What follows is based on
Preaching for a Verdict: Recovering the role of exhortation, by Josh Smith. B & H Academic, 2019.
Chapter 2 – A theological foundation for exhortation
A. God has spoken
(i) God’s word is inspired. 2 Tim 3:16 – ‘All Scripture is breathed out by God.’
(ii) God’s word is authoritative, because the One who speaks it has all authority. All things were created by him and for him, Rev 4:12. …
Preaching for a Verdict: Recovering the role of exhortation, by Josh Smith. B & H Academic, 2019.
Truly biblical preaching does not just involve explanation, illustration and application. It also seeks to persuade. It presses for a verdict. It involves exhortation.
Put another way, authentic preaching addresses the will, as well as the mind.
The recovery of exhortation is the burden of Josh Smith’s book. What follows is based on:
Chapter 1 – What happened to exhortation?…
2:6 While they were [in Bethlehem], the time came for [Mary] to deliver her child. 2:7 And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in strips of cloth and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.
‘No room in the inn’ (along with a grumpy inn-keeper) is part of the fabric of the nativity story, as popularly told. But the biblical text makes no mention of a stable, and the word commonly translated ‘inn’ may well mean something else.…
As popularly understood:
Cold = decidedly opposed to the things of God
Hot = enthusiastically committed to the things of God
Lukewarm = indifferent to the things of God
The implication would therefore be: better to be out and out against God than to sit on the fence.…
One of the most stubborn problems for Young Earth Creationists (YEC’s) is that of distant starlight.
The light from our nearest neighbouring galaxy – the Andromeda Galaxy – has been traveling about 2.5 million years before it reaches the eye of an observer here on Earth. And yet, according to YEC’s the entire cosmos is only a few thousand years old!
Various theories have been advanced in order to deal with this:
1. It has been suggested that light, when traveling vast distances, is able to take a ‘short cut’. …
When Christ returns in glory, and ushers in the new Heavens and the new Earth, none of us will be able to say: “That’s exactly as I predicted!”
Richard Bewes writes:
‘In our fallenness, we can all to easily get it wrong, despite the clear signposts!
Few were ready for the birth at Bethlehem.
The disciples were demoralised at the death of Jesus – despite his predictions.
The resurrection, when it happened, was a bombshell among them.…
‘You conservative Christians are welcome to your own views about marriage. The fact that we support gay civil marriage doesn’t affect what you do at all.’
Derek Rishmawy comments on this view, expressed in the following way by David French:
…‘For those who believe gay marriage is morally wrong for Biblical or other religious reasons, this decision changes nothing. Churches can still speak out against sexual immorality and can still choose not to perform gay weddings.
A precis of chapter 10
A teenager likes loud music. Supposing he steals records, and is severely punished by his father; that would be judicial punishment. But supposing his penchant for loud music causes hearing loss; that would be organic punishment.
Divine punishment for sin is usually construed, in Scripture, as organic. The destructive consequences of sin are built into the sin itself.
Except where it depicts God as violent, the Bible always describes punishment of sin in terms of divine abandonment. …
It is well known that John Newton (author of ‘Amazing Grace’) was a converted slaved trader. What is perhaps less well known is that his rejection of slavery post-dated his conversion to Christ by some decades. It was only in later life that he renounced slavery and the slave trade, writing up his thoughts in the tract Thoughts on the African Slave Trade.
David Robertson draws a number of lessons from Newton’s experience. What follows is mainly in Robertson’s (and Newton’s) own words.…
1:1 From the elder, to an elect lady and her children, whom I love in truth (and not I alone, but also all those who know the truth), 1:2 because of the truth that resides in us and will be with us forever.
Does this refer to a person and her offspring, or to a church and its constituent members? Although certainty is not possible, the latter option is to be preferred.
Some early writers were undecided. …
