The Value of Biblical Exposition in Evangelism
Dr. Randy White
Once upon a time, churches met on Sunday mornings for “preaching services.” In these services, preachers preached the Word of God, often verse-by-verse. They were chiefly teachers of the Word, and the faithful attenders were the eager students. They carried their Bible, took notes, and (over time) became experts of the Scriptures.Then, a thing called the Church Growth Movement changed all that.The Sunday morning service changed from the “Preaching Service” to the “Worship Service,” which eventually changed to the “Worship Gathering,” and further changed to simply, “Praise and Worship.” The service became mostly filled with music, drama, and moments of introspection. The preacher became the “Lead Pastor” and the “preaching” gave way to a “speech” and, then, just a “talk or conversation.” The talk was about felt needs and everyday issues. It was filled with humor, emotionalism, and “go get ‘em tiger” conclusions. All this was done because the church thought it needed to soften its tone, lighten up, be authentic (whatever that means), and speak to the heart. Otherwise, the lost would never come to know Jesus.What happened was that a lot of people –mostly kids and young adults on an emotional high created by the sights and sounds of the 60-minute production—made up some kind of testimony to faith. But they never became disciples, never learned much of anything from the Bible (except, “Judge not, lest ye be judged,” even though they can’t tell you where that verse is), and they never really had a commitment to being transformed by the renewing of your mind or washed in the water of the Word.I’m convinced that if Christians and churches want to be most effective at evangelism, the most important thing they can do is transform program and event-oriented congregations into Bible-teaching churches. When lost people get under the influence of the Word, they will very often come to a point of faith. The Word, after all, always does its work. It is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword.
Jenna’s Story
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Josh and Jenna are now happily married and growing in the Lord in Alberta, Canada.[/caption]Jenna listens to the Thursday night verse-by-verse online Bible study of our ministry. She recently shared her story, and it perfectly illustrates the value of expositional, verse-by-verse Bible study in evangelism.“I came from a non-religious family, meaning anything that was religious in my house was mocked or shunned. There were attempts throughout my life to go to churches but my mom usually shut that down quite quickly due to her own bad experiences. Throughout my life, I have been sexually abused (age 4), physically abused (age 13) and raped (age 14) which only hardened my heart against God wondering how he could allow such awful things to happen to me. This deepened my sin, I started getting into drugs and alcohol around age 15. I soon became one of the many who hated Christianity and everything they stood for. I eventually met Josh through mutual work and we began dating. It didn’t come out until about a month in that he listened to your Bible studies on Thursdays. This, of course, caused me some alarm because I was anti-Christianity. I decided to push past it and on Thursdays when he would do his Bible study I would simply take a nap in the same room.As time went on I found myself taking a slight interest in the things you were teaching. Eventually, I even started to stay awake for Thursday night Bible studies and even studying up on anything I didn’t understand. Josh and I began to discuss some of what you were teaching, and he answered many of my questions.Over time, I came to the conclusion that I had been wrong about Jesus, the Bible, and Christianity. Based on what you teach in your studies, I concluded that I was mistaken about my beliefs. And in March 2016 I became a Christian, partly because of you. Your teachings are so well put together that anything else didn’t make sense. So thank you for all that you do and know that your message reaches the lost.”