Questions and Answers (Fall 2021)
The following represents a select number of actual questions recently sent in to the ministry (lightly edited for brevity, clarity, and anonymity).
If you have a question you’d like to ask, feel free to send it in here: https://www.expositoryparenting.org/contact
Question: Are there teacher guides that go with the study guides on the Expository Parenting website?
Answer: No, there are no teacher guides or answer keys, and to be honest, that’s intentional. The purpose of these study guides is to assist parents and others in leading their disciples through the Scriptures, rather than as a kind of school assignment that is to be graded and checked (if that makes sense). Although many questions have definitive answers, there are also many that are open-ended and intended to help apply Scripture to particular situations as part of a study group. With that said, if there are any questions or difficulties you have on a particular section of a study guide, you can certainly reach out to me and/or your local pastors, of course. Hope that helps, and glad you're following the ministry!
Question: How would you define expository preaching?
Answer: As explained in Chapter 2 of Expository Parenting,
“…expository preaching sets forth the content and meaning of the Bible according to the manner and purpose with which the authors originally wrote it. The root of the word expository is “expose,” thus expository preaching is preaching that exposes the meaning of Scripture. Expository preaching respects the original wording, context, and sequence of an author’s writing and simply looks to shed light on (expose) a passage’s meaning based on its context. Simply put, if you were to explain what a verse means by what it says, applying the implications of the verse to your hearers, you would be performing the task of expository preaching (also known as biblical exposition). The one who performs the task of expository preaching would therefore be called an expositor. The hallmark characteristic of any expositor is that he endeavors to act only as a mouthpiece for God, a mailman who delivers the mail precisely as he received it, saying what God has said in the way God has said it.”
Some other helpful explanations can be found here: https://thecripplegate.com/what-is-expository-preaching-an-interview-with-dr-steven-j-lawson-part-1/
And here: https://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=47211428592699
With that in mind, there is an important distinction that needs to be made between an expositional message and an expositional ministry. Any given message may be considered expositional provided the preacher is carefully and accurately explaining the passage in context and appropriately applying it to the hearers. The elements of expository preaching include reading the text, interpreting the meaning, and exhorting the listeners (cf. 1 Tim. 4:13). However, in order for a ministry to be a genuinely expository ministry, the regular, weekly preaching needs to be sequential (verse by verse) through a book of the Bible. In other words, just as a message must be governed by the text in order to be considered expositional, so too must a ministry be governed by the text in order to be considered expositional.
So, for example, a pastor who decides to preach from various passages each Sunday, rather than verse by verse through a book of the Bible each Sunday, is leading a ministry governed by his own decisions rather than the text itself, regardless of how expositional any individual message may be. If a pastor decided to preach about the topic of marriage, and over the course of several Sundays preached from Colossians 3:18-19, 1 Peter 3:1-7, and 1 Corinthians 13:1-3, no matter how accurately he may have taught each of those passages, he is still a topical preacher regardless of how expositional any of those individual messages would be. The reason is that a truly expositional ministry explains verses in context, and in order to maintain the context you must inherently maintain the sequence. For example, to fully understand John chapter 21, I must understand John chapter 20. To fully understand John 20, I must understand John chapter 19. This argument operates recursively all the way back to John chapter 1. Thus, a pastor’s job is to teach verse by verse through entire books of the Bible, not jumping from one text to a totally unrelated text each Sunday regardless of how well he may handle them. Always ask yourself this question: is this church teaching in such a way that I am learning each book of the Bible, and to an extent so as to teach others?
Question: What advice would you give pastors who have public school teachers, advisors, principles and even administrators in their congregation?
Answer: That's an important question. I would say pastors should thank those men and women for their witness in that dark place to the extent that they are faithfully engaging people there with the actual claims of the Gospel (not just “being nice” at school, which is no different than a nice Muslim, Atheist, Mormon, Roman Catholic, etc.). Since education is about communicating a worldview in a categorically different way than other industries, there is a level of accountability that those in the public school environment will face that is greater than someone in another field of work (such as healthcare, construction, accounting, etc.). For example, any Christian teacher who participates in the lie of evolution by teaching their students that theory as fact will stand before God and give an account for that sin, and no excuse about the nature of the curriculum, the requirements of the school, or the demands of the administrators will be sufficient to deflect blame. And that is just one example among many for which teachers will give an account. Participating in general Christlessness, perpetuating the lie that God is nonexistent or unimportant in the affairs of men, is a sin of omission for which many educators will likewise be judged.
One of the main things that cannot be overlooked is that even though you may be in a “rural” area, the public schools are federally funded, and as they are under the umbrella of the NEA they cannot be Christ-centered by federal mandate. So you may see a few glimpses of hope in your school district, and perhaps have a better district than many (though everyone claims that they’re district is a “good one”), but again we must go back to Scripture and see that all school subjects are to be taught under the explicit Lordship of Christ. Even subjects such as math, without acknowledgment of the Math-maker, are inherently atheistic. Indoctrination happens not only by what virtue of what is being taught, but also by what is not. Furthermore, issues such as evolution—which dates back decades—are really where the battle over education was already lost. The reason is because as we see in Romans 1, it is the willful abandonment of a knowledge of our Creator that leads to other sins such as sexual perversion, strife, etc—not the other way around. So issues like Critical Race Theory, Transgenderism, and others that are being battled over in school board meetings are actually the fruit, not the root, of what is taught in government schools. The poisoned root has grown in the soil of the curriculum for decades.
With that in mind, I would advise pastors to warn those educators that faithfulness to Christ will, at some point very soon if not already, cost them their job—unless the Lord does a tremendous work of providence in overturning the NEA and the general cultural hostility in the U.S. Thus, they should not only be prepared to lose their jobs, but also extremely worried if they don’t. Finally, I would let them know that in spite of their witness, the public school system is no place for the children of believers, as Scripture nowhere sanctions the Christless instruction and indoctrination of children. Rather, we are explicitly told to acknowledge the Lord in “all our ways” (Prov. 3:5-6), providing a Christ-centered education which normatively is to occur under the tutelage of parents (cf. Deut. 6). The pragmatic “dueling discipleship” excuse, in which parents claim that they “counter-teach” their public-schooled children at home during the evenings, is neither supported nor Scripture, nor even practical to carry out. Therefore, the presence of public school workers in a congregation should in no way influence the church’s pulpit ministry, in which government education ought to continue to be exposed as outside of the Christian worldview. Sadly, it’s just the opposite in most churches, in which pastors are afraid to stand on the claims of Scripture with regards to the issue of education.
Question: I know this website is about parenting, however, I am wondering if you can recommend a formal discipleship program/curriculum/book? I have done plenty of informal discipleship but I would like something to follow and be able to point other men to (something that systematically walks one through discipleship).
Answer: Thanks for reaching out! I’m typically not a fan of “pre-packaged” and commercialized discipleship books because they’re typically pretty superficial. In that sense, I would recommend that you disciple other men using the study guides provided on the website: https://www.expositoryparenting.org/ntstudyguides Even though this is presented as a parenting ministry, the reality is that it’s actually a discipleship ministry; I’ve used those very NT Study Guides to disciple men over the years. They are intended to be used to disciple high school students and older (since, in reality, discipling a high schooler shouldn't look much different than discipling an adult). There is much of the NT left to be done, as I’m currently working to produce OT teaching outlines, but there’s enough there to last for quite a long time if you intend to cover one chapter per wekk.
With that said, here are a couple other ideas that I think would be beneficial. If the men you are discipling are relatively new to the faith, and just want a general introduction, I'd go with this: https://www.christianbook.com/fundamentals-lessons-grace-knowledge-jesus-christ/john-macarthur/9780802438393/pd/438393
Or, if you are discipling men who really want to get deep in theology, I would walk them through this: https://www.christianbook.com/biblical-doctrine-systematic-summary-bible-truth/william-barrick/9781433545917/pd/545917 or this: https://www.christianbook.com/essential-christian-doctrine-handbook-biblical-truth/9781433571855/pd/571855. The latter even has questions at the end of each chapter for group discussion. There are few things that would really get men fired up for ministry than working through an entire systematic theology. If I were leading the group, I’d probably assign maybe ten or so pages of reading per week, and then have everyone regroup for you to teach through the content, field questions, and facilitate discussion.
Question: What is the Word of Faith/Pentecostalism movement and how would you help another see the error of it?
Answer: The Word of Faith movement represents the “name it and claim it” prosperity Gospel (which includes not just financial prosperity, but emotional/mental/physical “positive affirmations”) in which coming to Christ leads to the ability to pronounce blessings for yourself in this life. Rather than counting the cost of following Christ, this movement teaches people that they the “abundant life” promised in Scripture has to do with temporal abundance here and now. And those who don’t experience such blessings are typically denounced as not having enough faith. This movement spans across a wide range of people and places, including old school heretics like Benny Hinn and Joyce Meyer who blatantly speak of claiming wealth and healing, all the way to new school heretics like Joel Osteen and Steven Furtick who couch their language in motivational speech and you-are-good-enough theology.
Pentecostalism, broadly speaking, includes the false Charismatic movement, and encompasses errors as mundane as thinking you are getting “nudges” and “whispers” from the Holy Spirit all the way to more ridiculous practices such as “grave-sucking” and the so-called “glory cloud” of Bill Johnson and Bethel.
The reality is that a vast number of people caught up in these movements need to hear the Gospel and be saved. Rather than coming to genuine repentance and faith in Christ, they are caught up in a delusion comprised of varying degrees of emotionalism, covetousness, discontentment, and narcissism. Sadly, with a focus on material, physical, and emotional benefits, the true need for spiritual benefits (forgiveness, redemption, reconciliation, etc.) gets left behind. Beyond that, those in this movement need to come to understand the doctrine of Sola Scriptura--that the Bible has everything needed for life and godliness—and that the apostolic gifts of tongues, interpretation of tongues, prophecy, and miracles were both given and completed in the first century for a threefold purpose: to authenticate the ministry of Christ and His Apostles, to demonstrate the nature of the coming Kingdom, and to edify the early church until the completion of the canon.
Question: Can you please direct me to some more solid teaching on typology?
Answer: Typology is the study of “types” in Scripture, which are historical events or people that symbolize, represent, or anticipate a later event or person (typically the Old Testament foreshadowing something in the New Testament).
The most significant typology would be that of Adam being a “type" or foreshadow of Jesus, in that the former served as a federal head of humanity who represented mankind before God in his disobedience in the garden (leading to all of mankind’s downfall), corresponding to the latter serving as the federal head/leader of redeemed humanity who represented the elect before God in His perfect life, death, and resurrection (leading to the elect's redemption). See Romans 5 for this teaching.
There are many other examples in Scripture of this kind of picture of Christ, as John MacArthur explains:
“Now, there’s much in the Scripture that comes under the category of typology. There are many theological terms that we use in Bible study and in Bible teaching. One of them is typology. Whenever we talk about a type, we mean an Old Testament picture of the person and work of Christ. For example, in the Old Testament we read about a brazen serpent being lifted up, and all who looked upon the serpent were healed from the snake bites. And then we hear in John chapter 3 that that is a picture of Jesus Christ. And it says, ‘As the Son of Man was lifted – as the serpent was lifted up, so shall the Son of Man be lifted up, and those who look on Him in faith shall be healed from sin.’
We read in the Old Testament about lambs being slain, and then we hear the words of John the Baptist, ‘Behold the Lamb of God’ in reference to Jesus Christ. There are many pictures in the Old Testament of Christ. We call these types, and Christ is the antitype or the fulfillment of that type. Now, we’ve shared this many times in reference to much of our Bible instruction, and that’s just a brief word of review.” (https://www.gty.org/library/sermons-library/1616/melchizedek-a-type-of-christ)
Though typology is important to interpretation, it’s not without any dangers to avoid. The danger when it comes to typology is the tendency to try to “find” Christ in Scripture (the Old Testament in particular) in places that Scripture doesn’t actually indicate. For example, some might say that Samson is a type of Christ, in that Samson liberated God’s people from their enemies by sacrificing himself in his death in the Philistine temple, just as Christ sacrificed himself on the cross to liberate God’s people from sin and guilt. Though well-intentioned, as people want to preach Christ from throughout the pages of Scripture, the problem with this approach to Scripture is that we begin to allegorize or “spiritualize” the details in these kinds of historical accounts to try to make them “match” the details of the Gospel or the crucifixion of Christ. A more egregious example of this would be trying to spiritualize the Song of Solomon, which clearly speaks of physical intimacy between a husband and wife, to turn it into a picture of Christ and the church. While there is no doubt that marriage represents the love Christ has for the church, trying to read the details of physical intimacy back into that kind of redemptive framework is a recipe for disaster—and particularly distasteful disaster. Undoubtedly, the most common misuse of typology is in the account of David and Goliath, in which many claim that David represents Jesus, Goliath represents Satan (or sin, depending on who you talk to), and thus the account is a sort of prophetic preview of Christ’s victory. Some with this view then continue to allegorize other aspects of the account, claiming that Goliath’s scale armor represents the scales of the serpent (Satan) and that David’s defeat of Goliath after forty days of taunting represents Jesus’ overcoming of Satan after forty days of fasting! This kind of handling of the Bible is a recipe for disaster. There is obvious much, much more that can and should be said, but the bottom line is that we cannot treat the Bible like a “Where's Waldo?” book in which we try to force details about Christ’s redemptive work back into the details of a historical narrative.
Here are some more resources for further study:
https://thecripplegate.com/preaching-christ-from-the-old-testament-interpretation-vs-application
https://hipandthigh.wordpress.com/2016/09/12/lets-talk-about-the-christological-hermeneutic
https://www.gracebooks.com/the-forest-and-the-trees.html
I also touch on this concept in Chapter 4 of Expository Parenting.