Welcome to Preaching Expository Sermons, Lesson 9. This is brought to you by A.T. Stewart Ministries. I am your host, A.T. Stewart. When we left off with Lesson 8, we had talked about the importance of outlining the sermon with one eye on the text and one eye on the purpose. And now we are picking up on expanding on the outline. The outline is just the skeleton. We must put meat and muscle on the skeleton in order for the sermon to make an impact, to be understandable and rememberable. So it's simply reading an outline is not producing an expository sermon. Now, as we develop the points, what I suggest you do and what I do is I will write each main point that comes from my outline that has been developed from the text on a piece of paper with the purpose of being able to think and pray and just let thoughts flow freely about that one point. I don't really think about organization of the point at that place. I'm just putting ideas together. Just things come together as I think about the point, I think about the truth of the point, and then I'll go back and put them together in an organized form. So I think as I look at the point, I think, okay, what would I need to help me understand this truth? Because a point, of course, is a truth from the text. And you should, first of all, I think, state the point in a message. Most all of my sermons are deductive sermons, which means I clearly state ahead of time what I'm going to say. And then I either prove it or state it or show where it is in the scriptures. And so I think when you come to a point, it's helpful to state that point, state the truth, the principle that you have gotten from the text that is that part of your outline. And so I think each point should be anchored in the text. Now, if you cannot anchor your point in the text, you need to seriously consider Do I really need this point in my message? Now let me give you an example of anchoring each point in the text or anchoring each point with the scripture. In a sermon I preached on God's unconditional guarantee out of Isaiah chapter 55 verses 10 through 13. had two main points. The first point was God's Word never fails to accomplish God's purpose and that was verses 10 through 13. And then my second main point was the results of God's unconditional promise or guarantee and that was in particular verses 12 and 13. Now let me go back. God never God's Word never fails to accomplish God's purpose. Now point A under that main point was God promises His Word will never fail. Now that comes from verse 11. So will my word be which goes forth from my mouth. It will not return to me empty without accomplishing what I desire without succeeding in the matter for which I sent it." And so A is anchored in verse 11. Point B, God's Word will always accomplish His purpose. Again, in verse 11. It will not return to me without accomplishing what I desire and succeeding in the matter for which I sent it. And then see in the outline under Roman numeral one is God's Word is likened to rain and snow in verse 10. For as rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there without watering the earth and making it bearing sprout and furnishing seed to the sower and bread to the eater. And so I anchored that point in verse 10. And then Roman numeral two, the results of God's unconditional guarantee. A under that point is we can use God's word with joy and with peace. Verse 12, for you will go out with joy and be led forth with peace because you know God will accomplish his will through his word. When we go out and preach, we can go out with joy and peace. Now I'll make a confession. On Saturdays in particular, when I am preparing for Sunday, there usually is great spiritual struggle and warfare that goes on. The enemy will throw his fiery darts at me and he'll say, nobody wants to hear what you've got to say tomorrow. Nobody cares. You're just wasting your time. Your sermon's not any good. You can't preach your way out of a paper bag. And so all of these fiery darts come at me. And so rather than going out with joy and peace, I find myself going out with dread and trepidation. But when I remember God's unconditional guarantee that His Word will never go forth from His mouth and return unto Him empty-handed without accomplishing what He desires, then I know it does not depend on me, on my clever wording, on my organization of a sermon, but it depends on God. And it depends on him and his word. And he is going to accomplish what he wants to accomplish as I am faithful to proclaim his word. As I tell young preachers, prepare like it all depends on you, but preach knowing it all depends on God. Knowing that God will accomplish what he wants to accomplish is never an excuse for us not to do our homework, for us to not do our preparation, for us not to do our study. But our confidence must never be in our message, in our organization, in our homiletics. But our confidence must be in God and his word. And when the enemy sends his fiery darts of doubt and saying, nobody cares, nobody's going to understand what you're saying is not going to change your human life, not going to make any difference. You're just wasting your time. then I must recall God's unconditional guarantee. And remember God, you said you would cause it to accomplish what you want it to accomplish. And so I'm going to believe you, I'm going to trust you. And when I realized it depends on God and not me, then I can go forth with joy and I can be led forth with peace, knowing that God is going to do what God desires to do through that message. and then B under Roman numeral two, God's word will have supernatural results. Now we see that in verse 13. Instead of the thorn bush, the cypress will come up. And instead of the nettle, the myrtle will come up. Now, when you sow a thorn bush, a seed of a thorn bush is sown, what do you expect to come up? A thorn bush. not a cypress. And when a nettle is sown, you don't expect a myrtle to come up, but a nettle. So this is a supernatural event taking place. What he's saying is God's Word brings about supernatural results, not human results. And instead of a thorn bush, a cypress will come up. God takes his word and transforms situations. He transforms humans and he brings about supernatural results. And then Roman numeral two C is God will be glorified by its success, by his words success. Again, verse 13, the second part of that verse. as I anchor that point in the text, and it will be a memorial to the Lord and everlasting sign, which will not be cut off. As God's word goes forth and accomplishes what God wants to accomplish and brings about supernatural results, it will be a testimony, a memorial to the Lord. It will bring honor and it will bring glory to Him. And so it's important, I believe, when you're developing your points to state the point and then anchor that point with scripture. Anchor it in the text. And then we often need to explain the point. Just like I did when I said, instead of the thorn bush, the cypress will grow up. And then I began to explain about how you would expect from a thorn bush, a thorn bush would grow up. But instead of Cyprus grows up, there's something unnatural happening there, something supernatural. And so once you have stated the point and anchored the point in the text, then you may need to explain that text that you have used to anchor the point. Teach the truth. that text. Give a clear understanding of the biblical point. Now your explanation will bring out what the text says about the theological principle underlying this sermon point. Now in doing that, you may need to look at the meaning of words in that text and You may need to look at the theological background of that text. You certainly will want to consider the context and may need to bring that in. You might need to look at the grammar of the text, the details, and significant exegetical insights. What's going on here in this passage? What is being said? What is the historical context of this passage? And so it's important to, again, I ask myself, what do I need? What would I need to hear to help me understand this text? And so I go from there and begin to just jot down points, jot down thoughts. Again, remember, you're just putting all these thoughts on a piece of paper with that point at the top. You haven't organized them yet. You're just letting your mind flow freely. verses come to mind that may explain the text you write down those verses as questions come up in your mind well you know what does it mean that his word will not go out and return to him empty you know what what's the meaning behind that and so you'll want to look at the text and explain it give a good understanding it. And this is again where your study has come in prior to this point, where you have studied the passage very clearly. And one of the things that I think is important is look for key words in that passage. Look at the subject. Particularly play, pay close attention to the verbs. If they are commands, you will want to bring that out. If God commands something in scripture, you will want to bring that out if that is in your verse. But you will want to look at the key words. There may be words that you need to define if it's talking about love. Well, what kind of love is it? As you know, scripture may have agape love. it may have phileo love and so you may need to say now love as it's used in this passage is the agape love and then you may need to give a sentence or two explaining agape love and when you don't know a congregation as well if you're visiting then You don't know quite how much you need to explain about different words or theological concepts because you've not been teaching them over an extended period of time. Now, if you are preaching in your own church and you've been preaching there for a good many years, then you know better what you've explained in the past, what you might need to explain afresh. But again, even if you've been preaching a long time, and you have visitors in the congregation, you may need to explain just a little bit, just to make sure they understand the concept. I think a rule of thumb is it's better to define too many terms and not enough terms, but you don't want your sermon to just be a compilation of definitions by any means. Now, when you are defining a concept or a truth, you want to compare the unfamiliar with what is familiar to your congregation. For example, over in Matthew 5 verses 17 through 19, Jesus is talking about the authority of scripture. And he says, do not think that I came to abolish the law or the prophets. I did not come to abolish, but to fulfill. For truly I say to you until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or the stroke shall pass from the law until all is accomplished." Now the English reader does not understand what Jesus is really saying. He has the Hebrew alphabet in mind And the smallest letter in the Hebrew alphabet was the yod, which looks like the apostrophe in the English language. And the smallest stroke is the difference between the letter that's known as bath and the letter that's known as calf. which is simply a little projection, much like the difference between a capital F in the English alphabet and a capital E. The only difference is that bottom part of the letter E has a projection that goes out, whereas the capital F does not have that little projection. So what Jesus is saying is, that the authority of God's Word extends to the smallest letter, which is the apostrophe, and the smallest stroke, which would be a little projection on the capital E, or you might say crossing the T. So Jesus is saying the authority of God's Word not only extends to the word itself, but even to the very letters of the very words, and even to the very smallest part of a letter. You might say in English, the authority of God's word extends to the dot over the I and to the crossbar of the T. Now this would be helping the English reader understand what Jesus is saying. by taking the familia, the dot or the apostrophe, or the projection of the cross ball on the T, and equating that to the yod, the smallest letter in the Hebrew, or the stroke, the difference between the projection on the bath and the calf, the other Hebrew letter. So this is helping them to understand what Jesus is saying. And so again, you take what is familiar to them, and then you bring the unfamiliar alongside it, and it helps them to understand that. Another aspect of developing your point, in addition to defining it, is to use word pictures. There are tremendous word pictures placed in scripture by the Holy Spirit. An example would be the New Testament word for redeemed. This word actually came from the slave market of Paul's day and it meant to buy someone out of slavery. And so that helps us understand the concept of God redeeming us, buying us out of our slavery to sin. And the word sin itself in the New Testament means missing the mark. It's like shooting at the bullseye and instead of hitting the bullseye, you miss the mark. Well, that's what sin is. Sin is missing the mark of God's perfect righteousness. So that's just a word picture to help people understand what sin is by using the terms of archery and missing the bullseye. Transgression in the Old Testament, the Bible speaks of transgressions. It means twisted and perverted. Just as the term righteousness carries the picture of being straight, transgression carries the picture of being twisted and perverted. One of the New Testament words for forgiveness is to lift away. And again, this idea of the weight of our sin is pressing us down. And when God forgives us, he lifts that burden, that guilt away from us. and removes our sins from us. So if you're dealing with a passage, it has the word forgiveness in it, and that particular word in the Greek has to do with lifting away, then it's good to bring that out. It helps give a word picture and gives a deeper understanding to your congregation of what these different theological words might mean. give them a picture that they can associate with this word. So hopefully next time they're reading their Bibles and they come on the word sin they'll think about missing the mark and have they measured up to God's perfect standard of righteousness. So another way to develop the point would be restatement. Now restatement has a purpose of helping people understand what you're saying when they may not have understood it because maybe their minds were wandering. Let's face it, people's minds wander during the sermon. When you have an opportunity to listen to other preachers and you're not preaching, you know how your mind can sometimes wander away. And so people recognizing that people's minds may get distracted Restatement helps state the truth in a different way, but to state it again, so that if they didn't catch it the first time, they can catch it the second time. All right. So it's also a way of impressing the truth on the listener's mind. For an example, over in 2 Peter 4, where Paul tells Peter to preach, excuse me, 2nd Timothy 4. Paul tells Timothy to preach the word. He says, preach the word, and this term there is in season and out of season. Preach the word continuously. Preach it when it's convenient, when it's not convenient. Preach it when it's popular and when it's not popular. Preach the word when it will be welcomed and when it will not be welcomed. Now, what I have done is I have simply restated that truth about preach the word continuously in several different ways. Somebody may have been able to connect with the idea of preach it when it's convenient, when it's not convenient. Another person may be able to connect with the phrase, preach it when it's popular, when it's not popular. I mean, it's easy to preach against segregation in 19, excuse me, in 2019. It was not so easy to preach against racial prejudice and against racial segregation Mississippi in the 1960s, and so to preach it when it's popular and when it's not popular means a totally different thing in 1960 in Mississippi than it did in and does in 2019. Certain things are not popular to preach about today would be the role of men and women in ministry, the role of men and women in the church, the role of men and women in marriage, God's ordained design and roles. In 1960 in Mississippi, you wouldn't have had a problem preaching about those. But in 2019, you have a problem when you start talking about God's design for men and women, because it flies in the face of modern culture. And so what might be popular at one time to preach one truth in scripture may not be popular in another time in the culture. But whether it's popular or not, if it is the truth of scripture, then it should be proclaimed. Whether it be welcomed or not, it needs to be proclaimed. So restatement is just another way of saying the same truth a little differently, giving people another chance to connect with it, to impress it on their minds for them to stay with it. And so these are some ways to help develop your points. Also, sometimes you may need to give some factual information to develop your point. Maybe statistics, observations. It can be verified. Sometimes you might need to give where your facts are coming from, particularly if they are rather outlandish so people won't think you're just pulling them out of the air. Now you don't want to use too many facts or statistics and you want to make things simple. For example, you would not want to say in 1906 in the city of Chicago there were 3,672,103 people. Instead, you would say in the city of Chicago, there were 3,600,000 people. So that is all your congregation would need to know. You don't want to weigh them down with too many details. Just give the general idea and concept. And you want to be true to your subject. You want to make sure you have your facts accurately. Because if people can verify and you have your facts wrong, then it hurts the integrity of your preaching. Because they think, well, he was wrong in that. How do I know he's not wrong in something else? So check out your facts. Don't just go on one source from the internet. Check on your facts. Make sure your facts are correct. Another way to develop the point is through quotations. You may use importance of quoting someone. You can use quotations to support or expand a point, either to impress people on the point or to add authority to it. Again, anchor the point with some wording that digs into the mind of the listener. Quotations can be used to gain authority if you quote someone who is an expert that they know. It doesn't do a whole lot of good to quote from someone who's an expert and they don't know who that person is. But if it's someone who is widely known as an expert on a subject, then you can use that quote and use it in a way that will impact the message. Now, you don't want to have long quotes. If you're going to have a quote that's more than a couple of sentences, I suggest if you're showing slides that you would have that quote there on the screen and they can read along with you. Or if you're giving out printed notes, then have the quote in the printed notes so they can follow along. A long quote read by you when they don't have a way of looking at it Their minds, most people's minds tend to wander, and you lose them. And so a short, pungent quote is much more effective than a long, drawn-out quote. If it is particularly a good quote, and you think, well, the people may not know who this is, then you might need to take a sentence or two to explain who this person is. and why they are an authority on the subject that you're about to give the quote concerning. So that's important as well. And then again, another way you might develop a point is through anticipating what your listeners might not agree with in your point. And then you might need to cite an authority on that. For example, I spoke of God being a God of wrath. And I said to them, you've heard it said, the God of the Old Testament is a God of wrath. And the God of the New Testament is a God of love. But I want you to know that the God of the New Testament is every bit as much a God of wrath as the God of the Old Testament. Now I anticipated that there would be people who would be saying, no, no, I don't agree with that. I think you're wrong preacher. And so I said to them, for example, over in John chapter three in verse 36, we read. He who believes in the Son has eternal life, but he who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him. And also in Matthew's gospel chapter three, beginning in verse seven, we read these words from God's truth, But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, speaking of John the Baptist, he said to them, you brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Therefore bear fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not suppose that you can say to yourselves, we have Abraham for our father. For I say to you that from these stones, God is able to raise up children of Abraham. The axe is already laid at the root of the trees. Therefore, every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. As for me, I baptize with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, and I'm not fit to remove his sandals, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His wintering fort is in his hand and he will thoroughly clear the threshing floor and he will gather his wheat into the barn but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire that is speaking of the raft of God again in the New Testament Matthew's gospel and then over in Romans chapter 2 as Paul is writing to the church at Rome He says there in verses five through nine of chapter two, but because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart, you're storing up wrath for yourselves and the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, who will render to each person according to his deeds. To those who by perseverance in doing good, seek for glory and honor and immortality, eternal life. But to those who are selfishly ambitious and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, wrath, and indignation. So I took what I thought would be an objection by some of those listening when I said the God of the New Testament is every bit as much a God of wrath as the God of the Old Testament, and I took three New Testament passages that clearly teach about the wrath of God. to show that he was and is a God of wrath in the New Testament as well. So if you're saying something that you think is something that your congregation or members of your congregation may not agree with, then you'll want to take a moment in your mind to think, okay, what do I need to say to show them? How can I answer the argument that I think they're raising in their minds about what I am saying? So there are times when you would need to do that to explain your point. And then application. There are times when you will want to apply your point during the message. There are other times that you will wait and hold your application to the end. I tend to like to apply my points as I go along. How does this point apply to the listener's life? You ask yourself that question. What action do you want the congregation to take after hearing the truth of this point? How can you help them visualize themselves applying the point? And then show them how to apply the truth. You may want to come up with an example that would show them how to apply the truth of that point. And in so doing, you help them visualize the truth of it and see themselves putting that truth into practice. An example of this would be you're trying to teach the truth of loving your neighbor as yourself. And so you are telling the either true story, like happened to me, I was waiting for the Georgia-Georgia Tech football game to come on one year. I've been looking forward to it all season, as we Georgia fans always do. And I told my wife, and I don't plan to do anything on this particular Saturday that the Georgia-Georgia Tech game is going to be on, and I want to be sure and see it. And I told the kids, I don't plan to watch anything else. This is what I want to see. I had this neighbor that was not a Christian, And I had been wanting to show him the love of God and be able to share with him about, uh, God's love through action as well as verbally. Well, we had a windstorm go through on the Friday before the Georgia, Georgia tech game on Saturday. And I heard him over there on Saturday morning before the game, uh, trying to cut up Liam's, uh, he had an ax and. trying to cut up limbs that had fallen down and a tree that had fallen down. Now, I had a power saw, a chainsaw, so I was thinking to myself, okay, I could just go over there and take it to him and leave it with him and say, hey, you're welcome to use this. I said, you know, after all, I do want to see the game. Uh, and this was back before the days of VCR. So, you know, I didn't have the luxury of, uh, taping it and going back and looking at it. And, but the Lord said, no, you need to go there and help him. You need to show him my love through going over there and helping him, uh, cut up these trees. And so I wrestled with it and I said, but Lord, you know, I want to see the ball game. Well, as you know, the Lord always wins. And so I got up, went over there and helped him cut up his trees, uh, and missed the ball game. Well, just by giving that example. you cause the congregation, those in there to think, okay, what would I have done in that situation? Would I have been willing to go over there and miss a game? Would I have not? How would I have shown the love of Christ? So it just gives them a concrete way to think about showing the love of Christ. And that illustration hopefully will stick in their mind. And more than just saying, you need to love your neighbors yourself, they will have an illustration to, bring alongside that truth and help it stick in their mind. After you have taken all this information and put it on that piece of paper, now you'll want to go back and organize it in a way that makes sense. You'll want to take your examples, your related scripture passages, and you'll want to think now, What's the best way to organize these thoughts so that they will flow under this point? And so go back. You've brainstormed. You've got all this information. Now go back and place it under in an order that will make sense and best develop that point. Now we want to move in our next lesson. In lesson 10, we'll be looking at the art of illustration. How do you add illustrations in to your sermon to make them the most effective they can be? And so join us next time as we continue with our lessons on preaching expository messages. This is your host, A.T. Stewart.