Proclaimer Blog
Better study equals better application
One practical reason why preachers are tempted to short-circuit working hard on their Bible-text is because they feel the pressure to have compelling applications. And the truth is that it can sometimes feel as if the further we bury ourselves in the text, the further we are getting away from the real lives of the people we’ll be standing in front of come Sunday.
Here’s one simple example from a passage that came up in our Cornhill practice classes this week, which demonstrates that we must hold our nerve and believe that the opposite is the case: namely, the further we bury ourselves in the next, the closer we are getting to the profound and precise message that the Lord has in it for our people.
The passage is Matthew 18:21-35, the parable of the unmerciful servant. It’s provoked by Peter asking Jesus how often he must forgive a brother or sister who sins against him. “Up to seven times?”, asks Peter.
Already there in the opening verse of the passage we are given two limitations to our application: this is primarily about sins committed against us…
– by fellow-believers, not the world in general;
– by fellow-believers within the life of the church family, rather than within our own family relationships.
There’s more. The immediate context is the well-known passage on church discipline (18:15-20), which speaks of the two possible outcomes for a sinning Christian: repentance and restoration, or coming to be regarded as an unbeliever. Peter’s question in v.21 can only have in view the repentant believer, since he asks about multiple acts of forgiveness. Here then is a third limitation to our application: the sinning Christian is assumed to be repentant.
I think I detect even a fourth limitation, too: since Peter assumes repeated forgiveness, primarily in view are sins that are committed pretty regularly, rather than enormous, infrequent sins.
If I notice all of this, I won’t start my sermon by talking about a Christian who said she forgave her unconverted father who sexually abused her as a child (not a Christian; possibly not repentant). I won’t start talking about a converted man who stays with his church-going wife through her continual affairs (possibly not a Christian; not repentant). If I start like this, I’ll probably do pastoral damage.
Instead, I’ll start talking about the kinds of sins committed regularly among church family members: gossipping, back-biting, lack of hospitality, etc. I may think that this passage speaks to forgiveness in other areas too. But if I think that, I’ll be guided by the text to work my way there through a series of careful pastoral steps.
As I said, in this case when I finally emerge from the hours spent buried in the text, although there’s still much to do, I know exactly in which direction my applications need to run.