The Text Can't Mean What It Doesn't Say

Welcome to Conversations with a Calvinist. This podcast is dedicated to helping believers better understand Scripture, defend truth, and engage culture. Get your Bible ready and prepare to engage today's topic.

Here's your host, Pastor Keith Foskey.

Hermeneutics and Exegesis: The Text Can't Mean What It Doesn't Say

Welcome back to Conversations with a Calvinist. My name is Keith Foskey, and I am a Calvinist. I'm being joined today again by my friend and fellow pastor, Kenny Roberts of Mission Way Church here in Jacksonville, Florida.

Hi, Kenny. How are you?

I'm doing well. I just bought a brisket for a men's event for church, so I'm doing really well.

Awesome. That's great. Now, are you cooking the brisket yourself? I absolutely am. Yes. Okay. All right. Well, I may have to come to your—I saw your men's event being posted on Facebook, and I may have to come try your brisket.

Come check it out, man. Awesome. Awesome. Well, tell everybody when it is, if anybody is interested.

This Friday night at 6 o 'clock at our church. We're just getting some men together, having some meat and fellowship, and I feel like those two things just go really well together.

Absolutely. Absolutely. All right. Well, Kenny, today I invited you on the program because of a previous conversation that we've had. We're going to be talking about the sister subjects of hermeneutics and exegesis.

Now, those are terms that I'm sure that many of our listeners are familiar with, but just in case they're not, I do want to define what we're talking about. When we use the word hermeneutics, we're talking about the art and science of interpreting the Bible.

The term hermeneutics actually can be used to interpret anything. I've often said the Supreme Court is a hermeneutical institution because its job is to interpret and apply the constitution. That's the job of the Supreme Court.

So hermeneutics really just means giving a proper interpretation and application of a text. And we talk about biblical hermeneutics. Well, that's what we're doing. We want to interpret the Bible properly and apply it in a way that is consistent with what it says.

And exegesis is really the way that that works, because exegesis means to draw out from the text what is there and not to impose upon the text something from the outside. When you do that, when you impose your own ideas or you impose a thought onto the text that isn't there, that's called isegesis.

The prefix in the Greek ex means out of, and eis means into. So exegesis means to draw out, and eisegesis means to read into the text. And we could give a thousand examples of eisegesis, someone reading something into the text that simply isn't there.

And I'm currently teaching it on this in our hermeneutics class at Sovereign Grace Academy. And one of the things I posted, which created this beginning of this conversation with me and you, Kenny, was this statement.

The text can't mean what it doesn't say. I'll say that again. The text can't mean what it doesn't say. And that caused you to reach out to me and say, Hey, I have something I want to talk about. And you said you've seen this in action recently.

I wanted to hear your thoughts.

The Danger of Reading Between the Lines

On that. Yeah. I mean, it stuck out to me for a lot of reasons, because I think this is actually one of the biggest problems that has led to faulty doctrine in the church. I really believe that. I think that, first of all, this is what people do all the time.

They read into the text something that's not there. And a lot of times it's, well, the text says this, but what's really going on here is this. And that's a problem. And I even have a friend that recently said something to along the lines of, well, the Bible is not inerrant in the way it was written.

And when it was written, it was not inerrant, but it's inerrant when we read it. In other words, the inerrancy of the scripture is when I, as a Christian, come into the text and literally, my friend said, read in between the lines of the text and draw out meaning.

And I was like that. I mean, at what point do we realize that that's going to lead to heresy and that's going to lead to everybody having their own interpretation of the text. And so it stuck out to me for those reasons.

I mean, I've seen this in action far too often where we read into the text, things that are just not there. And it's a simple, it's a simple thing, but we so often get it wrong.

Absolutely. And that's interesting that he would say we have to read between the lines. I would, I don't know this person, I don't know what he meant, but it's hard not to imagine, like you said, all kinds of opportunities for dangerous things to come out of that.

You know, I've used this example before many times, but John Dominic Crossom was a member of the Jesus Seminar. And I remember him teaching on Jesus Seminar, for those who don't know, is a group of people who, they're liberal scholars who believe they were searching for the historic Jesus.

They don't believe the Bible represents the historic Jesus. So the Jesus Seminar were guys who don't believe the Bible tells the story about Jesus. They're seeking to find their own story. And so he's a liberal professor, liberal teacher.

And one of the things he said was when Jesus fed the 5 ,000, that really wasn't, he didn't really take five loaves and two fish and turn them into food. What he did was he encouraged those who had to share with those who didn't.

And it's a great socialist miracle. And I tell this story all the time, because if there's ever an example of eisegesis, if there's ever an example of reading something into the text, that's not there, but your friend, you know, if he said, you got to read in between the lines, well, that's certainly in between the lines, because that's not in the line.

It's not in the text. Well, and that was eye opening for me because we had been discussing different texts and I realized his interpretation of those were incorrect. And when he said that, I realized, oh, so that's what you're doing.

And I've heard people say, well, they're doing that as they read all of scripture. And I've heard this argument where they're like, well, I'm trying to use all of the Bible to interpret this one text.

And there's a good principle in that, but that's not really what you're doing when you try to make the text say something that it's not saying you're not doing that. You're using an excuse that sounds right to accomplish eisegesis.

At that point. Absolutely. Recently I was teaching or I am still in Genesis 22. I'll be in my third week this Sunday preaching through Genesis, actually fourth week this week, preaching through Genesis 22.

And it's the offering of Isaac by Abraham. One of the things I mentioned in my first sermon was that the text never says Abraham was sad. I believe he was, I believe it was a tough walk. It was three days journey.

And then he had to go up the mountain to offer his son. And I believe when Isaac said, father, here's the wood, here's the fire, but where's the lamb, I believe Abraham probably had to choke out the words, God will provide.

And so I think that we can, as R .C. Sproul said, read the text existentially, meaning look at these as real people. These are not robots. These are not wooden puppets. These are real people going through the pathos of this situation.

But that doesn't mean that like there was, and I use this example in the sermon, there was a movie I saw where it was the story of Abraham and Isaac, and Sarah was running up the mountain trying to stop him.

And I was like, now, wait a minute, that's not in the story. That's not only eisegesis, that's like a whole other story. Because the text doesn't tell us that he told her what he was doing or anything.

She's not in the narrative in Genesis 22 at all. So there's one thing when I say, we can't, let me get back up. When I say the text can't mean what it doesn't say, I'm not saying that we can't have some sanctified imagination at certain points and try.

I think about the death of Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron. When they died, it says, Moses told Aaron, those who draw near to me must consider me as holy. And it says, and Aaron held his peace. Well, I think the statement Aaron held his peace was put in the text to remind us that he was feeling the pain of having lost his sons, but he didn't lash out at God, even though others may have.

And so I'm certainly not saying that we can't that we can't study the text more deeply. But I think the concern that you have, and that I would have as well, is when we begin to interject all of these other things.

Context, Meaning, and the Whole Counsel of God

Right. Well, and when you say the text can't mean what it doesn't say, that word mean is important because you take the example of believing that Abraham was sad when he had to, thought he had to offer up Isaac.

I mean, we can pretty easily and logically conclude that, but that doesn't, it doesn't change the meaning of the text, whether or not he was sad, right? That's right. So, so we have to be careful here of when we're, when we're reading the narrative of scripture and saying, man, it's, it's easy to assume that something else was going on here.

This person had this emotion or that was happening. We can think that may have happened, but don't ever read into the text. Something that changes the meaning is what's important. We need to bring our, this might be a weird statement, but I think it works here.

We need to bring our humanity into our reading of the Bible and remember that these are real people with real emotions. But don't read into the text, something that changes the meaning or causes the text to say something it's.

Not saying. Absolutely. Absolutely. And that's really the heart of what we're talking about today. When do we come to the point where we've changed the meaning? Yep. When do, when do we come to the point?

Because so much of what I hear people say today is, is really not biblical, but yet at the same time, they are claiming biblical fidelity. They're saying, no, I'm a, I'm a Bible based Christian. I'm a, you know, I'm, I'm a, I'm a sola scriptura believer, but yet their, their theology and their bibliology is so out of whack.

And, um, the, and the scary thing I mentioned this to you before the program, it seems like it's not just coming from wild eyed, you know, crazy sources, but it's coming from some of the, uh, people who we would identify as the good guys, the good solid reform, you know, guys that we would trust.

Um, because what's happening and I'll let you share your opinion on this, but I'll tell you my opinion. What I think is happening is people, people have become far too willing to allow their theology to be influenced by other things than the Bible.

For instance, whether it be their favorite preachers, um, their, their, you know, their favorite blog or Hey, their favorite podcast. I don't think mine's anyone's favorite, but, but, but, but, you know, there is a danger in podcast culture where podcasts can be helpful.

But if that's the only diet that people are getting of biblical theology is what they're hearing from their favorite podcaster, you know, and here's the thing, I mentioned this to you. I know, I know there are people out there who could probably name all of Doug Wilson's grandchildren, but probably couldn't name all of the 12 disciples or the, or the, or the 27 books of the new Testament, or, you know, um, because they have become, you know, they've got their Spurgeon is my homeboy t-shirt.

They've got their, you know, Paul Washer cover photo on their, on their page, but they're not spending time in the Bible. Yep. Yep. Oh, for sure. And I see this.

Happen so often, even some people that I know who I'll discuss doctrine with, they'll share an idea with me that is, is foreign to scripture. And if I call it out, they'll appeal to a preacher or somebody that they heard teach this doctrine before.

Um, I'm, I'm a part of a few Facebook groups, mostly for fun. I don't actually even engage with most of them. I just observe I'm a people watcher and I do that even on Facebook. Uh, but there's a group called reformed Christian teaching, I think.

And so many of the people on there are constantly posting, Hey, uh, use Paul Washer. For example, um, he taught this, what do you all think about that? And I think it's good to examine the teaching of men and women, but I think the danger is they're spending so much time evaluating their teaching and they're not spending time in the text.

And there's another danger here. I think if you've got two or three favorite podcasts, um, you can actually really fall into the danger of not studying the whole council of God because most podcasts, not all most podcasts are, they have certain topics that they're going to hit on more than others and rightfully so.

And they're going to be places of scripture that they never go because their podcast isn't intended for that. And that's okay for them. But if that's your only diet, there's just going to be parts of the Bible that you never get into because all you're doing is you're, you're pulling in sermons or podcasts or whatever it may be.

Um, so we've got to be careful to make sure that we're studying the whole council of God too. That's an important point here. Absolutely. Absolutely. And, and,.

You know, when we think about the, the Bible as what should be the steady diet and all of the rest of these things being the periphery or the, what I said, you know, the, the appetizers and desserts, um, these become the steady diet and you hit on something really important.

I hadn't even thought about it, but you're right. If you go to, and I'm not, it's, I'm not picking on Doug Wilson, but you go to put Doug Wilson's site, they're going to be the things that he focuses on, which right now is tend to be, you know, social justice and things like that.

Things that he's that, you know, which is good. I mean, we, we need voices in the church community who are saying some of the things that guys like Doug Wilson are saying guys like James White, who I, and, and I mean, I, I grew up on the dividing line, listening to James White, you know, I loved, you know, uh, listening to his podcast.

You know, when I say I grew up, what I mean is, you know, a lot of my formative years, you know, I would listen to the dividing line twice a week because it came on twice a week. So I know, I know where a lot of people are, right.

But if that's, if that's, if that's the majority or if that's all, you know, what, what is our devotional time? What, what is our time in the word really look like? And, um, and I think that, and this.

Might not be true for everybody that's listening to this right now, but for me, I was scrolling through my latest episodes in Apple podcasts, just scrolling through like, what are people talking about right now?

And it, it was mostly centered around, uh, the current issues of today. And that's good that we have voices talking about that, but are you ever spending time in the word to just simply abide with Christ or, or is your Bible consumption coming from teachers who are dealing with current issues?

That's an important section, but if you're never spending time to abide with the Lord in his word to study, um, you are missing out on a key part of our relationship with Christ. And I think that you're spiritually starving yourself.

Um, and, and again, I noticed that in my own life, my, in my own life, I tend to become very spiritually dry when I'm spending more time in podcasts and sermons than I am in the word. Um, and so that it's crucial.

This, this doesn't just matter because like, we're afraid that people are going to get led astray by some of these people that we're talking about necessarily. Um, but if, but if your authority is James White or washer or whoever, and not the scriptures, and if you're your spiritual diet are those guys and those podcasts and not the scripture, you're going to end up being pretty.

Anemic soon. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And, uh, when you were talking about the, um, the, uh, lost my place there. I'm sorry. No, no, this is just thinking about all of the, the, the things that are going on right now.

Exegetical Preaching and a Balanced Spiritual Diet

This is where exegetical preaching is also very valuable and, and, and something that a lot of people, you know, over, over the last year and a half, so many people have abandoned their churches. I know I don't mean to go off on a side note, but this, as you were saying this, it came into my mind.

If you're in a church, that's always preaching current events and is not preaching exegetically through texts. And it doesn't have to be, you know, I, I, I do believe for me, preaching verse by verse through books is the best way for me to preach.

But I do know there are some men who effectively do that differently. So I, I don't, I don't believe that exegetical preaching has to, has to necessarily mean you start at Genesis one, one, and go to Genesis 50.

You know, I, it doesn't always have to look like that. You can preach sections of a book. You can preach, you know, different things. But if, if, if every time you step foot in your church, your pastor's talking about critical race theory, or he's talking about all of these things, even though these may be the pressing issues of the day, you know, if there's not a robust and rounded diet, as you said, you know, then, then you're missing out on so much.

And, and so it's, you know, that, that could be for any preachers listening. Are we preaching our hobby horses? Are we preaching only, you know, and I know there, there are people that might accuse me and say, well, you know, I hear you preach a lot about Calvinism, but you really don't.

I'm, you hear me say I'm a Calvinist when I'm on the podcast, but as far as preaching the doctrines of grace or the five points of Calvinism, this is not, you know, it was so funny last night. I was at the booth.

We're doing our evangelism booth right now. It's our 10 days of evangelism at the fair. And I had two church members with me and somebody came up while, while we were there. And I was, I was on one side of the booth.

They each other. And somebody came up to one of the ladies and she's been a member of our church for a while and said to her, you guys are Calvinist. I don't want to take your track, which, you know, that that's, that's fine.

Right. But the, but the lady who's church member walked over, she goes, the lady just told me she didn't want to take our tract because we're Calvinist. I said, yeah, I understand people sometimes are like that.

And she goes, can you explain to me again what that means? And I was like, that's fine. You know, I mean, but that just goes to show that, you know, even though we try to teach these things, it's not, it's not the only thing, you know, is that we're, that, you know, that, that people might assume that because we're Calvinistic church, that everybody is branded with, you know, a tulip when they walk in and we're just constantly force feeding, you know, these things.

Yeah. Yeah. We can't. And I would just, I mean, this would.

Just based off of what you were saying, this is a challenge to pastors and those who are not pastors even to read and study texts that, that you're uncomfortable, that you don't fully understand that you're afraid to go to maybe the top of that list for a lot of people would be revelation.

But, but go to texts that you you're afraid to. And I, and I challenged myself in this sometimes when I'm thinking through preaching calendars and where we're going to go, there's times when a text or a book of the Bible will kind of come to my mind and I'll go, well, that's, that's going to be really hard to work through.

And I want to force myself to do it. I think that's important because if you don't, you're going to be leaving out parts of the script. You're going to be leaving out parts of the whole council of God.

And that's not to say that as a preacher you failed, if you don't preach from Genesis one to revelation 21 throughout your lifetime, but you got to preach the whole council of God. That's right. 22. Sorry.

No, you're fine. I tell you what, I will, I'll, I'll give you a thought on that. I recently have been doing, I've changed, changed the way I do my Bible reading. And we, my wife and I did a whole Bible reading last year.

We read through the whole Bible together. And you know, it's, you do that. It's like seven or eight chapters a day. It's a lot. Right. But this year I decided to do it differently. And what I'm doing is I'm taking a section of scripture every month and reading it every day.

So right now I'm reading revelation one through seven. I read that every day. The next month it'll be eight through 14 or whatever, 16 or whatever. But two months ago I was in first John and I read first John every day.

Now a lot of, a lot of people find a lot of comfort in first John. But I, but I get around chapter three and I start getting really convicted and it was, and it was really, you know, cause it talks about he, who's been born again, will not sin and things like that.

And we know that there's a meaning that doesn't mean that we're going to be perfect. That's not preaching sinless perfectionism, but there still is a, there's a certain conviction that lays upon us about our sin.

And, you know, I don't remember the last time I heard that as somebody's primary preaching text, you know, that people will go to first John. They really liked the portions, you know, about, you know, if we do sin, we have an advocate with the father, Jesus Christ, the righteous, you know, if we confess our sin, he is faithful and just forgive us and cleanse us of all unrighteousness.

Those are, those are the passages in first John everybody likes, but you, but you start getting into chapter three and he really goes, you know, the old joke, he went from preaching to meddling, you know, and he really starts meddling in our hearts.

But that's what that text is. What makes this conversation important to the text, the text can't mean what it doesn't say. When you read in first John three, he was born of God, doesn't sin. Or I'm, I'm, you know, paraphrasing, paraphrasing, you needed chapter two before you got to chapter three.

Because, because if all you have is chapter three, you're not getting what the text actually means. And so that's an important part of this whole discussion. And this is why it's important to read the whole counsel of God, because you, you need the text, all of the text, and then those local specific contexts to know exactly what is meant by what is said there.

I think, I think the danger, one of the dangers here is proof texting, right? This is what people do all the time. They, they grab a verse like that, that says he was born of God will not sin. And they form a whole theology around that, but that's not what the text actually is saying and meaning.

And so we, we needed chapter two before we got to chapter three.

Good and Necessary Consequence Without Eisegesis

Absolutely. And, and that's absolutely right. The, that text can easily be drawn out and used, you know, for Wesleyan perfectionism and people who hold to a view of sinless perfectionism. And when I teach on hermeneutics, when I teach in class, we talk about what we, what I call, and I don't know if this is something, this is something me and my fellow elders, we use this term.

I don't know if it's used by other people probably is, but, you know, we didn't invent it, but we talk about the term parameters. And by that, we mean the borders of the text, you know, exegesis. If you're going to draw out of the text, if you're going to, if you're going to to find out what the text says, you also have to stay within the parameters of what, what is allowed to be said by that text and not go, not go and be exercise creativity and bring in, you know, your own opinion.

And this was something I mentioned to you before the program, I had it in our pre-show notes is the idea of the Westminster concept of what is called good and necessary consequence, you know, and good and necessary consequence.

I'll read it. It's actually from the Westminster confession chapter one, which is on the scriptures and part of portion six, it says this, it says the whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for his own glory, man, salvation, faith, and life is either expressly set down in scripture or by good and necessary consequences or consequence may be deduced from scripture under which nothing at any time is to be added, whether by new revelations of the spirit or traditions of men.

And I mentioned that because what you just said, when I mentioned first John three, you know, if all you read was first John three, it would be easy to fall into the trap of sinless perfectionism. But what you did was you looked at the context, which is necessary for interpretation.

Obviously, hermeneutics is, you know, the three C's of biblical interpretation or context, context, and context. You know, we have to look at the context and thereby through good and necessary consequence, we deduce what the meaning is.

And of course, what I believe the meaning of first John three is, is a pattern of unbroken habitual sin. That is not something we see in the life of someone who is born again, someone who continues in a pattern of unbroken, habitual, unrepentant sin.

And even in the Greek, when we see, I believe the word sin there is in the ongoing tense, you know, the idea is continual. So, but would you agree with me if I said this, there are some people, there are some interpreters who take good and necessary consequence to a place where it does become eisegesis, where they're reading into the text.

Revelation, Universal Salvation, and Final Judgment

Absolutely. I'll use an example. So in revelation, there's two passages that I was talking with somebody and they used, they said, there's a part of revelation that says the gates of, of heaven, the gates of the new kingdom will never be shut.

And then just a little bit after that, it says the spirit and the bride say come. And they put those two texts together. And they said, what does this mean? This means that those who are outside of the kingdom are invited to come in.

After judgment, after judgment that those cast out of the kingdom, because the gates are open than those. And then because the spirit and the bride say come, then that's the invitation for all of those outside the kingdom to come into the kingdom.

And you just read two verses after the gates are never shut. It's very clear that, that there are those who will never be allowed in that they are cast out of the kingdom, eternally damned. And so that's an example.

I think of they're trying to use this principle of bringing other scriptures to bear on this text. The problem is they're not reading the context of either of the scriptures that they're putting together.

They've taken two concepts and they've removed both of them from their context. And they said, they're basically trying to say, even though they wouldn't use these words by good and necessary consequence, you put these two together and you have universal salvation.

And I'm like,.

That's not how you read the text. Absolutely. And that actually reminds me, and I don't know who this person is you're talking about, but it reminds me of a conversation I had on my front door with a lady who was a Jehovah's witness.

And we were talking about salvation. We were talking about when you die, what happens? And she said, oh yeah, when you die, you get another chance to repent. You're not eternally condemned. God's going to give you a chance at the judgment bar to repent and believe.

And I said, that certainly could be a comforting thought for people that we know that have died in their sins. They're going to get one more chance. I said, but where do we get that from the text? And what you just said is, she could have probably run there and said, well, here the gates are never closed and the bride says come.

And so I had never heard that interpretation, but it's interesting how the creativity of eisegesis. Well, and I'm seeing.

Something that's kind of moving through some people's theology and some churches where, and I think this applies to the conversation. I hope it does. They're basically saying, well, let's have a hopeful view of scripture.

In other words, the text says, for example, that these people are cast out of the kingdom for eternity. But what if our concept of eternity is different than the Lord's? And what if our concept of judgment is different than the Lord's?

And there's a lot of what ifs that are brought in. And that's why you go back to the statement, the text cannot mean what it does not say. It can't. And we have the completed full revelation of God. And so the things that are necessary for life and salvation are given to us in the scriptures.

There's never a question as important as judgment and final things that God has not.

Already given us the answer to. Absolutely. Absolutely. And you know, what's funny is you mentioned that and the doctrine that came to my mind is the doctrine of annihilationism. Yeah. You know, that's the thing a lot of people find somewhat comforting is maybe at some point God's just going to snuff out the existence of his enemies.

And rather than there being an infinity of punishment, perhaps there will simply be the cessation of life, cessation of existence rather. And there have been so many, I would say, godly pastors, godly preachers who have, I don't say fallen into the trap, but maybe dip their toe into the soothing pond of annihilationism because they couldn't rectify the idea of eternal conscious torment.

And even, you know, and I could be wrong on this, but I'm going off to the listener. I'm going off something I heard, not something I read. So forgive me if I'm an error, feel free to send me an email.

I'm sure they will. Yes, yes. People are very quick to correct. But as I understand it, even Luther, the great, you know, German reformer had at a certain point leaned towards annihilationism in regard to how he understood the possible condition of the final condition of the dam.

And again, you say, well, how does somebody get there? Especially somebody as knowledgeable as Martin Luther, how could he get there? Well, I think it's easy. It's so easy to emotionalize the concept of eternity.

And what you just said, it's almost a more hopeful view for some. Well, and I think some people would hear this conversation and call.

Us and people kind of talk this way, arrogant and saying, we know what the scripture is saying, and we have it all figured out. We have all the answers. But I'm not relying on my interpretation of the scripture as much as I'm relying on what the scripture has said.

And I understand interpretation has to matter here. We all interpret what the Bible is saying. But the goal is to interpret what the Bible is saying, not what I want the Bible to say. And Amen. That, I mean, that plays into so many conversations.

You put every culturally difficult topic and insert that in here. And that's what people are doing. They're saying, well, I know the Bible, this verse in this passage says this, but really what's going on here is, and then they go off on what they want the Bible to be saying.

And none of that is actually ever said in the text. So that's, I mean, again, it's such a simple hermeneutical principle that people I think would say, yeah, that's right. It can't mean what it doesn't say, but then in practice, this is exactly what people do because we want to do it.

And I'm not saying I'm immune to this. I think we all want to at times take the scripture to mean what we want it to say. But we are bound by what the scripture has said, not what we want it to say.

Observation Before Interpretation

Absolutely. And I think this is a good point in the show to sort of go toward what we were going to do at the end. And that is talk about the way that we find these parameters, the way that we study the Bible.

And, you know, because the urgency of this podcast for you, the listener who are listening is that we do want you to study the scripture. We want you to have a steady diet in the word, use books, use podcasts, use YouTube videos, use blogs, but let them be your appetizers.

Let them be your desserts. Don't let that be your primary sustenance. The primary sustenance is your time in the word of God. And as Kenny just said, the word of God, first and foremost, has to be read before we interpret.

And one of the things that I stress in the hermeneutics class that I'm currently teaching, which is based on the book, Living by the Book by Howard Hendricks, who was a legendary professor from Dallas Seminary.

Now, he wasn't a Calvinist, I don't believe, but he was a great teacher. In fact, one of the greatest teachers I've ever heard. He just had a wonderful way of connecting with his students. And he gives a threefold method for Bible study.

And his first method, the threefold method is observation, interpretation, and application. And what he says, he says, everybody jumps to interpretation almost immediately. And they almost always bypass sincere observation.

And what observation from the book is what he says is observation is, what does this text actually say? Not what does it mean, but just what does it say? And I was going to ask you this, Kenny, I know I didn't prepare you for this one, so forgive me if I'm asking something odd, but I'm going to ask you, when you sit down with the Bible, when you're getting ready for a sermon, or even when you're only doing your own personal study, what does that process of observation look.

Like for you, that first part? Well, very specifically and practically, when it comes to sermon prep, which is very similar to my devotional reading, by the way, the beginning of my sermon prep looks very much like when I'm just sitting down personally with the scriptures, not with the goal of writing a sermon.

I'll print out the text that I'm preaching on, and I just sit with it. I'm here at my desk and I have my computer in front of me, but I literally, I will, and this is kind of just intentional in my own mind.

I turn my chair to another part of my desk where I have the scripture laid out in front of me with nothing but a pen and a Sharpie and a highlighter so that I can figure out what is this text saying. I don't want to, like people will ask me sometimes, our worship team, for example, will say, well, what are you preaching on?

And a lot of times, if I haven't yet read the text, all I can say is, well, I'm preaching from this passage, and I think this is where I might go, but that might drastically change when I sit down and read the text, because there have been times when I thought, hey, it's going to go here, but that's not what the text was saying.