redemptive-historical preaching

My semester is almost over. I have two weeks of finals left before a month and a half break. This means my two (maybe three) regular readers should have more than six posts in three months (ouch!) to read.

Part of what I have enjoyed the most about my preaching class at Westminster has been the emphasis on "redemptive-historical preaching." For those unfamiliar with the label, here is how Dennis Johnson describes it in his book Him We Proclaim: Preaching Christ From All The Scriptures (please excuse the use of some fancy terms).

Redemptive-historical preaching ties homiletics closely to hermeneutic considerations. It emphasizes the organic unity of the history of redemption-the enactment of God's plan for the rescue, reconciliation, and re-creation of his people, climaxing in the person, obedience, sacrifice, resurrection, and exaltation of Jesus Christ, and reaching consummation at his return in glory. ~p. 48-49

Christians needs to be shown how to read each Scripture, first in the context of its original redemptive-historical epoch, and then in terms of the focal point and climatic "horizon" toward which the partiuclars of God's plan always pointed, namely Jesus the Messiah, who is the second and last Adam, seed of Abraham, true Israel, royal descendant of David, and obedient and suffering Servant of the Lord. Redemptive-historical hermeneutics, therefore, offer a framework for preaching Christ from all the Scriptures in a way that treats each text's and epoch's distinctiveness with integrity and at the same time does justice to the progressively unfolding clarity by which God sustained his people's hopes for the redemption that has now arrived in Jesus.~p. 49

The Christian preacher must never preach an Old Testament text (narrative or other genre) in such a way that his sermon could have been acceptable in a synagogue whose members do not recognize that Jesus is the Messiah. The purpose of the Old Testament historical narrative is not to teach moral lessons, but to trace the work of God, the Savior of his people, whose redeeming presence among them reaches its climatic expression in Christ's incarnation. ~p.51