I serve my church by preaching on a weekly basis. Thus, I spend a portion of my time reading books on preaching and thinking through how better to communicate God's Word to people. My primary concern is to communicate clearly the Word of God (Col. 4:4). I have found many books helpful:
Between Two Worlds, Sacred Anointing, Anointed Expository Preaching, etc. However, I attempt also to apply insights from the preaching found in the Bible. The book of Hebrews, which calls itself a sermon (Heb. 13:22), caught my eye a number of years ago in how the book explains a passage of Scripture and then calls people to apply it (Heb. 3:7-4:11). The book of Malachi has done the same recently in how the prophet uses disputation with his audience. The prophet's use of disputation, I believe, can be of help to the contemporary minister.
First, what is prophetic disputation? A
definition that I have found helpful is this: A speech in which the prophet argues a particular point of view by interrogation. The speech typically includes two things: a quotation of an opinion and then a refutation of that opinion. Here is an example from Jeremiah 8:8-9:
How can you say, "We are wise, and the law of the LORD is with us?" But behold, the lying pen of the scribes has made it into a lie. The wise men shall be put to shame; they shall be dismayed and taken; behold, they have rejected the word of the LORD, so what wisdom is in them?
Here one can see that the prophet quotes opinion of the people and then responds by telling them the truth according to God.
This type of speaking is needed today as well. The reasons are numerous. In our current context, any truth claim that is made is considered offensive. When a minister says for instance, "There is only one true Savior, Jesus", modern people say to themselves, "How can you say that?" or "How do you know that?", etc. Sin has effected people deeply and we should not assume that any time we proclaim the truth, people will sit back and just agree with us. Their false beliefs must be questioned and then responded to with God's Word.
Even the people of God have their own disagreements with the Word. In the context of the prophetic disputations in the Bible, the prophets are preaching to a rebellious Israel. We all come to the Bible with our own beliefs on how we should believe, conduct ourselves, etc. Some of those beliefs are in conformity to Scripture and some are not. Thus, the preacher that takes into account these inward disputation that his hearers may have, will do his listeners a great service by correcting their false assumptions.
