Preaching Christ from the Old Testament historical books

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Purpose
Even though Korean churches have been growing very fast and Christians in Korea have been renowned for fervent prayer, both churches and Christians in Korea have suffered from allegorical preaching. Many preachers have to preach seven or eight times a week. They do not have time to study the Bible, nor time to develop their sermon. Without further development, their preaching has been greatly affected by a few revivalists who used allegorical method in their preaching.
In Addition, it is easier for them to select the text from the New Testament than from the Old Testament. They did not have sufficient understanding of the Old Testament. And they did not know how to handle the text from the Old Testament in order to preach.
Even when they preach from the Old Testament, they do not consider the historical context of the text. They directly apply the 'teachings' of the text to our situation without regarding the differences between then and now. The sermon inevitably becomes the examplary, moral preaching.
In these days many young preachers are trying to cope with this problem, and we have several good preachers. Nevertheless, many preachers still try not to preach from the Old Testament, or simply allegorize the text.
The purpose of this project is to help Korean preachers to preach biblical sermons by providing a preaching manual which instructs them how to prepare sermons from different texts in the Old Testament historical books (Genesis to Esther). The manual teaches key themes of the Biblical theology in the first place and provides some guidelines Korean preachers how to preach from the Old Testament narratives.
Procedure
1. I will survey what books on homiletics are currently available for Korean pastors. They can be either by Korean authors or translation of foreign preaching books. Then I will survey what homiletic texts are used in Korean Bible Colleges or seminaries. This procedure is to understand what books are affecting the preaching of Korean preachers.
2. I will gather data by analyzing some sermons of representative Korean preachers to define what are the most common misunderstandings of Korean preachers when they preach O.T. texts, and how often they preach from the O.T. historical books.
3. I will teach the Old Testament courses at a Korean Bible college in New York and the Reformed Presbyterian Theological Seminary of the East, New York.
4. I will gather and analyze Old Testament sermon excerpts of Korean preachers from God said, a monthly preaching magazine published in Korea.
5. I will prepare at least four sermons from the O.T. historical books.
6. I will develop a manual for the Korean preachers to correct their common misunderstandings in terms of Bible exposition.
7. The project material will be presented before the Korean Graduate Student's Association of Westminster Theological Seminary.
8. I will evaluate the resource by leading a seminar for the Reformed Presbyterian Theological Seminary of the East, New York. The evaluation will be done by comparing their responses to questionnaires before the seminar and after the seminar.
Project
The project will include at least the following:
Part One Background studies
1. Results of the initial survey to demonstrate the need for this project.
2. The place of O.T. Historical books in the redemptive history. --In this section historical perspective of the Old Testament, Covenant theology, the relation of the Old Testament with the New Testament, and typology will be discussed.
3. A section to show a pastor how to approach O.T. passages. --In this section the principles of preparing sermons from the Old Testament narratives will be presented and over twenty sermon excerpts will be analyzed along with the principles and their possible correction will be given.
4. Several sermon outlines preached by a Korean pastor during six month period, and critiques for the sermons.
5. Twelve sermon excerpts from God said, and critiques for the sermons.
Part Two Manual
Part Three Method and results of evaluation of the training
Bibliography

목차 (Table of Contents)

• LIST OF TABLES = viii
• LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS = ix
• PART ONE BACKGROUND
• I. Introduction = 1
• A. The purpose of the Project = 1
• B. The Survey = 2
• 1. The Old Testament is not used frequently enough in Korean pulpit = 2
• 2. Possible reasons = 4
• C. Basis of the Project = 8
• 1. The Bible is the Word of God = 8
• 2. Unity of the Bible = 9
• 3. The Old Testament is for us = 9
• 4. The Old Testament witnesses God Himself = 11
• 5. Continuity and Discontinuity = 11
• 6. We need the history = 13
• II. Biblical view of history = 16
• A. History:for remembrance = 16
• B. The focus of the Old Testament = 18
• C. Redemptive history = 19
• III. Pattern of the redemptive history = 20
• A. Exodus in the Old Testament = 20
• B. The structure of the book of Exodus = 23
• 1. The outline of the book of Exodus = 23
• 2. The book of Exodus shows two aspects of salvation = 24
• 3. The book of Exodus shows the purpose of deliverance = 28
• 4. The book of Exodus shows that we need a mediator = 30
• IV. Covenant in the Old Testament = 37
• A. God in the Old Testament:Covenant God = 37
• 1. God's covenant with Abraham = 37
• 2. God's covenant with Jacob = 39
• B. The covenants in the Bible = 42
• C. Unity of the covenants = 46
• D. Fulfillment of the covenants = 47
• E. Two aspects of salvation imbedded in the covenants = 49
• F. Conditionality of the covenants = 59
• G. Summary = 61
• V. The relationship between the Old Testament and the New Testament with respect to the covenants = 63
• A. The relations between God's people, land, and covenants = 63
• B. Overlap of the two ages(Aeon) = 65
• C. Application of two aeon concepts in the Old Testament preaching in terms of Exodus motif = 67
• VI. Typology = 72
• A. Typology in General = 72
• 1. Definition = 72
• 2. Basis of typology = 78
• 3. Typological connection = 79
• 4. Misuse = 80
• 5. Difference between typology and allegory = 81
• 6. Controlling factor in interpreting the Old Testament:Christ = 82
• 7. Typology is not typologizing in the exemplary approach = 87
• 8. Procedure for interpreting types = 88
• B. Type of Christ in the Old Testament = 89
• 1. Men in the Old Testament:Type of Christ, Example for Christians = 89
• 2. Israel:Type of Christ, Example for individual Christians, Example for the Church = 108
• 3. Law:Christ;Fulfiller of the Law, Christians;Follower of Christ = 115
• 4. Tabernacle, Temple:Type of Christ = 131
• 5. Land:Type of Christ, "in Christ", Grace for us = 134
• VII How to preach the gospel from the Old Testament historical books = 140
• A. General = 140
• 1. Theocentric preaching and Christocentric preaching = 140
• 2. Process of interpretation = 146
• B. Historical context = 146
• 1. Selection of a passage for a sermon = 146
• 2. Study its literary style and historical context = 148
• 3. Find the interpretation of the text, theme, and recurring motif = 148
• 4. What is the intention of the biblical author? = 150
• 5. Understand the situation of the original readers = 151
• C. Relational perspective = 152
• 1. Evaluation of other passages about the given text = 152
• D. Location of a given text in the redemptive history = 154
• 1. Typology:Christ-centered, God-centered = 155
• 2. Study recurring motifs = 155
• VIII. Test of the study = 157
• A. Sermons of a pastor of a big church in Seoul, Korea = 157
• 1. God defends the city for the sake of David Text:Is. 37:33-35 = 158
• 2. Passover Text:Ex.12:1-14 = 160
• 3. Jehovah Jaire Text:Gen.22:9-14 = 162
• 4. The prayer of Daniel Text:Dan,10:10-12 = 165
• B. Sermons from God said = 167
• 1. The Three Questions toward the Human Race Text:Gen 3:1-13 = 169
• 2. Person whom God is looking for. Text:Gen. 3:1-10 = 171
• 3. You are dust. Text:Gen. 3:17-19 = 174
• 4. Forgiving heart Text:Gen. 45:1-8 = 175
• 5. God met at the mount of Horeb Text:Exodus 3:1-12 = 179
• 6. Manna that came down from heaven in the desert Text:Exodus 16:13-31 = 184
• 7. The way to Victory Text:Joshua8:1-9 = 188
• 8. The God Whom I believe Text:I Sam2:1-8 = 194
• 9. Conquer the Goliath of today. Text:I Sam 17:28-40 = 198
• 10. The Faith of Leisure Text:II Sam6:12-23 = 202
• 11. The Threshing Floor II Chronicles3:1-2,Matthew3:1-12
• 12. Let's do good works with our best effort Text:Nehemiah 2:11-20 = 209
• IX. Conclusion = 215
• PART TWO MANUAL
• I. Introduction = 219
• II. Lesson 1 Focus of the Old Testament Preaching = 221
• III. Lesson 2 Steps for interpretation = 227
• IV. Lesson 3 Immediate historical context = 229
• V. Lesson 4 Relational perspective = 237
• VI. Lesson 5 Location of a given text in the redemptive history = 239
• VII. Lesson 6 Salvation in the book of Exodus = 242
• VIII. Lesson 7 Covenants in the Old Testament = 246
• IX. Lesson 8 What is typology? = 250
• X. Lesson 9 Typology (2):People = 259
• XI. Lesson 10 Typology (3):Law = 264
• XII. Lesson 11 Typology (4):The Tabernacle, the Temple and the Land = 266
• PART THREE THE USE AND TESTING OF THE MANUAL
• A. Pre-test = 268
• 1. Text of the Questionnaire = 269
• 2. Summary of Responses = 269
• B. Post-test = 275
• 1. Text of the Questionnaire = 275
• 2. Summary of Responses = 275
• C. Overall assessment = 280