Reclaiming the Old Testament for Christian Preaching

Written by Grenville J. R. Kent, Paul J. Kissling, and Laurence A. Turner, eds. Reviewed By George Robertson

In the last few decades the OT has been rediscovered in the evangelical temple. And as was true in Ezra's day, its reading is leading to preaching. Thirty years ago Sidney Greidanus plowed the mostly untilled ground of redemptive-historical preaching of the OT in his Sola Scriptura (1970). Mostly dismissed as a perspective on the internecine battle in the Dutch Reformed Church between the two world wars, Greidanus's work remained largely unnoticed. While there were a few—especially at Westminster Theological Seminary—who discovered its treasures, it remained a rare book in the English-speaking world for nearly twenty years. As a new preacher, I was aware of three scholars who each had a copy but refused to lend it to me or anyone else for dread that his copy would be lost! In the last few years, however, numerous additional books have been produced that provide evangelicals with excellent homiletical instruction for preaching the “cleaner pages” of most Christians' Bibles. Excellent examples include Graeme Goldsworthy's Preaching the Whole Bible as Christian Literature: The Application of Biblical Theology to Expository Preaching (2000), Bryan Chapell's Christ-Centered Preaching: Redeeming the Expository Sermon (2nd ed., 2005), and Dennis Johnson'sHim We Proclaim: Preaching Christ from All the Scriptures (2007) as well as his edited volume Heralds of the King: Christ-Centered Sermons in the Tradition of Edmund P. Clowney (2009).

Reclaiming the Old Testament for Christian Preaching stands among the best in this family of books and is uniquely practical for the active pastor. One would be hard-pressed to find another book serving as such a complete manual for tackling all the genres of OT literature. Contributors offer practically oriented essays to preaching the law, prophets, minor prophets, apocalyptic, laments, and poetic portions of the OT. Other essays deal with hermeneutical topics like plot, character development, difficult texts, and biblical theology. While all the authors are professors, they are also active preachers. This means that most are very intentional in showing the reader how each hermeneutical principle applies to preaching. Another strength is the relative geographic diversity of the pastor-scholars. They come from Australia, Austria, the United Kingdom (majority), the United States, and the Philippines, reinforcing the truth that the OT was not just for Middle Easterners or even the Dutch (!) but for God's people of all ages and places (1 Cor 10:1).

One has to apply a fine-tooth comb to critique such a good book full of chapters daring enough to propose methods for preaching unnerving books like Ezekiel and Song of Solomon or topics like total war and talion. But there may be ways to produce an evenbetter work in subsequent editions. First, most of the chapters recapitulate the basic questions of grammatico-historical exegesis: What are the author's background and perspective? Who is the audience and what were their cultural idiosyncrasies? What is the genre of the writing? What is the structure of the book? What are the peculiar rhetorical and verbal characteristics of the book? Perhaps that was intentional, with the anticipation that preachers would use the book as a reference tool and only go to the specific chapter dealing with their current need. Otherwise it might be helpful to put this material in an introduction. Second, some of the authors (e.g., Wenham, Moberly, Firth) seem distracted with form-critical or source-critical theories regarding the origin of Genesis or Mosaic authorship or the structure of the Psalms. In a book for preachers, these issues would be best dealt with in footnotes (as Longman does), thus reserving the body of the essay for homiletical coaching.

Third, several of the essays seem uncomfortable or unfamiliar with a redemptive-historical approach to Scripture. Rather than insisting that the unfolding redemptive work of God must be developed “organically” (Greidanus) from every OT text and event, several imply that preaching Christ occurs satisfactorily when the preacher can document fulfilled prophecy or note explicit inter-canonical connections to the NT. Exceptions to this are Tremper Longman and Christopher Wright, whose chapters on preaching wisdom and preaching the law, respectively, are two of the finest in the book. Each exemplifies a journeyman's skill in weaving together sound exegesis, biblical theology, and Christ-motivated and enabled application. One can learn to preach any genre of Scripture christocentrically from their two essays alone. Finally, those chapters focusing on narrative portions of Scripture would be helped by the Westminster Shorter Catechism's reminder that the Spirit blesses not only the preaching but also the reading of the Word of God. Many of the subtleties of plot and character development would be accounted for by a robust reading of the whole passage before it is reduced to a sermon.

But these are quibbles more than critiques. This manual is a must on every preacher's shelf as a reference tool that will serve him well for the life of his ministry. Not only is it on mine and already well-marked, but it will make its ways into lectures to my theological students as I endeavor to train them to preach Christ “from Moses and all the Prophets.”


George Robertson

George Robertson
First Presbyterian Church
Augusta, Georgia, USA

Other Articles in this Issue

Evaluating a new English translation of the Bible can be extremely difficult...

Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) is remembered today as a saint, scholar, preacher, pastor, metaphysician, revival leader, theologian, Calvinist—the list goes on...

Almost two decades ago I wrote an essay titled " When Is Spirituality Spiritual? Reflections on Some Problems of Definition ...

He was the youngest son of elderly parents. His childhood was secluded and unhappy, which might in some measure account for his lifelong melancholy...