The Christ-Centered Expositor: A Field Guide for Word-Driven Disciple Makers

by Tony Merida

Second, find some ways to keep your mind from wandering.

Third, mingle Bible reading with prayer.

Fourth, mingle writing with prayer.

Fifth, mingle praise with prayer.

Sixth, work on your public prayers.

Seventh, develop prayer partner relationships.

Eighth, do not stop praying until you have prayed.

Ninth, fast and pray regularly.

Finally, develop a routine for praying right before you preach or teach.

I too believe that being captivated by the God-ness of God and a desire to see him known and worshipped, through Jesus Christ, must remain central to expositors.

When computer gadgets, social media, deer hunting, pop-TV shows, sporting events, and worldly comforts excite us more than our Creator and Redeemer, then it should not surprise us when God’s greatness is absent in pulpits.

Psalm 19 teaches that we see the glory of God first in creation but most vividly in the Scriptures.

Paul considered everything as “dung” compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Jesus as Lord (Phil 3:7–8).

“One of the most urgently needed things today is a careful treatment of how the gospel, biblically and richly understood, ought to shape everything we do in the local church, all of our ethics, all of our priorities.”185

We must consider three aspects of each sermon: our motive, our message, and our manner.

1. Indwelling Sin. Sin clouds our vision of God and hinders intimacy with God. Consequently, our motive gets distorted when our hearts are not clean.

2. The Praise of Men and the Fear of Men. A second obstacle to preaching for God’s glory is caring too much about the reaction of people.

When Knox died in 1572, the regent, Earl of Morton, said at his grave, “Here lies one who never feared the face of man.”186

3. Competition and Jealousy. Another regrettable problem that we have in maintaining a Christ-honoring motivation is the temptation to compete with other preachers.

Here is how you overcome your wicked jealousy: Care more for Jesus’s glory than your own. Let the glory of Christ be your chief concern.

4. Obsession with Church Growth. Certainly, numbers are important because people are important.

The temptation is to do “whatever works” (pragmatism) in order to attract a crowd, keep your job, or get a raise.

Great Puritan pastors like John Bunyan and Richard Baxter led relatively small congregations yet made an eternal impact. Measure success by faithfulness to your calling: declare the Word of Christ faithfully for the glory of God supremely. We will do this as we tend to our souls, as we preach for one primary audience, as we avoid competition and jealousy, and as we avoid man-centered pragmatism.

The best approach for exposing the nature of God and his voice is Word-driven preaching and teaching.

We should read the Word, explain it, and urge people to obey it.188

Like Ezra, open the book, read from the book, and convey the meaning of the book, for the glory of our God who gave us the book.

In Between Two Worlds, John Stott identified four character traits that should be embodied by the preacher: sincerity, earnestness, courage, and humility. I have found these four, plus the virtue of love (1 Cor 13:1–3), to be critical points of examination in my ministry. Such virtues are really evidences of the work of the Spirit who produces the character of Christ.

Before entering the pulpit, ask yourself, “Am I being sincere? Do I really care about what I am talking about? Am I really trying to implement this sermon personally?”

Next, we should examine ourselves for the presence of passion. Stott says, “To be sincere is to mean what we say and to do what we say; to be earnest is, in addition, to feel what we say.”191

Ask yourself before preaching, “Is my heart on fire over this text?”

Finally, humility is perhaps the greatest character quality missing in preaching today.

God is not glorified in arrogance but by the humility of Christ.

Some ways for us to maintain a God-centered, Christ-exalting agenda in the pulpit are by checking our motive—to see if it is God centered; by checking our message—to see if it magnifies God’s voice; and by checking our manner—to see if it reflects Christ’s character.

As Erasmus once rather playfully said, “If elephants can be trained to dance, lions to play, and leopards to hunt, surely preachers can be taught to preach.”195

While laziness and business are common excuses, there is perhaps a more painful reason: no one has modeled expositional study for them. Like it or not, the flock will follow the shepherd’s study habits to a large degree.

Exposition is about maximizing what God actually said.

Principle 1: Read the Bible in an attitude of prayer.

Principle 2: Remember that context is king.

Principle 3: Look for the historical meaning first.

Always ask, “What did the original author want the original readers to understand about this passage?”

Principle 4: Identify the type of literature in which the verse is found.

Principle 5: Remember that the whole Bible focuses on God’s redeeming work in Jesus.

The Old Testament points to Christ, and the New Testament flows from Christ. Therefore, always ask, “What does this passage teach me about salvation history? How does it point to Jesus?”

Principle 6: Interpret Scripture with Scripture.

Principle 7: Because the Bible is a unified testimony, always look for theological themes in the selected passage.

God’s truth is worth repeating.

To emphasize the number of observations one could make about a text, I often tell students to read a passage and make twenty-five observations about it.

Interpretation later serves as the foundation of our application of the text because the purpose of application is to apply biblical truth.

First, study the context in greater detail.

Second, dissect the passage.