Foundations for Preaching

[chagal was here]

Typical modern sermons are built on a scriptural foundation - at least the GOOD ones are - The preacher takes the pericope and delivers from it a lesson or admonition or encouragement or ect... for the gathered congregation.

But before the Canon was fixed, Christians used a broader selection of writings - many of which were eliminated when the canon was set in place.

And the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox branches of the church accept several books as scripture that the Protestant side of the fence would deem "not scripture"

And even further back - The prophets of the Old Testament preached without merely taking a scripture passage as a foundation. Granted they recieved their messages directly from God.

?Question? --- Is Scripture the Only foundation for preaching? And if so, should that include the so called apocryphal or deutero-cannonical books?

 

[Gerry]

Sinec a question like this is not intended to solicit an answer, but rather a "discussion", why not state your hypothesis, and lets go from there?

 

[panterapat]

First of all, until the Council of Hippo in approx 300A.D. there was no Bible of sorts. There was the Hebrew Scriptures and there were writings of the Apostales along with letters to the various churches. The Catholic Council of Hippo(Not sure of the exact time frame), determined which writings were or were not inspired of God and which would be included in the newly created Bible. Jesus had instructed the Apostales to "preach to all nations". He didn't say have them read My words. For 300 years there was no established work for Christians to read. They were preached to. In the 16th century, Martin Luther determined that certain books of the Bible did not suit his theology, so he dropped them. The Catholic Church believes that the totality of revelation is contained in the Bible. But the Church also relies on Sacred Tradition and the guidence of the Holy Spirit. These will not contradict the Bible but will further enlighten the Church with biblical truths. These are all facts of history. Now to answer your question. All preaching does not need to be Scripture based per se. But it must not contradice biblical truths. May God bless you and guide you always.

 

[filosofer]

Just to correct a couple of misunderstandings, errors.

The Catholic Council of Hippo(Not sure of the exact time frame), determined which writings were or were not inspired of God and which would be included in the newly created Bible.

Actually the council only publicly acknowledged what the churches had already been doing. Thus those at the council did not determine which were or were not inspired.

In the 16th century, Martin Luther determined that certain books of the Bible did not suit his theology, so he dropped them.

Luther did no such thing. What Luther did do was to go back through the history of how the Bible was accumulated and wrestled with the same issues as the early church fathers. He did not remove them because they "did not suit his theology."
-----

If you study Luther, you will note that he claimed that the "Word" had three distinct referrents.

1. Word = 2nd person of the Trinity (John 1:1-14)

2. Word = proclaimed Word (John 14-17; 1 Thes. 2:13) - derived from the first one.

3. Word = written Word (2 Peter 3:15-16) - derived from #2 and indirectly from 1.

 

[Julie]

Originally posted by filosofer
Just to correct a couple of misunderstandings, errors.


Actually the council only publicly acknowledged what the churches had already been doing. Thus those at the council did not determine which were or were not inspired.



Luther did no such thing. What Luther did do was to go back through the history of how the Bible was accumulated and wrestled with the same issues as the early church fathers. He did not remove them because they "did not suit his theology."
-----

If you study Luther, you will note that he claimed that the "Word" had three distinct referrents.

1. Word = 2nd person of the Trinity (John 1:1-14)

2. Word = proclaimed Word (John 14-17; 1 Thes. 2:13) - derived from the first one.

3. Word = written Word (2 Peter 3:15-16) - derived from #2 and indirectly from 1.

True, Amen, Julie

 

[psalms 22.3]

i see no reason for anyone to preach something that has no foundation from the bible, and i think that would be very dangerous, i will never do that. seeing it gives rise to silly stories and such, even you may have no scripture to refute it.
if it needs to be preached, i beleive god would have had it included in our bible which was inspired by him in the first place. if it is not in the bible, i get the conclusoin that god aparently didnt think it needed to preached, if he thinks this, it would be wise for all to agree.

im not saying you cant explain biblical truths, that arent very explained in the word, or expand on the word for better understanding, as is pretty much all paul and some others did.
but i say never preach anything that you dont find in the word.
if you have a revelation, yet you didnt get it from the word of god (if you cant find a foundation in the word for it, you didnt get it from god)
then were did you get it? your head, or the father of lies?
both are lethal to congregations.

there is no need to preach anything except what is in the word, and it is just to dangerous to try it anyway.
as james said
BE NOT MANY MASTERS (teachers preachers) KNOWING THAT WE WILL RECIEVE THE GREATER CONDEMNATION.

i wouldnt dare preach anything i didnt find in the word, not when ill be judged for it.
god doesnt take kindly of people causing his children to be lead astray, even if it wasnt meant as evil.
you better watch what you teach or preach. a word to the wise.

 

[chagal was here]

i don't have a completely solidified opinion here. I preach from the bible (protestant - without the deuterocannonical books) but I've enjoyed reading them and I realize that Roman Catholics and Orthodox Christians believe them to be just as fully the word of God as the rest of the "regular" bible.

Just wondered if it's possible for a protestant minister to preach using the "extra books"

and as i was contemplating that, I thought about the prophets and the apostles who didn't preach from a pericope selected from the scriptures. They may have used an OT scripture text as support but their messages weren't merely commentaries on or interpretations of already written texts, they created new.

 

[Blessed-one]

in the oT, the apostles probably didn't carry around the manuel scripts of scriptures, instead the Holy Spirit was like their personal bible.
In other word, they were still preaching according to God's Word and guidance.

In today however, as there're many false teachings and doctrines, it'll be safer to preach with backings from the bible. The Holy Spirit's still there, to help us in the interpretation of the bible.

 

[psalms 22.3]

well in a way the new testament apostles created new.
but if you read thru their books enough, you see that over and over they do have refferances to things jesus said, or verses from the old testament to show the athority behind their words. preachers should always look to increase the authority in there sermons with as much scripture foundation as possible.

i think there was only one man, who i am supposed to trust enough to say his words are the words of god, even if he doesnt quote scripture referances, and thats jesus, everyone else better have something jesus said to back them up.
but even knowing that jesus is god, even jesus said he only repeated what god had told him, and when attacked by the enemy, the only thing that came out of his mouth, was SCRIPTURE, AND ANOTHER SCRITPURE, AND ANOTHER SCRIPTURE.

i myself dont beleive the apocryphal books becuase i find the evidence of it being contradictory and silly to be overwhelming. im not trying to start a debate about that. but there are statements in them that clearly contradict the words of the new king james translation that we do trust, well, supposing you trust our bible to be true, i doubt anyone here will say it isnt.
and if they can make statements that contradict, how can you trust the rest? if one part aparently isnt inspired, why even assume the rest could be?
im sorry if i seem to harp or to drag it on, keeping saying these things, for those of you who do agree with the apocryphal books. im not trying to keep an aregument going.


well, then again
even my pastor has preached things and said "I CANT PROVE THIS, I DONT HAVE ANY SCRIPTURE, BUT I THINK....."
and even paul himself said that he didnt always have a scripture to prove what he was saying, but that he trusted that he was speaking by the spirit, the same spirit that wrote all scripture.
but when he said these things, he made it very clear that that it was simply what he thought, and that men should judge it amoung themselves.
so, if we do say preach these things, we must make it clear that we could be wrong, and leave it up to men to judge amoung themselves.