Ministry

Preaching Christ in the Old Testament: A Look Forward to the Upcoming Table Talk with Dr. Scharf and Dr. Luy

Kirk E. Miller

This post was originally published at Rolfing Unshelved.

On Wednesday, November 11 from 12-1:15 pm at the front of the library, Dr. Scharf and Dr. Luy will be facilitating a discussion on preaching Christ in the Old Testament. We will be examining some of the different perspectives and issues involved in that endeavor. Because of the complexity of this topic and the many subjects it raises to our attention, Dr. Scharf and Dr. Luy will begin the Table Talk by making some brief introductory comments. These initial remarks will serve to focus subsequent discussion. And after discussing these matters in groups, we look forward to a time of interaction with Dr. Luy and Dr. Scharf on further questions and group observations.

I hope that you will bring your lunch and join us!

This blog post seeks to introduce you to the subject at hand–preaching Christ in the Old Testament–and to expose you to some of the issues involved in that conversation.

As Dr. Scharf recently wrote me in an email,

The practice of preaching Christ in the Old Testament raises a host of questions and subjects the preacher to significant perils as well as offering great promise. Navigating these waters requires that the preacher have a defensible theology, a valid hermeneutic, and exegetical expertise (enriched ideally by a grasp of the history of interpretation of the preaching text) as well as a love for his or her listeners, the required spiritual gifting, and prayerful reliance upon the Holy Spirit.

You’ll immediately notice from his statement that the issues involved here are multi-faceted.

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RECOMMENDED: Vanhoozer and Kruger on the Pastor-Scholar (or Vice Versa)

Kirk E. Miller 1 Comment

An (Unintentional) Introduction

Within the span of a few days, I ran across two media, one by TEDS‘ very own Kevin Vanhoozer and another by Michael Kruger over at RTS, both addressing this idea of a pastor-scholar (or vice versa).

This topic of pastor as scholar is particularly interesting to me because I originally wanted to go into academia but have since change my plans and now desire to go into pastoral ministry. I suppose my reasons for shifting directions are more complex than I will explain here in this paragraph (see this post for further elaboration). But in short– My reasons for doing so are not that my concern for scholarly or “deep things” has somehow lessened over time or that I value such things to a lesser degree than I once did. Hardly. If anything my concern to become more studied has increased now that I want to be a pastor and feel the weight and breadth of that task. Nor is this because I now have become more of a “people person” (if you know me well, you might laugh at the thought of that) or more pastoral or that I now value pastoral matters more than I once did. Hardly. When I wanted to be a professor, that was what I wanted to do primarily. That is, that’s what I wanted to do to make a living. And I wanted to serve in the church as a lay elder-pastor. Now I just want to be a pastor as my primary “gig.”

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RECOMMENDED: On Recovering a Practice of Devoting Ourselves to the Public Reading of Scripture (Article by Scott Newling)

Kirk E. Miller

I just read/listened to this article by Scott Newling, “Devoted to the public reading of Scripture,” advocating a recovery of the actual practice of devoting ourselves to the public reading of scripture in our churches.

As 1 Timothy 4:13 says,

Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture….

Scott Newling says,

Let me be blunt: when we reduce the Bible reading in order to privilege something else in our meetings we are shifting the congregation’s understanding of what church is. When we choose not to read some bits because we deem them inappropriate, we forget that God wrote them—and that in his wisdom he knew what he was doing when he did. When we choose not to read parts because they seem irrelevant or unclear, we teach our congregations and ourselves that God’s word isn’t eternal or understandable. When we choose to not read the Old Testament because it is ‘unfamiliar’—how else are we going to get familiar with it? The non-Christian world certainly isn’t going to help us. If we find Scripture to be boring, it’s not God’s fault, and the solution isn’t to silence God! If we find a part boring, we must ask God to give us interest in it, because we love him and want to know what he has to say. The Bible is well aware that some bits are harder to understand than others (2 Pet 3:16-17). But where did we get the idea that the solution to this is to stop reading?

When we choose to reduce Bible readings for something else, do we then in effect say that our means, our words, are better than God’s to grow people?

I loved this article. It reflects a lot of my own convictions on the matter and thoughts I’ve been having for a little over a year now.

You can check it out over at Matthias Media’s The Briefing. Click here.

The Seminary Strain

Kirk E. Miller

“Imagine an institution that requires its leaders to attend not only college, but graduate school. Imagine that the graduate school in question is constitutionally forbidden from receiving any form of government aid, that it typically requires three years of full-time schooling for the diploma, that the nature of the schooling bears almost no resemblance to the job in question, and that the pay for graduates is far lower than other professions. You have just imagined the relationship between the Christian Church and her seminaries.”

~ From “The Seminary Bubble” by Jerry Bowyer. Continue reading here.

I’m currently in my third year of seminary. So the intense financial, physical, relational, emotional, psychological, and (am I allowed to say it?) spiritual strain of the seminary experience is particularly vivid to me (and my wife) right now. This awareness comes not only from personal experience–although that’s my primary source–but also from the stories of many of my peers. Some of those stories are rather heart-wrenching.

I’m recuringly bothered by this. I’m troubling with how straining the seminary experience typically is and how little attention the church (speaking broadly here) seems to be giving to this problem. To be blunt, it seems that many are actually pretty oblivious to the problems. And, mind you, these seminarians are the future leaders of the Church who are putting themselves through this because of their heart for and call to serve her.

I don’t have a solution to offer for this multifaceted dilemma (I’m just well aware that there’s a problem). So, I suppose I’m leaving this post in a bit of a depressing mood (sorry). However, my goal is not to be a “Debbie downer,” but to bring some awareness to this issue.

Read the rest of “The Seminary Bubble” here.