Lately some other pastors and I have been reading through a book together. We get together once a month to discuss about 3 chapters from that book around some food. Of course there is food involved! We're pastors and pastors can do some eating; especially Brian Sandifer. ;)
Over the period of about two hours we talk about what we have gleamed from this encouraging book.
Here is the first post of many to come about this great book by Grame Goldsworthy.
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Concerning the mandate to preach-
“We believe that preaching is not some peripheral item in
the program of the local church, but that it lies at the very heart of what it
is to be the people of God. We understand the activity of preaching as the
primary way in which the congregations of God’s people express their submission
to God”
Taken from- Preaching
the Whole Bible as Christian Scripture; page 1.
Taken from- Preaching the Whole Bible as Christian Scripture; page 6.
Taken from- Preaching the Whole Bible as Christian Scripture; page 21.
Concerning the reduction to moralism of the OT in preaching-
"The message of the Old Testament is too easily reduced to the imitation of godly example and the avoidance of the ungodly example. This raises the questions of the Bible's unity, the relationship of the Testaments. (page 5)
"Jesus is presented in the New Testament as the one who fulfills the promises of God by achieving for humankind the salvation that is i otherwise beyond our reach. Against the backdrop of the complexity of the history and prophetic expectations of the Old Testament, Jesus proclaims himself to be the goal of all the purposes and promises of God. Where the Old Testament describes the goal of God's work in terms of a remnant of the chosen people, the promised land, the temple, the David prince, and a whole range of images and metaphors, the New Testament claims simply that the death and resurrection of Jesus fulfills them all. The mighty acts of God, interpreted by his prophetic word, and by which he revealed his nature, are declared by the preaching of Jesus and his apostles to be preparatory for the person and work of Jesus. The God who acts in the Old Testament is the God who becomes flesh in the New Testament in order to achieve the definitive saving work in the world."
Concerning the Bible's main subject-
"The principle is simply this: Jesus says that the Old Testament is a book about him. ... How does this passage of Scripture, and consequently my sermon, testify to Christ? There are two man grounds for this question. The first, as stated above, is that Jesus claims to be the subject of all Scripture. The second is the overall structure of the biblical revelation, which finds its coherence only in the person and work of Christ."
Goldsworthy is an Australian Anglican and Old Testament scholar. Now retired, Goldsworthy was formerly lecturer in Old Testament, biblical theology and hermeneutics at Moore Theological College in Sydney, Australia. He is the author of According to Plan (IVP, 1991) and Preaching the Whole Bible as Christian Scripture (Eerdmans, 2000). Goldsworthy has an MA from Cambridge University and a ThM and PhD from Union Theological Seminary in Virginia.
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