Expository Preaching Enables Transformative Encounters With God Himself

[00:00:00] It's timeless truth that the people today are dying spiritually to hear and they desperately need me to get out of the way of the text and to speak the scripture to them. Explain what needs to be explained. Give background when that is necessary. Draw analogies to things that are familiar to them, to the things that are unfamiliar. All of that needs to take place.

[00:00:30] Confidence is never in our clever presentation.

[00:00:37] Hey, welcome to the Expositors Collective Podcast Episode 312. I'm your host Mike Neglia and the voice that you heard is our guest for this week. It's the return of Brother Jim Wilson.

[00:00:49] He was on an earlier interview and then he also joined us for our in-person training event which took place back in 2023 in Tamecula, California.

[00:01:00] He does a great job of starting us off and he has encouragement for those of us who preach and teach and also some great bonus advice for those of us who listen to preaching and want to listen well so there's something for everybody.

[00:01:15] Before he starts talking, I have kind of a very direct question that I want to ask you. Could you do us a favor? Could you please follow this podcast on Spotify?

[00:01:28] I don't know if you're listening to us on Apple Podcasts or on YouTube or on ExpositorsCollective.com. I don't know how you're listening but if you have a Spotify app or an account could you find us on there and then hit follow?

[00:01:42] The reason why is because we're kind of on the cusp of having enough followers on that platform that's going to open us up for some cool ad revenue.

[00:01:53] There's ways that really just kind of opens up income stream for us and it's not so that I can get rich,

[00:02:01] it's so that I can just get pumped back into this ministry in paying our editor in paying for the website and also for investing into travel expenses for upcoming training events.

[00:02:16] In this coming year, we really want to invest in some under-resourced parts of the world. In fact just in about a week and a half myself and Nick Katie and also some leaders from my church Calvary Corp in Ireland,

[00:02:34] we're going to be in Serbia and we're going to be doing a training event for some local pastors there as well as some guys that are traveling in from Hungary and also from Romania.

[00:02:46] And I appreciate your prayers and an simple act of following the podcast, that could be the thing that sets in motion away for us to earn more money without doing more stuff so we can invest in more stuff like that.

[00:03:02] So if you want to make a direct donation, there'll be a link in the show notes toward supporting the work of expositors collective but for free 99 for nothing at all.

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[00:03:26] Thanks for listening and as you're listening to Brother Jim Wilson, I hope that this helps you to grow in your personal study and public proclamation of God's Word.

[00:03:41] I'm not going to define expository preaching. I'm grateful for what is written in the notebook that we can take notes in because it kind of talks about the things that are similar.

[00:03:54] And I'm not wanting to try to draw distinctions between this or between that.

[00:04:00] But instead of talking about, instead of defining expository preaching or talk about how to do expository preaching, my role is to talk about the why before we get to the how.

[00:04:15] Why do expository preaching? And there's a slight twist at the end of my talk because my application at the end is not for those of us who do expository preaching but for those of us who listen to expository preaching, which is everyone in the room while only a handful in the room their primary ministry is the preaching of the Word.

[00:04:39] And so that's the way that we will close this out. I'm not going to define preaching expository preaching but I do want to talk about what it involves.

[00:04:50] Expository preaching involves teaching people the Bible. Now, I have those words in that order for a reason.

[00:04:59] Often times people will say expository preaching is teaching the Bible. The Bible has nothing to learn. We teach people the Bible and that's not just a moot point.

[00:05:13] We must realize that when we're teaching, we're teaching people but we're teaching them something and we're teaching them the Bible as well as we can according to the authorial intent.

[00:05:28] As the Spirit of God inspired the writers, we don't come to the text with our idea. The most dangerous thing in the world is an idea seeking a sermon.

[00:05:39] Instead, we come to the text and we ask if it's from the gospel of Mark, what did Mark intend? What is Mark saying? What did Mark mean?

[00:05:52] One of the most dangerous questions we can ever ask is this. What does this Bible verse mean to you?

[00:05:59] It doesn't matter what it means to you because the Bible can never mean what it did not mean. We go back to the authorial intent and we go back to the beginning.

[00:06:12] The most dangerous thing we can do is have an idea and then search for a text to preach our sermon. I do have a two-step process to keep that from happening.

[00:06:25] The first step is to repent and then follow your face before God and say, Lord, what do you have me to say to your people from your Word?

[00:06:36] So it involves teaching people the Bible so they can encounter God and live transformed lives.

[00:06:46] So to do this, they need far more than simply to understand the text.

[00:06:58] Now that's a starting point and they do need to understand it but we do not want them merely to be hearers of the Word.

[00:07:08] We want them to be doers of the Word also and so it must end in the Bible, be integrated into the fiber of the way that they live.

[00:07:20] Now I don't want to diminish the fact that my small doctor Mark a moment ago aside that expository preaching does include teaching the Bible.

[00:07:31] We must have a source for our teaching and that source is God's holy Word because it is truth without any mixture of error, because it is an errant.

[00:07:43] We must preach it and when we preach it we do so with boldness and clarity because we know that when we do we will build the listener's faith and they will receive direction for their life.

[00:07:57] It begins with us taking the sufficiency of the Scripture seriously.

[00:08:04] You can never do better than the text, never whatever an adult that you add or whatever clever twist that you add to it or whatever cultural relevance you attempt to bring to it.

[00:08:23] But you can never do better than the text speaking of relevance.

[00:08:28] I laugh from time to time when asked about making the Bible relevant that would be like asking me to make water wet.

[00:08:36] How can you make the Bible relevant? It already is.

[00:08:41] It is God's Word to God's people with timeless truths. The Bible is relevant, it does not need a makeover, it does not need a contemporary update.

[00:08:53] Preachers must preach the Word we never can do better than the text.

[00:09:00] The Bible is relevant, but because we are teaching people that do not know its customs, its times, they do not know other texts that are parallel to the one we're speaking about.

[00:09:16] Because in general our target audience are not Bible scholars.

[00:09:23] Because of that, while we never work to make the Bible relevant, we sure work to make our sermon relevant.

[00:09:32] Because we're going to need to explain some things, we're going to need to illustrate some things, we're going to need to help the people experience some things.

[00:09:42] And we do that because we're not just teaching the Bible, we're teaching the people, the Bible.

[00:09:52] The Scripture is truth without any mixture of error, and so when we are teaching the Scripture, we are teaching what is true.

[00:10:01] Not what is true for me or what is true for you, we are teaching what is absolutely true.

[00:10:08] It's timeless truth that the people today are dying spiritually to hear, and they desperately need me to get out of the way of the text and to speak the Scripture to them.

[00:10:28] Explain what needs to be explained, give background when that is necessary, draw analogies to things that are familiar to them, to the things that are unfamiliar.

[00:10:39] All of that needs to take place.

[00:10:43] But confidence is never in our clever presentation.

[00:10:52] Confidence is never an understanding of the biblical languages.

[00:10:58] I used to think I was pretty good with them until I read DA Carson's exegetical fallacies that pretty well ruined my life.

[00:11:07] There are so many of us that put our confidence in the wrong thing.

[00:11:14] Our confidence is in the word of God and the spirit of God to speak to His people and to make a difference in their life.

[00:11:26] So we bridge the gaps between the ancient and the modern.

[00:11:30] The people today need good expository preaching to help them understand, experience, and apply the text.

[00:11:39] So yes it involves teaching people the Bible, but there's a reason we're teaching them the Bible. It's not so they can be Biblically literate.

[00:11:49] We need not lament the fact that people are Biblically literate. We must lament the fact that people are hell-bound.

[00:11:58] They need the truth of the Scripture so their lives can be transformed, so they can encounter the God of the Bible, the God of great mercy and great compassion who loves, who forgives.

[00:12:12] They need to know that God and they're not going to hear it from other places.

[00:12:20] If the preachers today are not preaching the word of God culturally, they're not going to hear it.

[00:12:30] You may have argued there was a time and a place where that would have happened but you cannot make that argument today.

[00:12:36] Not in this time and in this place. This is the only place they're going to hear it as we teach it, as we preach it, as we live it, and as we go out into the community and teach it perhaps one on one to people.

[00:12:54] It is good for them to hear the Biblical truth, but it is much better when they apply it to their life and when that application results in them being transformed.

[00:13:09] Preaching does not transform anyone.

[00:13:17] Preachers cannot transform the people. People cannot transform themselves. God is the agent of transformation and yet he's chosen to use the foolishness of preaching as the way that that word is spread, and then the people hearing the word and living the word.

[00:13:41] And then out in the community, the people seeing the word being lived. God changes lives.

[00:13:51] He is a God that loves, he is a God that cares, he is a God that intervenes. He changes lives. He transforms people.

[00:14:01] In Romans 12 verses 1 through 2, I'm reading from the S.V., God's Word says, I appeal to you therefore brothers by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God which is your spiritual worship.

[00:14:20] Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and is acceptable and perfect.

[00:14:36] The word here that's translated to be transformed, Paul only used it twice in the New Testament. Now Mark also used it in Mark 9 verse 2.

[00:14:50] And he used it in a similar form to describe Jesus's transfiguration. But Paul uses it here in Romans 12 and he uses it again in 2 Corinthians 318.

[00:15:05] And in both times it denotes a work that happens inside the believer, brought about by an outside force with the person's content.

[00:15:18] In the Romans passage, the one that I just read, it results in knowing and by extension proving or doing the will of God.

[00:15:29] So there is a sense of knowing what God's will is and then there becomes a sense of proving that will by actually accomplishing what God has spoken for you to accomplish.

[00:15:44] In the Corinthians passage, it results in reflecting Christ's likeness.

[00:15:54] Only used twice by Paul, wants to speak of this transforming force that changes a transfiguration sort of change.

[00:16:08] And then that when you encounter this, you begin to reflect the image of Christ's likeness in who you are and the way you live.

[00:16:21] How many of you would love those two things happen in your church? It's right here in the word.

[00:16:29] It happens by transformation. And that's why the ultimate goal of expository preaching must be transformation because the only way it's going to occur is as God works from the outside end to make the change that's necessary.

[00:16:56] It's a passive voice. It's what we refer to as a divine passive. You see, while we're commanded to be transformed, we can't do it.

[00:17:07] We cannot transform ourselves. No one else can transform us. That is God's work in us.

[00:17:17] It's the spirit of God working with the word of God that is spoken over us and the spirit of God inside of us changes us.

[00:17:28] He transforms us, but that doesn't mean there's not a response.

[00:17:33] We have this great act of God working inside of us, but there's also a believer's response. There's something that we must do.

[00:17:41] Paul says, we must renew our minds. That's why we come under the preaching of the teaching of the word so that our minds can be renewed.

[00:17:54] We renew our minds. We present ourselves to God. It's an active pursuit.

[00:18:03] It's not a once in a time, it's not one in a time, but it's an active pursuit of constantly presenting ourselves to God.

[00:18:11] And then we resist the forces that can form us to the world.

[00:18:17] And so we renew our minds. We present ourselves to God and we resist the things of the world.

[00:18:27] And because of that, expository preaching helps us to think the right things, the renewing of the mind.

[00:18:36] It encourages us to submit to God, present yourself as a living sacrifice.

[00:18:42] And then it calls on us to live righteously, not be conformed to the world.

[00:18:49] This is why preaching involves teaching the people the Bible so they can experience life transformation.

[00:18:59] But we're teaching the Bible so they can encounter God so they can experience life transformation.

[00:19:07] Let me mention in passing that the Bible is not a book about Moses or Joshua or Ruth or any other character you find there.

[00:19:16] The Bible is a book about God.

[00:19:20] And one of the big errors we make is when we see a person and say, this is either a negative or a positive example.

[00:19:28] Please live like this.

[00:19:30] And our sermons sound somewhat like a self-help book that you could buy at the checkout stand at the local grocery store or a convenience store.

[00:19:40] Here's how you can improve your life. Here's how you can become a better parent.

[00:19:45] Every text is about God.

[00:19:50] And so here comes the gift I have for you to close on my talk.

[00:19:57] Actually there's two gifts. One of them has a slight monetary value, very slight.

[00:20:03] It's one of my books. So it's very slight monetary value.

[00:20:08] For those of you who are pastors, who your primary duty is teaching or preaching, then if you'll stop by the gateway booth back there

[00:20:16] to have a copy of my latest book for you on illustrating well.

[00:20:20] No catch. Don't have to sign up for anything. Maybe smile to the nice young man that's going to hand it to you.

[00:20:26] But if you'll go buy and get those I don't know if I brought enough for everyone if I didn't my apologies.

[00:20:32] But now the gift for those of us that hear God's word regularly.

[00:20:37] I want to ask you to stop listening to a sermon, to evaluate how good it is.

[00:20:49] And I want to ask you to start listening to a sermon to encounter the living God.

[00:20:58] Maybe you can do both. I can't.

[00:21:04] I can evaluate a sermon or I can encounter God.

[00:21:11] But I find the part of my brain that makes me critical to determine whether this marker or that marker was hit

[00:21:19] also keeps me from noticing the glory of God in the midst of the text.

[00:21:25] And so whether the preacher does or not, whether the preacher makes every text about God or not, you do that.

[00:21:34] When you read the text and by the way if our preachers that we listen to read the text there is something valuable in their sermon

[00:21:45] because they have read God's holy word.

[00:21:48] And even if they mess other things up, if they read the text there is benefit to you as you listen to it and you reflect on it.

[00:21:59] And so you ask this question as you're listening, where is God in this text?

[00:22:06] What do I learn about God? That is the transformative truth.

[00:22:12] When you look at what the text teaches about God, that is the truth that will change your life when you pair it with the next question.

[00:22:21] What is my reasonable response to who God is as demonstrated in this text?

[00:22:28] Not my conform to this world response.

[00:22:35] What is my response with a renewed mind as a spiritual act of worship?

[00:22:43] So if you could see two arcs, one arc that's in the text that shows God's glory in the text and what you learn about God in the text.

[00:22:54] And another arc, my reasonable response, my spiritual response,

[00:23:00] the point where those two arcs touch is the point that will transform your life.

[00:23:09] When you see God in all of His glory and all of His majesty, in all of His mind, in all of His grace and all of His mercy

[00:23:19] and you submit yourself to Him, having set under the hearing of the Word,

[00:23:25] you see the value of expository preaching is even if it's not done perfectly.

[00:23:32] It can guide us to live exemplary lives of men and women of faith growing in the image of God.

[00:23:43] All right, well thanks so much to Brother Jim for that.

[00:23:48] I can listen to that guy talk all day, so much wisdom, encouragement and a real heart of care.

[00:23:55] In future episodes, there's a panel discussion where you can hear more from Brother Jim just giving more and more of that solid seasoned advice.

[00:24:04] I hope that you're following us on Spotify for the reasons why I explained at the beginning of the episode.

[00:24:10] And I hope that this episode and all that we do help you to grow in your personal study and public proclamation of God's Word.

[00:24:17] This podcast is a part of CG and media, a podcast network that points to Christ.

[00:24:22] We are supported by listeners like you to help us create more great shows, visit cgmedia.org slash support.