Workshop Hosting Manual
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2.1. CONVICTIONS ABOUT OUR DIRECTION
Pastors preach in an image-based, postmodern, pragmatic, and success-oriented culture. A belief in Truth—inerrant, sufficient, potent and exclusive Truth—is counter-cultural. Consequently, pastors have a profound lack of confidence in God’s Word and need to be convinced that expositional preaching 1) is what God is asking of them, and 2) that it brings about the radical gospel growth and maturation promised in the Word. We believe that expositional preaching can be taught, learned, and passed along from one generation to the next for the advancement of the gospel. Workshops are a means for us to pursue these realities.
2.2. WORKSHOP GOALS
The mission of the Workshops is threefold. First, for expositional preaching to take hold of a preacher and subsequently edify and evangelize his congregation, he must be confident in applying himself to the task. We must convince the pastor that the heart of pastoral ministry is the proclamation of the Word. Second, as he is convinced, he must also grow in his confidence to practice expositional preaching. We must encourage him in his own life-long ministry by ministering to him from the Word. Finally, as he is encouraged, he must also be given the tools to apply specific principles such that he both understands and is equipped for true expositional preaching. We must show him how to rightly handle the Word of God. Our process can be explained in three activities:
1. Convince him that it must be done.
Using the Scriptures, show men that God’s view of preaching has at its heart the proclamation of the word. This takes hard work. It does not guarantee numerical growth or popularity. We must show that the Spirit works through the Word, God reveals Christ through the Word, and that people grow in faith through the Word.
2. Encourage him that it can be done.
While a preacher may be convinced that Biblical exposition must be done, a preacher must also be encouraged that progress in the work is attainable for them. We pray for the preacher to grow in confidence in the week to week work of exposition.
3. Show him how it is done.
Showing the participant how to do exposition includes instilling convictions about preaching and providing training on a proper pathway for preparing a sermon from a specific passage that participants can implement.
2.4. WORKSHOP SESSIONS
In Instructional Sessions, trained instructors utilize a modified socratic method to teach principles of exposition. During Expositions, experienced preachers demonstrate and illustrate the principles conveyed in instructional sessions with sermons aimed at strengthening participants for life and ministry. The Small Group Sessions reinforce the instructions and provide an occasion to practice. These three sessions work together to convince participants that Biblical Exposition must be done, to encourage them that it can be done, and to show them how it is done.