecting observations and interpretations about culture to your sermon. 1. To evoke needs in your introduction: Use the material that surfaced in your observations and interpretations to evoke needs pertinent to the purpose of your sermon that your central proposition will address. These "needs" may be spiritual, existential, philosophical, and even physiological. Utilize those findings in articulating an effective need in your introduction. 2. To illustrate your points: These studies will give you opening and closing illustrations and supportive material to use throughout the sermon. 3. To integrate truth and reality: At the point of cultural needs or tensions, find ways to integrate and apply the central proposition to their present life realities. To make connections, observe the behavior of your audience and draw some conclusions as to its structure. For instance, if you observe that people carry many keys (for their house, car, office, etc.), ask yourself what is the deep structure of this surface behavior? What are people afraid of? What do they hope for? If they carry many keys, they may have a deep desire for security and ownership. If you are in a passage that refers to God's protection, such as Psalm 46, or God's ownership of all things, such as Psalm 24, you can illustrate and apply it from this aspect of your audience's life.  Understand how people would like to behave as opposed to how they actually live. This understanding will reveal an important resource and connection for preaching. For example, people may want to be generous but live selfishly. Being generous takes time and money, both of which people think they have little. If you are in the Good Samaritan passage, you can illustrate and apply it from this aspect of your audience's life. You need to understand what your audience already believes without their needing proof or justification. In the West, people believe that one can actually control life (or aspects of it); in other parts of the world, people believe that one cannot actually control life (any aspect of it!). If you were preaching a passage about God's rulership over lives, the truth would apply differently in the two contexts. In the West, you would challenge people to yield control of their lives to God. In other parts of the world, you would stress that people take responsibility for certain aspects of life even though God is sovereign over all. A final comment: The best way to know your audience is to spend time with them. Spend time with them in their work and at home. Be with them at the hospital and cemetery. Read what they read. Understand their questions. Get inside their minds and lives. As you integrate your exegesis of the Word with your exegesis of the world, your communication will be richer, deeper, more relevant, interesting, dynamic, and impacting.  APPENDIX 9 THE ELEMENTS OF A COMPETENT SERMON OUTLINE The following elements of a competent outline, with slight alteration, are taken from Al Fasol's Essentials for Biblical Preaching: An Introduction to Basic Sermon Preparation. It is more important that you are conscious of meeting these criteria in a topical sermon than in a textual sermon, because many of these will be met as you seek to elicit the outline from the text in textual exposition. 1. The outline should have a strong, clear relationship to the title. 2. Each major point should discuss only one aspect of the title or theme. 3. Each major point should be distinct from other points. 4. Each major point should be written as a complete sentence. 5. Each major point should be written in the present tense. 6. Each major point should have approximately equal value in the development of the sermon. 7. The points should be organized in whatever order and style (e.g., logical, poetic) will best communicate the textual interpretation to a particular congregation. 8. The outline should contain specific rather than general wording. 9. Each major point should have a textual basis.  APPENDIX 10 A SAMPLE SERMON INTRODUCTION In step 6 we divided the introduction into three parts: pre-introduction, introduction, and sub-introduction. Pre-introduction. This segment has nothing to do with the sermon but has everything to do with the speaker and the audience. Often these are words of greeting and show some continuity with the earlier part of the service or the audience or the hosts. Main introduction. Again the main introduction has four characteristics: Gets the attention of the audience Raises an appropriate need Orients the audience to the theme or the central proposition of the sermon States the purpose or destination of the sermon Sub-introduction. The sub-introduction sets the "context of textual authority" for the sermon while reviewing a previous sermon or the title of the series or announcing the text. I will illustrate these ingredients of a strong introduction from the "Get Off the Chair!" (Rev. 4) sermon mentioned in step 6. This sermon just happens to be the one I preached while writing step 6. Let me show you how I attempt to apply what I have suggested in step 6. What I would say is in italic. TITLE: Get Off the Chair! -Needs to tease the reader into taking a second look and thinking a second thought -Accurate, clear, short, and interesting TEXT: Revelation 4:1-11 MAIN INTRODUCTION. [Attention getter related to the theme. Notice this is not a good story for a good story's sake. Appropriate illustrations must be found.] Four mothers who had priests for sons were declaring the esteem with which these men were addressed. The first said, "My son is a priest. When he walks into a room, the people call him 'Reverend Father.'' The second said, "My son is a monsignor. They address him, 'Your Excellence.'' The third said, "My son is a cardinal. The people call him, 'Your Lordship.'' The fourth mother was not sure of what to say: "My son is 6 feet, 10 inches, and 350 pounds. When he walks in, people get up and say, 'Oh, my God!'" Orientation to the theme: "Creature Deification by Christians" This morning I want to speak about creature deification-or more specifically, Christians (not Christ's) usurping claims to divinity. We have robbed God of his nature or attributes and focused them on ourselves. Other religious frameworks claim the nature of God as dwelling in humans. In our culture and in evangelicalism especially, we have usurped the omni-functions and feelings of deity. We concentrate glory, honor, and power on ourselves. We prefer to sit on the throne of our lives and think we live forever and ever: "Flirtations with divinity' or "self-deification.' It is true that the ultimate religious question that man needs to face is whether he will worship someone transcendent or himself. I call these "throne strategies' of men. Wider culture has wider throne strategies, for example, biotechnology and genetic engineering-the desire to play creator of life itself. However, Christians too have functionally occupied the throne of heaven in our own lives. We practically role-play God so that God cannot play his practical role. Like Eve of old, we are enchanted with deification, tempted by the possibility of acting divine, fascinated by self- sovereignty. Let me suggest three areas where we flirt with deification. Raising a need: Christian Throne Strategies and Their Vanity  Throne Strategy 1: This is an "independence through proprietorship' syndrome-a flirtation with sovereignty, the assumption of independence and ownership of my life. I have independent ownership of my life. I am the owner, maker, source of my life. If I don't look after myself, nobody will. How else can we explain, for instance, our quiet living in sin, our patterns of wrongful behavior, habits of sin that we pursue in our lives? Any time we sin we are assaulting God's throne. It is an act of cosmic treason; a coup d'etat against God's government. In sinning, I make the rules. How else can sin be explained except if we are claiming sovereignty? In the old worldview, humankind was the measure of all things. Now the individual is the measure of all things. I include an illustration of a Christian justifying his lifestyle of sinning, and then I go on to raise the need. Yours may not be an overt sin and a covert lifestyle such as that, but every time I am tempted to sin, I am tempted to sovereignty. There is the assumption of independence. We declare that we are the ultimate arbiters of the laws. Sin and the Christian faith reconcile in me. If you are carrying sin in your life today-anything from anger to adultery, you are your own sovereign! It is an illusion of divinity. You are sitting on the throne of heaven in your life. Would you mind getting off the chair? I go on to a couple more need raisers in this sermon and end each of those with "Would you mind getting off the chair, please?" I spend a substantial amount of time-15 to 20 percent of the time-raising the need, so that people will be yearning for some resolution or solution. There is room for only one to be seated on the throne to receive worship. We need to get off the chair! Here I review the subject again. Independence, invincibility, importance "syndromes' are thoroughgoing characteristics of Christian deification. Only deity can claim these without exaggeration or error. We cannot, ladies and gentlemen. We cannot and should not. Statement of purpose: My purpose today is to challenge us to dethrone ourselves in view of the central throne of heaven. I want us to resist temptations to deification by cultivating the protocol of heaven when it comes to the sovereign chair-the Lord God Almighty, Holy, Eternal Creator who is the only one worthy of worship. Let us look at how to get off the chair that we have wrongly occupied. SUB-INTRODUCTION I refer you this morning to the throne vision passage of Revelation 4. As you may know, as part of the continuing apokalypsis, the apostle John is invited into the throne room of heaven to receive spiritual ("I was in the Spirit') and prophetic (his vision is a composite of Isaiah's and Ezekiel's visions) foresight and insight. The question that Revelation addresses is: Who will be king-the exclusive sovereign God or an idolatrous substitute? Christ or Caesar in the past? Christ or Antichrist in the future? and by implication, Christ or anything else including yourself in the present? As you also know, Revelation 4 follows Christ's messages to the churches of Asia (Rev. 2-3). Five of the seven churches experienced disloyalty to Christ as their number one spiritual problem. Soon there were to be options for deception that would deceive even the elect if possible. Revelation 4 is pregnant with significance of how we relate to the chair of heaven and history. Let's get in with John's invitation. Peek into heaven-to observe, learn, and apply heaven's protocol on how to relate to the Sovereign who is worthy of your worship. Two of over a dozen heavenly hymns in Revelation are found here. Our focus is not on the song of the living creatures, which Bishop Heber immortalized for us in "Holy, Holy, Holy." Here I sneak in the CPS in raw form and will do so at the end of the sermon as well. Our focus is on the second song-the song of the elders. "Our sovereign God is worthy of our worship because he is the significance, superintendent, and sustainer of all people.' He is the owner and operator of the universe; he is the maker and manager of all history-macro- and micro-history. Therefore, we can't sit in his chair. Would you mind getting off the chair, please?  APPENDIX 11 FORMS OF SERMON INTRODUCTION Here is a partial list of types of material to use in an introduction secured from some Dallas Theological Seminary notes on introduction. I have classified them as pre-introduction and introduction possibilities. Pre-Introduction Commendation Reference to previous speaker Acknowledgment of introduction Reference to a special season Main Introduction If you recall the four ingredients of an effective main introduction, you may want to write in the precise ingredient each entry on the following list attempts to meet. Startling statement Challenging question(s) Serious or pertinent incident Humorous or amusing incident Vivid word picture Concrete illustration or example Definition(s) Quotation(s) Paradoxical statement Statement of problem News item Witty items Object lesson Parable or proverb Reference to popular book or TV/radio program Current event  APPENDIX 12 SERMON EVALUATION QUESTIONNAIRE While teaching homiletics at Dallas Theological Seminary, Haddon Robinson and fellow faculty devised a very useful questionnaire to evaluate one's preaching. It is still used in the preaching laboratories of Dallas Theological Seminary-one of the foremost homiletical training institutions in the world. I have adapted and expanded this questionnaire, which is found in Robinson's Biblical Preaching, in keeping with the preaching method in this book. The following questions will guide you as you structure your sermons and evaluate your delivery. The principles represented are universally applicable since they are based on the way humans send and receive messages. Ask yourself these questions each time you write and preach a sermon. Organization of the Sermon Title Is it contemporary? impacting? accurate? clear? short? Does the title explicitly or implicitly reveal what the sermon is about? Pre-Introduction Does it show awareness of what has gone before in the service? Does it take into account the audience's attitude toward the  speaker? Does it show common ground with the audience? Is there a discernible transition between the pre-introduction and the main introduction? Reading of the Text Is the passage properly declared? Is time given to find the passage? Is it read well? (Text may be declared and/or read in several places. See step 6.) Main Introduction Does it get attention? Does it raise some need directly or indirectly? Does it orient you to the theme? or to the main proposition? or to the first point? Is the sermon purpose stated? Is it the right length? Sub-Introduction Is the background of the text or sermon clear? Does it contribute to the theme, purpose, or main proposition in a useful way? Body Structure Are the points clearly stated? sufficiently anchored? adequately validated? properly explained and applied? Is the development clear? Is the overall structure clear? Does the sermon have a central proposition? Can you state it? Are transitions clear? Do they serve as review? Is there a link between the points? Do the main points relate back to the main proposition? Are the subpoints clearly related to their main points?  Design Structure Is the sermon arranged in an impacting way? Does it evidence logical arrangement? chronological arrangement? Does it show sensitivity to the psychological or sociological issues that may be raised by the sermon? Conclusion Does the sermon build to a climax? Is there an adequate summary of ideas? Is the central proposition of the sermon restated? Are there effective closing appeals or suggestions? Content Central Proposition and Exegesis Is your theme or topic significant? Is it appropriate to the text and audience? Is the central proposition of the text stated or evident in the sermon? Is the sermon anchored in good exegesis? Do you tell your audience where you are in the text? Is the analysis of the theme full? sensible? Are the arguments convincing? Does the content show originality? Supporting Material Is the supporting material integrally related to its point? Is it interesting? varied? specific? sufficient? Do you state the points to be illustrated? Do you make a transition from the points to the illustrations? Are the points connected to the audience? Are points restated or reviewed after their illustrations?  Application Are applications made in the right places? Are they customized to the audience? Are they concrete? Do they answer the "so what" question? Do they answer the "now what" question? Style Is all grammar correct? Is vocabulary concrete? vivid? varied? Are the words used correctly? Does the choice of words add to the effectiveness of the sermon? General Effectiveness Audience Adaptation Is the sermon adapted to the audience's interests? attitudes? Is it related to their knowledge? Does it meet needs? Review of the Delivery Intellectual Directness Do you speak loudly enough? Do you speak directly to the audience? Are you friendly? Does your delivery sound like lively conversation? Do you stumble over the pronunciation of any words? Oral Presentation  Do you use a pleasant tone of voice? Do you articulate clearly? Do you vary the pitch, loudness, and rate? Do you use pauses effectively? Physical Presentation Is your entire body involved in the delivery? Do you use gestures? Are the gestures spontaneous? definite? Do you try to avoid distracting mannerisms? Do you use good facial expression? Do you make appropriate and adequate eye contact? Are you aware of the audience's response?  APPENDIX 13 TOPICAL EXPOSITION We have noted the two ways of expounding Scripture-textually and topically. The Scripture Sculpture process delineates textual exposition. But theologians, preachers, and evangelists have often indulged in the topical exposition of the Scriptures as well. The key difference between textual and topical exposition lies in the source and development of your central proposition. In a textual sermon, the theme and development of the sermon is controlled by the text. In a topical sermon, the preacher chooses the theme and governs the development of the sermon. For this reason alone, some professors of preaching call on us to fall on our knees to weep and wail in repentance after preaching a topical sermon! I see the primary advantage of topical preaching not in its ease of preparation, for good topical preaching can demand time; nor in its higher potential for relevance, for you should depart from your textual servings to address immediate issues topically; but in the great advantage of inculcating a biblically informed worldview among biblically illiterate audiences who do not hold the Bible as authoritative in their lives. I suggest the following method in pursuing topical sermons. Topical Exposition 1. Choose your topic. You will find hundreds of topics in reference Bibles such as Thompson's or Nave's or Dake's or in a concordance. These topics are usually Bible-driven and lend themselves more to instruction than motivation. For example, what does the Bible say about "heaven" or "grace" or "money"? You may also choose topics that are audience-driven. That is, your choice of a topic, though the topic itself is addressed or anticipated in the Bible, is audience-driven. For example, if there has been a tragedy in your city, or should your people need a study on "giving," you would bring that particular topic to the Bible. Mix your preaching themes and topics between Bible- driven and audience-driven choices. The former addresses "knowledge and belief" needs while the latter focuses on "conduct and behavior" needs of the audience. Homiletical growth and development lie in picking topics that the Bible addresses and are also needed by the audience. I chose as my topic for a pastor's conference "finishing the work that God has given you to do." Knowing that my audience faced such issues as moral failure, ministry apathy, spiritual distraction, and discouragement prompted me to choose a topic the Bible addresses by statement, author-intended example, and repetition in the Old and New Testaments. I would later "homileticize" or "stylize" the topic. 2. Limit your topic. Limiting your topic will make your preparation easier and your choices of texts less random. One of the questions homileticians ask of a typical, three-point, topical sermon would be why there are three rather than four or five or more texts and points. You should prevent that negative judgment on your seeming arbitrariness by narrowing, defining, and specifying your topic. You may have heard of the preacher who said, "To make up for my twenty-point sermon of last week, my sermon today will be pointless." Select one limited theme (the word theme applies to textual, thematic, and topical sermons) that you can probe in your study and preach well. "Finishing the work God has given you to do" applies more specifically to pastoral leaders than simply "finishing well," a topic for a general audience. We could go to numerous texts and examples in Scripture to illustrate "finishing well" or "not finishing so well." Since you are limited by time and occasion, limit your topic to seize the preaching opportunity. Any desire to be exhaustive will exhaust you in preparation and your audience in your delivery. 3. Build your topic. Here you engage text and topic in interaction for developing the sermon. Use extreme care in building your topic. First, find pertinent Scriptures and then build subtopics, not the other way around. While you may derive topics from audience needs, build your subtopics according to the available Scriptures to explain or support your topic's development. Do not create your topical edifice and attempt to find Scriptures to buttress your choices. For, if you do, you will fall into the problem of "proof texting." It is at this point that topical preaching goes awry. We can support almost anything with scriptural proof texts! Proof texts become pretexts for whatever we want to say to our people, rather than receiving what God says on a particular matter and turning them into the structure of the sermon. How does one avoid arbitrary choices of subtopics, the fragmentary mining of texts, and personal penchants in building subtopics? 1. Build on prescriptions, assertions, or statements. These are especially found in epistolary or in wisdom literature. You can confidently gain subtopics for your topic from straightforward declarations or imperatives in Scripture. If a text plainly or by implication teaches truth on a topic, you may freely choose it to develop your topic. In many ways clear assertions ("God loves a cheerful giver," 2 Cor. 9:7) and prescriptions ("give in proportion to prosperity" [based on 1 Cor. 16:2]) are the easiest in topical development. Real problems for topical preaching, however, arise in finding topics and subtopics in the narratives, in biographies, and especially in the practices of biblical characters. Textual authority will seem weak if we preach on "why we should travel in pairs," using Noah's pairing of his animals; or Jesus' commissioning disciples to minister in pairs; or the feature of apostolic pairs (Paul and Barnabas). It is very difficult to exegetically or theologically justify that "traveling in twos" was being proposed for present obedience. You may be able to focus the topic on "the advantages of traveling with at least one colleague in itinerant ministry" and make a pretty solid case. Yet such advantages-mutual encouragement, accountability, and mentoring-themselves have to be deduced from examples in narrative that may or may not have been within the author's purpose. Thus I propose a threefold grid in utilizing  narratives for developing topical sermons. 2. Build on purpose, plot, or pattern of the text. To choose a valid point or subpoint from the narratives (this holds good for textual expositions as well), you need to detect and demonstrate your points from: (1) The purpose of the text. If I am preaching on the topic of "God's protection of his covenant people," I may go to 2 Kings for one of my points. But I would need to lodge that point ("God's protection proves his exclusive presence among his people") in the purpose of 2 Kings. The first part of 2 Kings is written to underscore that "there is a God in Israel, and the man of God is in Israel, over and against God's absence in the powerful nations that captured them." (2) The plot of the text. The author's "plot" is one way the author accomplishes his purpose and a critical way to discover that purpose. The purpose of the Gospel of John is clearly stated -"these have been written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name" (20:31). John not only narrates the miracles of Jesus, but also the Lord's interaction with specific characters to accomplish his purpose. You can detect John's use of Nicodemus (or the Samaritan woman or Thomas) moving from questions to interest to belief to commitment to Jesus. If you would then preach the story of Nicodemus according to these movements in the entire gospel, you can be clear and certain of textual authority. (3) The pattern of the text. If the author's plot has to do with characters, the author's pattern emerges from words, phrases, and concepts. You can explore the themes of "belief," "light," and "eternal life"; "provision of physical food by Jesus points to spiritual provision" from the author's patterns. Let's say you want to preach about believing on Jesus the Shepherd. You can obviously go to Psalm 23 but also to the "Shepherd of Israel" (e.g., Isaiah 40; Ezekiel 34) motif of the OT, which reveals a pattern of God's leadership of Israel. Your final point can relate Jesus' claim to be the Good Shepherd (John 10) as one of his assertions to deity so people can believe on him. Going back to the sermon on "the advantages of traveling in pairs in itinerant ministry," if you detect authorial purpose or plot or pattern to make a case from Luke and Acts for the topical imperative, then you possess textual authority. Otherwise, you will appear to be random in your choice, pursuing your personal interests while communicating mere opinion. Sadly, your people's opinions are as valid as yours and do not facilitate their obedience to God's truth. You can communicate your opinion as preference from observed textual phenomenon; just don't present it as a prescription for obedience. If an apostolic practice is supportable by prescription elsewhere or repeated for emphasis, you stand on surer textual ground. If not, your audience is left to your whimsical imagination and capricious ingenuity without adequate textual or theological foundations. The closer you can establish the connection between Scripture's propositions, the author's purpose, and your main points, the more authority your topical sermon will contain and convey. You can thus preserve the biblical integrity of your topical sermon. From the author's repeated statements of Jesus setting his face toward the cross and Paul fulfilling his life intentionally, I chose my specific topic "Finishing the work God has given you to do." I also limited my choices of subtopics to clear texts. I found two rather clear texts that turned into a two-point structure for a topical sermon. a. John 17:4. Jesus glorified the Father by accomplishing the work he was given to do. b. Acts 20:24. Paul did not count his life as dear to himself in order that he may finish his course (cf. his final declaration in 2 Tim. 4:7). 4. Preach your topic. Your topical sermon will evidence the same features as a textual sermon. Come up with a stylized central proposition, a clear structure, and then preach that sermon. The central proposition of the topical sermon, as does any proposition, consists of theme and thrust. My theme on this topic is simple: "Finishing the work God has given you to do?" (stylized later to "Going the distance in God's work despite failures, fatigue, and fear"). My thrust carries a multiple edge (another prominent feature of topical sermons is that they carry multiple thrusts):  a. Seek to glorify God in all you do and you will finish the work God gives you to do (John 17:4) (stylized later to "Increase God's weight in all aspects of your God-given ministry to go the distance in God's work"). b. Don't consider your life as dear to yourself and you will finish the work God gives you to do (Acts 20:24) (homileticized later to, "Decrease your self-importance in all aspects of your God-given ministry to go the distance in God's work"). I must admit that topical sermons elicit and unleash creative energies in choosing a focused, specific, pertinent, and interesting topic, and then in structuring and preaching it. I encourage you to balance textual and topical exposition in all your preaching. Textual sermons resemble vitamins that fortify, while topical sermons are more like aspirins that pacify. Your people need both strengthening and soothing. As long as you are disciplined and honest enough to exegetically and/or theologically justify your textual choices and interpretations as within the range of the authors' (divine and human) meaning, you should be safe and confident. You would still have to kneel often, but you wouldn't have to repent for having preached a topical sermon.  NOTES Preface. A quick survey of what we can learn from great preachers in history is found in G.-Ray Jordan, You Can Preach: Building and Delivering the Sermon (New York: Fleming-H. Revell, 1951), chap. 5, from Clement of Rome (bishop, ca. 88-ca. 93) to Phillips Brooks (1835-1893).. This phrase itself is a plagiarism! Webb Garrison (The Preacher and His Audience [Westwood, N.J.: Fleming-H. Revell, 1954], 256), points out Charles-L. Moore's ("the Highest Type of Originality in Literature," Current Literature 50 : 100) criticism of Faust, who is supposed to have borrowed the first half of the entire piece. In reading most of the homiletical works of the last century, I found unstated borrowing was a regular feature! I shall attempt to state where I got ideas singularly or en masse.. I do not include this anecdote to disparage preachers in the great city of Bombay (now Mumbai). My friends did find a fine church there. I guess I should have preached more on the problems of alcoholic consumption.. A comprehensive homiletical textbook would consider everything from the person of the preacher to his presence in the pulpit, from his personal holiness to the use of his voice. This manual focuses only on the mechanics of preaching, occasionally dabbling in the full range of subjects of a homiletics textbook. Several basic textbooks, such as those by Broadus and Robinson, are cited in the bibliography. Introduction. Here are some excellent definitions of expository preaching. Braga and Hayden focus on the content of the sermon. Robinson and the Committee on Biblical Exposition include methods and goals of expository preaching. An expository sermon is "one in which a more or less extended portion of Scripture is interpreted in relation to one theme or subject. The bulk of the material for the sermon is drawn directly from the passage and the outline consists of a series of progressive ideas centered around that one main idea" (James Braga, How to Prepare Bible Messages [Portland, Ore.: Multnomah, 1969, 1981], 53). An expository sermon is one that "begins with a substantial passage of Scripture and allows the principal thoughts of that passage to become the outline for development and the basis for application" (Edwin-V. Hayden, "What Is Expository Preaching?" in Charles-R. Gresham, ed., Preach the Word: Guidelines to Expository Preaching [Joplin, Mo.: College Press, 1983], 1-2). Expository preaching is the communication of a biblical concept, derived from and transmitted through a historical, grammatical, and literary study of a passage in its context, which the Holy Spirit first applies to the personality of the preacher, then through him to hearers (Haddon Robinson, Biblical Preaching [Grand Rapids: Baker, 1980], 20). Bible exposition is communicating the meaning of a text of Scripture in terms of contemporary culture, with the specific goal of helping people to understand and obey the truth of God (Committee on Biblical Exposition, 1982). Step 1: Study the Text. Step 1 is related to what is commonly known as Bible study methods. Starter books on the subject include: Fee, Gordon D., and Douglas Stuart. How to Read the Bible for All It's Worth. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1982. Finzel, Hans. Observe, Interpret, Apply: How to Study the Bible Inductively. Wheaton: Victor, 1994. Hendricks, Howard G., and William-D. Hendricks. Living by the Book. Chicago: Moody Press, 1991. Traina, Robert-A. Methodical Bible Study: A New Approach to Hermeneutics. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1985. Wald, Oletta. The Joy of Discovery in Bible Study. Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1975.. Robert Traina, Methodical Bible Study: A New Approach to Hermeneutics (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1985), 181.. Roy B. Zuck, "Biblical Hermeneutics and Exposition," in Walvoord: A Tribute, Donald-K. Campbell, ed. (Chicago: Moody Press, 1982), 19.. Eugene Lowry, How to Preach a Parable: Designs for Narrative Sermons (Nashville: Abingdon, 1989), 36-37.. Harold W. Hoehner, "Ephesians," in The Bible Knowledge Commentary: New Testament (Wheaton: Victor, 1983), 639. Step 3: The Central Proposition of the Text. I prefer proposition as the clearest term. Philosophically, proposition is more consistent with an evangelical bibliology; and homiletically, the term is consistent with homiletical tradition. For example, John Broadus, in On the Preparation and Delivery of Sermons, 4th ed., rev. Vernon-L. Stanfield (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1979), written in the late 1800s, used proposition (see chap. 8). A more recent text also refers to proposition. After identifying coordinates and subordinates (cf. our step 2), the authors write: "The next step in text analysis is the formulation of a propositional statement, a statement which distills and crystallizes the central thought of the text. The propositional statement is a statement out of which the sermon theme eventually evolves" (Joel Gerlach and Richard Balge, Preach the Gospel: A Textbook for Homiletics [Milwaukee: Northwestern, 1978], 25). Seven years after I put down the sermon regimen in writing, I found this fine text by Gerlach and Balge, which reflects some of the sequence that I am proposing in this manual. This again confirms the suspicion that I declared in my introduction-even contemporaries have been stealing my supposedly original thoughts! I also gratefully acknowledge the homiletics program at Dallas Theological Seminary over my student and professorial years. Haddon Robinson, Duane Litfin, John Reed, and colleagues too numerous to name have influenced me in concept, practice, and explanation.. Quoted in John R.-W. Stott, I Believe in Preaching (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1982), 226.. Haddon Robinson, Biblical Preaching (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1980), 33. Homiletics students exposed to Biblical Preaching will detect my plagiaristic indebtedness to Haddon Robinson in my step 3. Step 4: The Purpose Bridge. If there is anything that claims a semblance of originality in this manual, it is the mechanics of the process I explain in step 4, or the movement from step 3 to step 5 through step 4. Even advanced students seem to be helped in their grasp of the homiletical process each time this process is taught.. John Killinger writes: "Sermons often flounder because their preachers have not identified their purpose before beginning them........ The ingredients of a good sermon may be present-a spiritual attitude, clever ideas, good language, illuminative analogies or illustrations-so that both the preacher and the congregation are puzzled about why nothing seems to happen in the sermon. But without a clear purpose in mind the preacher cannot hope to accomplish much" (Fundamentals of Preaching [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1985], 48).. Jay Adams has entitled his book Preaching with Purpose (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1982), pointing us to the telos or the goal of the sermon. He makes a powerful case for justifying the purpose of everything in a sermon- from illustration to outline structure. See especially his chapter 1: "The Centrality of Purpose.". Gerlach and Balge call purpose "the telic note: What does the Holy Spirit intend to accomplish through this Word of God in the hearts and the lives of his people on this occasion?" (Preach the Gospel, 26). "Purpose is the central issue. The preacher's purpose in preaching, the purpose of the text, the purpose of the sermon content, of the organization, of the style, of the illustrative materials, of the type of delivery used-all of these and much more are crucial to good preaching" (3). As mentioned earlier, the approach of Gerlach and Balge is akin to what I have proposed in steps 1-4, except that they want the telic note to influence the propositional statement. The purpose of the sermon should not influence the propositional statement of the text. It will certainly affect the propositional statement of the sermon.. "A sermon is a revelation of some aspect of the reality of God in reference to some human need or condition" (Theodore-P. Ferris, Go Tell the People [New York: Scribners, 1951], 17).. For some who may be interested, I must address a point that Eugene Lowry (How to Preach a Parable: Designs for Narrative Sermons [Nashville: Abingdon, 1989], 37) brings up. He castigates the propositional form of preaching because of its deductive orientation in most preachers. "Those who suggest a thematic statement in the sermon preparation process often place it exactly between biblical work and sermon formation. The unintended result is to divide the work, with the whole process unwittingly imagined as an hourglass on its side: biblical work narrowing toward the thematic sentence, which then opens into sermon formation." Here is my response. First, in this method the thematic statement is not in the middle of the process. The purpose bridge is the link between biblical work and sermon formation. Second, "a deductive orientation" arises from the system of education that seminarians go through rather than something that is intrinsic to the sermon process being presented here. It is inductive as it arrives at the thematic sentence. Whether the sermon will be deductively or inductively oriented depends on step 4-the design/structure of the sermon. Third, I appreciate the "artsy" side of Lowry's suggestion. Instead like "experienced novelists and other narrative artists who never quite know where the story will go or should go," preachers must stay open. "We, too, need to maximize our capacity to keep open throughout the preparation process. The theme sentence seems not to encourage that openness" (37). I suggest that an effective "purpose" bridge preserves and provides for the preacher to be an artist while not allowing an uncontrolled and uncontrollable "openness" that will rob the text of its authority. Step 5: The Central Proposition of the Sermon. John R.-W. Stott, I Believe in Preaching (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1982), 225.. John A. Broadus, On the Preparation and Delivery of a Sermon, 4th ed., rev. Vernon-L. Stanfield (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1979), 38.. John Killinger, Fundamentals of Preaching (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1985), 44. Killinger suggests that the sermon idea comes from the lectionary text for the Sunday or out of the blue "at any time." For expository preaching, this "idea" comes from the text and is processed through the "purpose" of the sermon. Or as Gerlach and Balge put it: "The propositional statement attempts to express the central thought or the main thrust of the text in terms of its telic note. It accents what the inspired writer accents. It subordinates what he subordinates. It is not a sermon theme, though on occasion it may be. The sermon theme is embryonic within the propositional statement and emerges from it" (Joel Gerlach and Richard Balge, Preach the Gospel: A Textbook for Homiletics [Milwaukee: Northwestern, 1978], 27). By the way, if you want to preach a subordinate point of the text as the main point of your sermon, you have to shorten the text that you are considering as the preaching portion for the occasion.. J.-H. Jowett, The Preacher, His Life and Work (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1912), 133.. Some refer to the "theme" as "subject" (for example, Haddon Robinson). In my experience, students tend to confuse the homiletical subject (or theme) with the grammatical subject of a sentence, which is most often a prominent noun. Consequently, I have given up the term subject for the less confusing term theme. The theme also works well for topical subjects or themes that one may pursue. Whether textual or topical, the sermon has one theme. Henry Grady Davis, Design for Preaching (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1958), writes against erroneous kinds of subjects or themes (chap. 5). He calls them "Indefinite Subjects," "Fuzzy Subjects," and "Noun Subjects." He defines a subject or theme thus: What's in a subject? At least: What is to be talked about. Always: The limits within which to keep. Or more: A hint of what is to be said. At most: All that the sermon will say. (58). Contemporization is not "face-value" relevance. Ernest Best calls such a theory of interpretation "direct transference" and shows several legitimate faults with the "face-value" theory of interpretation (From Text to Sermon: Responsible Use of the New Testament in Preaching [Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark, 1978], 57ff.). Very simply, situations are never the same between the early world and ours; concepts change their meanings between original and contemporary usage; there may be no equivalent concept today. Best gives the example of the concepts of sheep and shepherd as lacking in Eskimo culture. (His last two problems with this theory come from a subevangelical view of the Scriptures and are not dealt with here.) An outstanding short work, it is much clearer on what we are not supposed to do in preaching than on what we are to do. For those interested in the technical aspects of hermeneutics and homiletics, I make the following assertion: We cannot always hold to the "face-value" theory of relevance. In the didactic literature of the Epistles, this relevance is easier to pursue than in the nonepistolary literature. I hold to "face-value meaning" arising from a historical-grammatical theory of hermeneutics. I also hold to a dynamic-equivalence theory of homiletics consistently built on the historical-grammatical hermeneutic. We cannot equate or confuse the hermeneutic strategy with the homiletic strategy. Step 6: Structure the Sermon. Sermonic unity is demonstrated and preserved in this sermon-making process in the following ways: -Unity is found through the central proposition of the text (step 3). -Unity is found in the purpose of the sermon (step 4). -Unity is found in the central proposition of the sermon (step 5). -Unity is found in the structure of the sermon (step 6). -Unity is found through review, repetition, and restatement of the CPS or the main points or the subpoints as the sermon moves forward to a conclusion (steps 6 and 7).. Over a century ago, Henry Ward Beecher (Yale Lectures on Preaching, First, Second, and Third series, [New York: Ford, Howard & Hulbert, 1887]) spoke about the need for variety: No man ever preaches, all the time thinking of producing specific effects, without very soon being made conscious that men are so different from each other that no preaching will be continuously effective which is not endlessly various; and that not for the sake of arresting attention, but because all men do not take in moral teaching by the same sides of their minds. (Series 1 53) Beecher classified hearers in the following way: Intellectual: For these the more logical and more mathematical the better. Emotional: These are "fed by their hearts." Aesthete: These look for beauty of style and charm of imagination in the sermon to accept its truth. Mystic: "These do not receive anything unless it is hazy!" He then goes on to speak to his young students on "How to Meet Differing Minds." A couple of quotes on variety will suffice. The hotel proprietor does not serve what he likes best. He spreads his tables for the benefit of the community at large. (Ibid., 55) If a man can be saved by pure intellectual preaching, let him have it. If others require a predominance of emotion, provide that for them. If by others the truth is taken more easily through the imagination, give it to them in forms attractive to the imagination. If there are still others who demand it in the form of facts and rules, see that they have it in that form. Take men as it has pleased God to make them; and let your preaching, so far as concerns the selection of material, and the mode and method by which you are presenting the truth, follow the wants of  the persons themselves, and not simply the measure of your own minds. (58-59) You are not practised workmen until you understand human nature, and know how to touch it with the Divine truth. (61). These characteristics are found in Broadus, On the Preparation and Delivery of Sermons, 4th ed., rev. Vernon-L. Stanfield (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1979), 81ff.. Or, application deals with two basic connections: "As Then-So Now" (Positive) "As Then-So Not Now" (Negative) Adapted from R.-C.-H. Lenski, The Sermon: Its Homiletical Construction (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1968), 228.. Biblical counselors have always included the "Now what?" in their ministries. Jay Adams in Preaching with Purpose (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1982), makes an effective point: Clearly, the Sermon on the Mount possesses an abundance of deliberate how to. Why have homileticians failed to notice a very obvious fact? Possibly because, unlike biblical counselors, they have not been aware of the importance of implementation in change. If you want your preaching to be effective, then, like Christ, be sure to give how-to help. (129) Typically, Bible believing preachers have implemented neither positively nor negatively, by how or how not to. They have been good at telling congregations what to do, but notoriously poor at telling them how to do it. (138). Beecher, Yale Lectures, Series 1, 171. Evans echoed the opinion a long time ago as well: "The preacher needs to have wide-open eyes. To have eyes and see not, ears and hear not, is fatal to the preacher" (William Evans, How to Prepare Sermons and Gospel Addresses [Chicago: Colportage, 1913], 61).. The definition of an illustration includes its connection with the audience. Beecher calls illustrations "covert analogies." "The groundwork of all illustration is the familiarity of your audience with the thing on which the illustration stands........ substantially, the mode in which we learn a new thing is by its being likened to something which we already know" (Yale Lectures, Series 1, 155).. Haddon Robinson (Biblical Preaching [Grand Rapids: Baker, 1980], 79-96) has three helpful "developmental questions" to which the central proposition and individual points must be submitted. 1. "What does it mean?" 2. "Is it true?" and 3. "So what?" The other use of these three questions is to pinpoint places where illustrations are needed.. This section on conclusions is summarized from the author's entry in the Leadership Handbooks of Practical Theology, vol. 1: Word and Worship, gen. ed. James-D. Berkley (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1992), under "Conclusions," 94-95.. Milton Crum Jr., Manual on Preaching: A New Process of Sermon Development (Wilton, Conn.: Morehouse-Barlow, 1988, 88), sees the need for synopsis in the following two sequences. "A Synopsis summarizes the verbal content of the sermon in two or three segments, in their order of presentation, usually either as 1. Situation-Complication 2. Resolution or 1. Situation 2. Complication 3. Resolution In either case, the conclusion will relate to resolution. Step 7: Preach the Sermon. A sermon that is written out is qualitatively different from the extemporaneous sermon. "By this [an extemporaneous sermon] it is meant preaching without writing. It is not to be mistaken for preaching without adequate preparation." J.-J.-A. Proudfoot, Systematic Homiletics (New York: Fleming-H. Revell, 1903), 300. Adequate preparation includes the discipline of writing out the sermon.. A few that we recommend at Dallas Seminary are Sue Nichols, Words on Target (Richmond: John Knox, 1963); A.-Duane Litfin, Public Speaking: A Handbook for Christians, 2d ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1992); Reg Grant and John Reed, Telling Stories to Touch the Heart (Wheaton: Victor, 1991).. According to A.-W. Blackwood, the "three tests of literary style in a sermon" are clearness, interest, and beauty (Expository Preaching for Today [Nashville: Abingdon, 1953], 49). In my opinion, interest and beauty are the twin edges of razor sharp style in effective communication.. You could hide your half sheets in your Bible just in case you forget some sermon points. But you will soon find this covert operation unnecessary if you put steps 1-7 into practice. Again, in no case should you be dependent on your notes. Would you want an outstanding soloist to sing from her score or a movie actor to check his notes in the middle of the movie? An integral part of the preaching ethos is lost when you are dependent on notes.. When you are preaching your sermon, you should ask yourself, "How would I feel about me if I were sitting where they are, listening to me?" Technically, this question relates to the attitude of the audience toward the speaker. They are sizing up your competence, modeling, friendliness, trustworthiness, enthusiasm, and presence, which are all dimensions of your credibility. Your delivery will influence their attitude toward you in several of these areas.. Check Spurgeon on articulation: "Do give a word a fair chance; do not break its back in your vehemence, or run it off its legs in your haste." Spurgeon's Lectures to His Students, condensed and abridged by D.-O. Fuller (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1955), 93. Appendix 1: The Holy Spirit and Your Pulpit Effectiveness. Lewis Sperry Chafer, He That Is Spiritual, rev. ed. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1967), 23.. In this outline of the "Holy Spirit and the Christian," I dispel any doubts that I engage in "topical exposition." I attempt to restrict unlimited trails by textual limits-only four commands relate the Holy Spirit to the Christian; and a practical limit-the time allotted to the sermon. One time the pastor of a church leaned over to whisper just before I took the pulpit, "Preach for as long as the Holy Spirit leads you in the fifteen remaining minutes of our service!" A practical consideration indeed.. Phrase borrowed from the title of Tony Sargent's The Sacred Anointing: The Preaching of Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones (Wheaton: Crossway Books, 1984). "Lloyd-Jones refers to it ["unction" or "the sacred anointing"] as a 'divine afflatus' which drives the preacher to the point where he has so surrendered himself to the dynamic of God's power that he is driven along as he proclaims the message" (31). Appendix 5: The Perils of Principilization. For a well-articulated and careful approach to the principilization process, see Timothy-S. Warren, "A Paradigm for Preaching," Bibliotheca Sacra 48 (October-December 1991): 463-860. See also J. Daniel Hays, "Applying the Old Testament Law Today," Bibliotheca Sacra 158 (January- March 2001): 21-35.. S. Greidanus, Sola Scriptura: Problems and Principles in Preaching Historical Texts (Toronto: Wedge Publishing Foundation, 1970).. Ernest Best, From Text to Sermon: Responsible Use of the New Testament in Preaching (T & T Clark, 1978).. Greidanus, Sola Scriptura, 58, citing B. Holwerda. Greidanus, Sola Scriptura, 61.. Ibid., 61.. Ibid., 64.. Best, From Text to Sermon, 70.. Ibid., 57ff.. Greidanus, Sola Scriptura, 93.. Ibid., 80. Appendix 6: Hermeneutical Analysis and Homiletical Application of Narrative Texts. S. Greidanus, Sola Scriptura: Problems and Principles in Preaching Historical Texts (Toronto: Wedge Publishing Foundation, 1970), 60; see also Robert Alter, The Art of Biblical Narrative (New York: Basic Books, 1981), whose comments are included in several points in this appendix.. Alter, Art of Biblical Narrative, 21.. Ibid.. Ibid., quoting T.-Todorov, The Poetics of Prose, trans. Richard Howard (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1977), 53-65.. Ibid., 18.. Ibid., 33.. Ibid. Appendix 9: The Elements of a Competent Sermon Outline. A. Fasol, Essentials for Biblical Preaching: An Introduction to Basic Sermon Preparation (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1989), 65-66. Appendix 12: Sermon Evaluation Questionnaire. Haddon Robinson, Biblical Preaching (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1980), 217-20. Appendix 13: Topical Exposition. For those interested in hermeneutics, I propose three levels of unpacking a text's meaning. Statement, implication, and extrapolation comprise the range of meaning in a text. Statement repeats and reports what the text says. Implication arises from what the human author intended to say in the text and provides for continuities between the original audience and us. Extrapolation is embedded in the human author's statement and implication and is explored through biblical and systematic theology, as intended by the divine author for discontinuities between the original audience and us. For example, while the contemporary issue of abortion is addressed by biblical statement and implication, cloning issues need to be addressed by extrapolation. You may consult the first ("Selected Issues in Theoretical Hermeneutics") and second part ("Levels of Biblical Meaning") of my series "Methodological Proposals for Scriptural Relevance," Bibliotheca Sacra 143 (January-March 1986; April-June 1986): 14-25; 123-33.  BIBLIOGRAPHY Adams, Jay E. Preaching with Purpose. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1982. Alter, Robert. The Art of Biblical Narrative. New York: Basic Books, 1981. Baird, John E. Preparing for Platform and Pulpit. Nashville: Abingdon, 1968. Baumann, J. Daniel. An Introduction to Contemporary Preaching. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1972. Beecher, Henry Ward. Yale Lectures on Preaching, First, Second, and Third Series. New York: Ford, Howard & Hulbert, 1887. 3 vol. in 1. Berkley, James D., gen. ed. Leadership Handbooks of Practical Theology, vol. 1: Word and Worship. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1992. Best, Ernest. From Text to Sermon: Responsible Use of the New Testament in Preaching. Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1978. Blackwood, A. W. Expository Preaching for Today. Nashville: Abingdon, 1953. ---. The Fine Art of Preaching. New York: Macmillan, 1943. Braga, James. How to Prepare Bible Messages. Portland, Ore.: Multnomah, 1969, 1981. Braun, Frank X. English Grammar for Language Students: Basic Grammatical Terminology Defined and Alphabetically Arranged. Ann Arbor, Mich.: Edwards Brothers, 1947. Broadus, John A. On the Preparation and Delivery of Sermons. 4th ed., revised by Vernon-L. Stanfield. San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1979. Crum, Milton, Jr. Manual on Preaching: A New Process of Sermon Development. Wilton, Conn.: Morehouse-Barlow, 1988. Davis, Henry G. Design for Preaching. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1958. Demaray, Donald E. Introduction to Homiletics. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1990.