Category: Pastoral

Book Recommendation: Preaching with Variety

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn Books, PastoralLeave a comment

Today, on the blog, I want to recommend a book I have been reading, and will be reading for a long time, not because it is a thick book, but because its content is so rich. The book is Jeffrey Arthurs’ Preaching With Variety.

I know you are probably wondering, I am not a preacher, why is he recommending a preaching book to me? And I understand not all my readers are preachers, but I believe this book is not only helpful for preachers, but also for the average congregate. The reason is because Arthurs spends half of every chapter talking about the literary genre used in the Bible, then he spends the other half of the chapter talking about how to preach that specific literary genre, which, even if you are not a preacher, is helpful in understanding how the biblical text applies to your life.

So, if you have ever wondered how to interpret the Psalms, how to read an Epistle, how to get at the meaning in a Parable, how to understand the pithy sayings of Proverbs, what strategies are employed by the biblical author in the Narratives, which by the way make up about 70-80% of the Bible, or how to read Apocalyptic literature like Daniel or Revelation, then this book is for you.

You can purchase it on Amazon by clicking here.

How to Meet the Unchurched

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn Discipleship, Evangelism, Pastoral, Practical3 Comments

In order for us to reach the unchurched in our cities, we have to get to know them. Often times this can be difficult for Christians. Between all of our church activities, our kids sports, and fellowship with other Christians, it can seem difficult to make the time to befriend those who are not running in our same circles. However, if our desire is to reach our community for Christ, and it should be, we have to find ways to interact with those who are non-Christians. With that in mind, I want to offer you a few suggestions that might help you to interact with those outside of your church circles.

Ways to Interact

Encourage Your Kids to Play on a City Sports League

Kids typically play sports, and as their parent, you are the one who takes them to practice and watches their games. Since you are already involved in this activity, why not enroll your child in the city league instead of placing them on a church team? By doing so, you will have the opportunity to get to know the other parents, who may or may not be Christians.

Sign Yourself Up for a City Sponsored Sports League

We all need exercise, and most of us enjoy playing some sort of sport, so why not play it with your neighbors? City sports leagues are a great way to interact with those living in the community. The common bond helps to build relationships with those you would not ordinarily come in contact with, allowing you the opportunity to speak the gospel into their lives.

There are many different leagues to play in: Soft Ball, Kick Ball, Basketball, Soccer, Rugby (if you are a real man), etc.

Join a Local Club

If you do not have a hobby, you need to get one. It is a great way to relieve stress and keep you sane. If you have a hobby, why not consider doing it with others in your community? There are many different clubs you can join: Book Clubs, Chess Clubs, Cycling Clubs, Running Clubs, Photography Clubs, etc.

Get Out of Your House

Another way to meet those in your neighborhood is by getting out of the house. Do yard work when your other neighbors are out. Walk around the block. Office outside of the house. I spend a lot of time at Starbucks, which has allowed me to get to know the employees and frequent customers, and it has led to many opportunities to either speak into their lives, or share the gospel with them.

Attend Events

If a buddy from work invites you to come over and watch the game, take the opportunity. He may not come to church with you, but hanging with him at his house is a great opportunity to start building into him, getting to know him, and hopefully having the opportunity to share the gospel with him. In addition, people typically invite more than one person over to watch a game, so it can be a great opportunity to meet their friends.

Invite Co-Workers or Neighbors Over For Dinner

Sharing a meal with someone is a great way to get to know them. It is non-threatening, and provides a lot of time for conversation. You may not be able to get your neighbor to attend church with you, but I bet they will come over for a free dinner.

Conclusion

Those are a few suggestions as to ways we can meet non-believers, get to know them, and speak the gospel into their lives. Yes, it takes a little effort, and may even force us out of our comfort zone, but it is worth it. I also hope you have seen that you can accomplish this feat without changing your current schedule too much.

Image: Now and Zen Photography / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Illustrations and Their Benefits

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn Pastoral, PreachingLeave a comment

Last time, I wrote about the necessity of using illustrations in our sermons. You can read that post here. Today, I want to talk about the benefits of using illustrations. The first one will be obvious, but the others you may not have thought about.

Benefits

(1) Illustrations help the audience understand the theological point

Through stories, listeners are able to come to a deeper more full understanding of the theological point because we learn best when the abstract is made concrete.

(2) Illustrations connect the preacher to the audience in a way pure exposition cannot

The preacher connects and bonds with the audience because his personal perspectives are revealed through the stories he chooses to use as his illustrations.

(3) Illustrations reveal the character of the preacher

Behind every illustration, the personal story of the preacher lies. Bryan Chapell says, “Your own personal story always shimmers in the background of any story you tell, witnessing to your own character, principles, and priorities.[1] In essence you are saying, “This is what I think this means in my world.” [2]

(4) Illustrations reveal your personal trustworthiness

Depending on the illustration you select your congregation will determine if you are trustworthy. If you select an illustration that holds out ideals or expectations one cannot hope to attain, then your audience will lose trust in your judgment. On the other hand, when you select illustrations that apply directly to the context of your audience and which contain ideals and expectations that are attainable, the audiences’ trust in your judgments grow.

(5) Illustrations have the power to reveal your personal integrity

If you consistently give credit where credit is due, not using others stories as your own, and give proper facts, then your personal integrity will grow. A preacher who consistently and knowingly passes stories off as his own, when they are not, proves he has an integrity issue.

(6) Illustrations help the audience see “themselves in the contexts of Scripture’s realities” [3]

When the audience hears of someone facing the same struggles they are, they realize they are not living in isolation. They also realize there is an answer to their problem that exists in Scripture.

Resource

[1] Bryan Chapell, Using Illustrations to Preach with Power, 133.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid.,136

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Illustrations and their Necessity

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn Pastoral, Preaching1 Comment

For most preachers (including myself), providing more than one illustration in a sermon is difficult, if it is done at all. But no matter how difficult it is, it must be done because it helps the listener process the principles, providing more clarity to the meaning of the text.

The Difficulty

Illustrations are difficult because they require preachers to shift gears from excavating the text and laying it out systematically to discovering how the texts principles relate to life situations, whether it be theirs or someone else’s. This “shifting of gears” is often difficult for those who think in logical patterns and systems, which are taught and re-enforced through their reading patterns. By spending more time reading theological treatises, which present material systematically and logically, rather than works of literature, which reveal its truths through stories, preachers are training their minds to follow logical patterns and lay out systematic grids, which is not a bad thing, as long as you recognize the intellectual development that is occurring. As a result, preachers (myself included)  find it difficult to make the shift to thinking in terms of narratives and stories. This difficulty of shifting from one job to the next is often why preachers neglect the task of illustrating.

Going further, illustrations are also neglected because they require the preacher to “delve to that level of being where mind, soul, body, world, and psyche are real. Until he has done so – until he has plumbed the depths of his emotions, relationships, and experience and integrated what he discovers in those oceans with what he knows intellectually – his own understanding is not complete.” [1] To delve to this level takes work. It takes hours of thinking, working, and re-working an illustration until it is just right. It requires one to go the extra-mile intellectually. Neglecting this extra work may prove one to be intellectually lazy.

The Purpose of  Illustrations

The purpose of illustrations is to make the abstract, real, or to make the foreign, familiar. Truth is best understood when it is observed in the context of a human situation. This does not mean truth is only understood through experience, like many post-moderns would claim, but it does mean we best understand a truth when we are able to work with it, see ourselves in the situation, or relate it to an experience we have had. Illustrations allow us to do just that, they “provide the mechanism for this life-specific understanding and are thus indispensable to effective preaching.” [2]

As preachers, we must understand people do not make decisions simple because they have the intellectual knowledge. Rather people make decisions when they can see themselves in the situation.

If you have ever been hesitant to move to another town for a job, even though you knew it was a better position for your career and the town was better for your family, you know what I am talking about. You may have had all the facts in front of you, but until you actually met your colleagues, toured the facility, and walked the streets of your new neighborhood, you were not really convinced the new job and town were better. Why?

“Because we best learn and make decisions when the abstract is made concrete.”

Bringing what is abstract into the concrete is the purpose of illustrations. As preachers, we want our people to be able to see themselves in the situation, to experience the principle of the text at work, so they will understand how their lives need to change, or how the principle relates to their world. Bryan Chapell says, “Because life-situation illustrations provide this experiential data, allowing individuals to “live through” the implications of their spiritual choices, they well serve life-changing preaching.” [3]

Conclusion

Illustrations are difficult to incorporate into a sermon, but they are necessary. Without illustrations, our people in the pew will not fully comprehend the meaning of the text, nor will they understand how the text applies to their lives.

In other words, without illustrations we are not providing full-fledged communication. By linking the text to experience, illustrations “make the Gospel real, fleshly, and interpretable.” [4]. This means illustrations are not a side-show used to make the text simple for simple-minded folks; rather, illustrations are a necessity for communicating the whole idea of the text. They are what add depth to our ideas and motivate our people to change.

So the next time you think about skipping out on an illustration because it would require too much effort, think again. Your extra effort may just be what you and your people need to fully understand the text and be motivated to change.

Resources

[1] Bryan Chapell, Using Illustrations to Preach with Power, 59.
[2] Ibid., 49.
[3] Ibid., 62.
[4] Ibid., 59.

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The Story of the Bible

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn Pastoral, Practical, Preaching8 Comments

In his book According to Plan, Graeme Goldsworthy provides an Outline of Biblical History at the beginning of each chapter in part three. I want to share his synopsis with you in hopes it will help you tie the entire biblical story together.

Genesis 1-2

In the beginning God created everything that exists. He made Adam and Eve and placed them in the garden of Eden. God spoke to them and gave them certain tasks in the world. For food he allowed them the fruit of all the trees in the garden except one. He warned them that they would die if they ate the fruit of that one tree.

Genesis 3

The snake persuaded Eve to disobey God and to eat the forbidden fruit. She gave some to Adam and he ate also. Then God spoke to them in judgment, and sent them out of the garden into a world that came under the same judgment.

Genesis 4-11

Outside Eden, Cain and Abel were born to Adam and Eve. Cain murdered Abel and Eve bore another son, Seth. Eventually the human race became so wicked that God determined to destroy every living thing with a flood. Noah and his family were saved by building a great boat at God’s command. The human race began again with Noah and his three sons with their families. Sometime after the flood a still unified human race attempted a godless act to assert its power in the building of a high tower. God thwarted these plans by scattering the people and confusing their language.

Genesis 12-50

Sometime in the early second millennium B.C. God called Abraham out of Mesopotamia to Canaan. He promised to give this land to Abraham’s descendants and to bless them as his people. Abraham went, and many years later he had a son, Isaac. Isaac in turn had two son, Esau and Jacob. The promises of God were established with Jacob and his descendants. He had twelve sons, and in time they all went to live in Egypt because of famine in Canaan.

Exodus 1-15

In time the descendants of Jacob living in Egypt multiplied to become a very large number of people. The Egyptians no longer regarded them with friendliness and made them slaves. God appointed Moses to be the one who would lead Israel out of Egypt to the Promised Land of Canaan. When the moment came for Moses to demand the freedom of his people the Pharaoh refused to let them go. Through Moses God worked ten miracle-plagues which brought hardship, destruction and death to the Egyptians. Finally Pharaoh let Israel go, but then pursued them and trapped them at the Red Sea (or Sea of Reeds). Then God opened the way in the sea for Israel to cross on dry land, but closed the water over the Egyptian army, destroying it.

Exodus 16-40, Leviticus

After their release from Egypt, Moses led the Israelites to Mount Sinai. God then gave them his law which they were commanded to keep. At one point Moses held a covenant renewal ceremony in which the covenant arrangement was sealed in blood. However, while Moses was away on the mountain, the people persuaded Aaron to fashion a golden calf. Thus they showed their inclination to forsake the covenant and to engage in idolatry. God also commanded the building of the tabernacle and gave all the rules of sacrificial worship by which Israel might approach him.

Numbers, Deuteronomy

After giving the law to the Israelites at Sinai, God directed them to go in and take possession of the Promised land. Fearing the inhabitants of Canaan, they refused to do so, thus showing their lack of confidence in the promises of God. The whole adult generation that had come out of Egypt, with the exception of Joshua and Caleb, was condemned to wander and die in the desert. Israel was forbidden to dispossess its kinsfolk, the nations of Edom, Moab and Ammon, but was given victory over other nations that opposed it. Finally, forty years after leaving Egypt, Israel arrived in the Moabite territory on the east side of the Jordan. Here Moses prepared the people for their possession of Canaan, and commissioned Joshua as their new leader.

Joshua, Judges, Ruth

Under Joshua’s leadership the Israelites crossed the Jordan and began the task of driving out the inhabitants of Canaan. After the conquest the land was divided between the tribes, each being allotted its own region. Only the tribe of Levi was without an inheritance of land because of its special priestly relationship to God. There remained pockets of Canaanites in the land and, from time to time, these threatened Israel’s hold on their new possession. From the one-man leaderships of Moses and Joshua the nation moved into a period of relative instability during which judges exercised some measure of control over the affairs of the people.

1 and 2 Samuel, 1 Kings 1-10, 1 Chronicles, 2 Chronicles 2-9

Samuel became judge and prophet in all Israel at a time when the Philistines threatened the freedom of the nation. An earlier movement for kingship was revived and the demand put to a reluctant Samuel. The first king, Saul, had a promising start to his reign but eventually showed himself unsuitable as the ruler of the covenant people. While Saul still reigned, David was anointed to succeed him. Because of Saul’s jealousy, David became an outcast. However, when Saul died in battle, David returned and became king (about 1000 B.C.). Due to his successes Israel became a powerful and stable nation. He established a central sanctuary at Jerusalem and created a professional bureaucracy and a permanent army. David’s son, Solomon, succeeded him (about 961 B.C.) and the prosperity of Israel continued. The building of the temple at Jerusalem was one of Solomon’s more notable achievements.

1 Kings 11-22, 2 Kings

Solomon allowed political considerations and personal ambitions to sour his relationship with God, and this in turn had a bad effect on the life of Israel. Solomon’s son began an oppressive rule that led to the rebellion of the northern tribes and the division of the kingdom. Although there were some political and religious high points, both kingdoms went into decline. A new breed of prophets warned against the direction of national life, but matters went from bad to worse. In 722 B.C., the southern kingdom of Judah was devastated by the Babylonians. Jerusalem and its temple were destroyed, and a large part of the population was deported to Babylon.

Keep Reading

Who Among Us are Missionaries and Where Does Their Mission Take Place?

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn Discipleship, Evangelism, Pastoral, Practical2 Comments

Wednesday I put out a post seeking to define our mission as Christians. You can read it by clicking here. In it I determined that our mission is God’s mission, and I gave this succinct definition of God’s mission and how I believe we fit into His mission:

God is on mission to redeem all of creation, we are apart of that mission as His elect peoples, and our purpose in that mission is to present the gospel through our actions and words, by which God will redeem all of creation in Christ for His glory.

Today, I want to discuss where our mission takes place and determine who is involved in this mission by asking and answering these questions:

Is our mission strictly relegated to overseas, or does it happen in our backyard? Is mission relegated to a special group of people sent out by a church, or is it taken up by everyone in the church?

Both Overseas and Our Backyard

I believe our mission takes place both overseas and in our backyard by all those in the church. Granted a special group of people will travel overseas, but everyone should participate in mission in their city.

Throughout the New Testament we have examples of mission happening overseas by a select group of people and in our backyard by everyone.

Jesus commissions his apostles to go to all the nations with the gospel message, but first He commissions them to go to their city (Matt. 28:16-20).

In Acts, the apostles are seen going to all the nations to proclaim the gospel to unreached people groups.

During Paul’s mission, he visits a number of places some of which are: Philippi, Thessalonica, Corinth, and Ephesus (Acts 16,17,18,19). In these areas, churches are established. Even though Paul continues to keep in touch with them, the church itself becomes responsible for evangelizing the area. This is evidenced by the apostle constantly calling these churches to holy living, so their conduct among their neighbors would be honorable, allowing them to proclaim the gospel unhindered (Matt. 5:16; Phil. 2:14-15; 1 Peter 2:12).

We see a prime example of a church who is living correctly and proclaiming the gospel to their neighbors in 1 Thessalonians. The church at Thessalonica was known in their region of Macedonia and Achaia because of their witness and example (1 Thessalonians 1). In fact, the Word of God had gone forth so faithfully from them in that region that Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy did not feel they needed to say anything.

How to Proclaim the Gospel in Your Backyard

If all the church is to proclaim the gospel in their own backyard, then we need to know how this works out. Does it work out by simply going door to door, or can it happen in other ways? In an effort to be succinct, but still answer the question, we will look at the church at Ephesus.

In Ephesians, we learn Paul expected their speech, sexual conduct, interaction with their neighbors, family life, and master slave interactions to be radically different than the culture in which they lived (Eph. 4-6). The purpose was so that they would shine as lights in a dark place and be witnesses to those around them.

From the example of the Ephesians, we learn how we can interact with those around us.

We are to live lives that are radically different than those who live next door. As we live lives that are different than those surrounding us, we put forth a model of what a redeemed community looks like and we hopefully earn the right to proclaim the gospel. Or when we proclaim the gospel to our neighbors, they are able to see how it has changed our lives, and hopefully they too will desire the same change.

Following the example of the Ephesians also means our everyday life is apart of our mission. As we go to work, play with our kids, date our wives, attend a movie, and interact with our neighbors, we are on mission. If we are on mission in our everyday lives, then we cannot fragment our lives into missional segments like so many in the church do.

Redefinition of Missionary

In order to be on mission all the time, we have to radically alter our current definition of a missionary. No longer can missionaries be thought of as a select group of people who go out to an area to proclaim the gospel and return home at a given time.

Rather, being on mission, and being a missionary, happens in every aspect of our lives, and is accomplished by everyone in the church.

Pastors, deacons, staff members, businessmen, lawyers, doctors, small business owners, blue collar workers, teachers, grandparents, stay at home moms, kids, etc are all on mission together. Meaning no one in our church is not on mission all the time, and there is no one in our church who are not missionaries.

Summary

From our limited examples, we can see that mission is not only reserved for a select group of people who go into other countries to proclaim the gospel, but it is reserved for the entire church, and it plays out in their own backyard.

If being on mission is to be taken up by everyone everywhere they live, work, and play, then we must redefine what we mean by the term missionary. Everyone in our church is a missionary, and their mission field is where they live, work, and play. Every aspect of their lives has to be included in their mission. The stores they visit, the places they live, the people they choose to hang out with, the restaurants they frequent, the places they take their kids to play, and the sports teams they play on are all apart of a strategic plan designed to meet and engage non-believers with the gospel.

Helpful Articles

The Geography of the Gospel

Chandler, Horton, and Keller on the Church in Mission

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