Select a textual unit with an eye to congregational needs.

2. Read and reread the text in its literary context.

3. Outline the structure of the text.

4. Interpret the text in its own historical setting.

5. Formulate the text’s theme and goal.

6. Understand the message in the contexts of canon and redemptive history.

7. Formulate the sermon theme and goal.

8. Select a suitable sermon form.

9. Prepare the sermon outline.

10. Write the sermon in oral style.

the lack of character evaluation exhibits the narrator’s purposeful attempt not to close off the narrative at the human level but to keep the narrative open to God: What is the covenant God doing in and through and in spite of these human characters? Thus the narrator not only narrates from God’s point of view but manages to turn our attention to God even when the narrative is about human characters.

Even more telling is the twofold reference to Abraham’s obedience in the text itself: “By myself I have sworn, says the LORD: Because you have done this, and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will indeed [Wenham, “really”] bless you.… because you have obeyed my voice” (vv 16–18). Wenham speaks of “the meritoriousness of Abraham” and declares that “the central thrust of the story [is] Abraham’s wholehearted obedience and the great blessings that have flowed from it.”38

Historical interpretation is interested in discovering the meaning of the text in its own historical-cultural context. For the interpretation of narrative, the historical questions concerning the author, the original audience, the time, setting, and purpose of writing are important, for they provide further clues to the purpose and meaning of a passage.

Under historical interpretation we need to ask two basic questions. First, What was the author’s intended meaning for his original hearers? We can answer this question by seeking answers to the five familiar questions: Who wrote this text? To whom? When? Where? And why?

The second basic question is, What need of the hearers did the author seek to address? Every text has a question behind the text, an issue that called the text into being. It may be idolatry, or lack of knowledge, or lack of justice, or lack of love for neighbor, or foreign alliances, or exile, or misplaced trust in large armies.

The major question under theocentric interpretation is: What does this passage reveal about God, his redemptive acts, his covenant, his grace, his will for his people? The question about God in relation to his people is probably the most important question to ask to prevent the moralistic, imitation preaching so prevalent today. For basically the Bible is about God; it is his self-revelation to his people. This revelation naturally includes God’s will for his people, but this is usually revealed in divine laws and directions for human behavior rather than in fallible models of such behavior. In addition to preventing moralistic preaching, theocentric interpretation also provides an important link to Christ-centered preaching, as we shall see in Step 6.