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3 Lenses for Preaching Well
How do we see the Bible through the eyes of our ancient authors and not just our modern lenses?

My parents were born in Seoul, Korea. I was born in Portland, Oregon. My parents lived through a war when they were children. My most traumatic childhood experience was when the guacamole gun at the Taco Bell went dry. In college, I tried to use my broken Korean to tell my parents that I met a girl, only to see a look of shock on their faces because apparently, I misspoke and said that I had met a massage girl.
Misunderstandings and miscommunications are still rampant between my parents and I. For better communication between us, a generational gap had to be crossed and a cultural understanding had to be navigated.
These differences are so much greater when we open our Bibles.
The Bible is far older than my parents and it was written in a culture much different than Korea in the 1950s.
As westerners, the sin of Sodom and Gomorrah seems clear to us (Genesis 19:1-9). We even named a sin after it. However, to Indonesian Christians, it’s clear to them that the sin was also gluttony and a lack of care for the poor. “Now this was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters had pride, plenty of food, and comfortable security, but didn’t support the poor and needy” (Ezekiel 16:49).
How do we see the Bible through the eyes of our ancient authors and not just our modern lenses? Here are a couple tools you might be able to use to help you bridge the divide.
1. Westerners see everyone as equal. The biblical authors saw everyone as distinct.
If a missionary came into Eastvale, California, and asked if there was any difference between African Americans, Anglos, Asians, and Hispanics, some would say, “Of course, not! Everyone is equal.” But there are obvious differences between every culture. We don’t gain any ground by pretending. The biblical authors acknowledge what we often want to ignore.
In Acts 6, the church has its first major internal problem—the Greek-speaking Jewish widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food, while the Hebrew-speaking Jewish widows were getting what they needed. Now, we may overlook the cultural tensions here, but this brought about significant prejudices that existed between these two groups. So, the apostles commissioned the appointing of leaders to resolve the issue—and five of the seven selected by the church are Greek. What we don’t usually see is that the apostles not only wanted to meet the needs of the church, but they also wanted to avoid an ethnic schism at the same time.
We must read the text, as best we can, with the original audience in mind. How would they have received this? How would they have heard this? Preach from the context to your context.
2. Westerners are rugged individualists. The Biblical authors were committed collectivists.
In the United States, we want to stay true to ourselves. We usually make decisions not caring what others, especially our parents, think. Eastern culture is the exact opposite. A missionary from Japan once said that when they tried to convert a Japanese man, they could never call him “him” because that one man represented an entire family, a village, their ancestors, and more.
This thinking is most difficult for us when it comes to what the Bible has to say about church. Scripture is clear that when we become Christians, we become a part of the family of God with all its responsibilities and expectations. We are committed to the family of God and bound to them by the Spirit. When an American says that they follow Jesus but don’t need to commit to or attend a church, this would never have been the mindset of the New Testament authors.
We must study God’s Word and our context, so we don’t make sloppy connections and applications in our sermons. How would the original audience live this? How does this challenge our individualism?
3. Westerners are motivated by right and wrong. The biblical authors were motivated by honor and shame.
In the story of David and Bathsheba, after David hears of her pregnancy, he dreams up a plan to escape the trouble by inviting her husband Uriah back from war so he will sleep with his wife and have a time window for the conception of the new baby. Cover-up complete. Wrong.
In a city so closely built and in a palace with so many servants, there is no such thing as secrets. Everyone would have likely known that David was sleeping with Bathsheba. When David asked Uriah to go home and spend the night with Bathsheba, David was trying to protect his honor as the king. Kings don’t call random soldiers off the line, so Uriah may have been curious about why David was summoning him so that if the king wanted to execute him, he could “fail to show up” for that appointment. The easiest way to find out why the king wanted to speak to him was to ask the messengers whose job it was to take supplies from the city to the army. Uriah may have discovered the true reason why he was being summoned.
We must study to understand the motivations of the ancient cultures found in the Scriptures. Where have we lost the sense of honor and shame? How does this paradigm change how we understand the passage?
Study Hard
Scripture can be difficult to preach because it is so different from any other book that we read. It is centuries, cultures, and context far removed from us. So, planter, here’s what you must do: study. And study some more.
You will need to read commentaries, consult study Bibles, and work hard to understand the context so you can apply the Word to your hearers. As Paul told Timothy, “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth” (2 Tim. 2:15). Study to rightly handle the Word of God.