Home > Resources > Interdisciplinary > Apocalyptic

Afternoon Seminar
From Biblical Text to Sermon Manuscript in the Book of Revelation
—Gregory Beale

The title of Gregory Beale's preaching seminar, “From Biblical Text to Sermon Manuscript in the Book of Revelation,” summarized the goal of his session. His purpose was to quickly discuss the do's and don'ts of informed Reformed exegesis and then move on to showing participants how he had written a sermon on Revelation 6:1-8. Beale stressed the importance of well-chosen interpretive ideas and transitions in an outline while highlighting his own choices when writing a sermon “verse by verse.”

Each of his points followed an expository style taught by professors such as Sidney Greidanus, Douglas Stuart, and Haddon Robinson. Contrasted with an inspirational talk, this sermonic style is textually based, predominated by explication and careful interpretation, posits the Word of God as authoritative, and summarizes the text's meaning in the sermon's conclusion. Another aspect of this style and its emphasis on careful interpretation is word study – the good sermon writer is a student of the biblical languages.

Professor Beale finished the seminar by preaching his sermon. It was helpful for participants to hear his earlier points delivered in a pastoral setting. His powerful conclusion of how Christ unleashes trials throughout history for the building up of the Church was an exclamation point to his entire seminar. Participants left feeling better informed and encouraged to preach from Revelation.

—Mark Hofman

Listening to God: The Sermon Compared to the Inspirational Talk

Inspirational/Topical Talk	Expository Sermon
Stories predominate	Explication predominates
Topically based	Textually based
Greatest care to choice of illustrations	Greatest care to accuracy of interpretation
Text supports some assertions	Text makes all assertions
Intro focuses on life	Intro focuses on text
Conclusion makes practical point about living	Conclusion summarizes passage
Speaker is authority	Word of God is authority

- Gregory Beale