The Equipping Ministry, Student Workbook, SW15

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T H E E Q U I P P I N G M I N I S T R Y

The Kerygma Is about Preaching and Teaching Jesus of Nazareth as the Messiah

All four Gospel writers intend to preach Jesus Christ. For example, in his second volume Luke writes, “In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach, until the day when he was taken up” (Acts 1.1–2 RSV). The new literary criticism (or narrative criticism) confirms that Jesus is central in the Gospels: he is described as “the central figure,” “the subject around which every narrative turns” . . . (Achtemeier, 53), “the major character,” “the protagonist,” “the supreme exponent of God’s evaluative point of view” (Kingsbury 1988, 10–13, 36). In sermons that would be true to the Gospels, this centrality of Jesus may not be subverted. ~Sidney Greidanus. Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels . J. B. Green, ed. (electronic ed.). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 1997. p. 627. The following principles and concepts underlie the heart of our discussion in this, our first lesson on the equipping ministry. Throughout this module we will refer to the equipping ministry in terms of the kerygma (preaching) and didache (teaching) ministries of the NT. Review the following principles in light of the important role that preaching plays in the building up the body of Christ through the proclamation of the truth in Christ. The terms for preaching and its related terms are numerous in the NT, and regardless of the various words used to translate “preaching,” “preach,” they all contain an element of announcing a message to an audience, to proclaim a message publicly . We can outline various models of preaching based on our readings and understanding of the usage of the terms in the NT. These models include our viewing the preacher as herald (one who announces a message on behalf of another as one crying out news as a messenger ), the model of the preacher as ambassador (i.e., one called to represent the Kingdom of God, as it were, in a foreign land), and the model of the preacher as prophet (“ Fed-ex delivery man ”), as one who like the prophets were charged to get a message clearly and unchanged to a predetermined audience. The preaching ministry is distinctive among all the NT ministries of communication. These distinctives include its focus on mixed audiences , even sometimes wholly non-religious ones, its intimate connection to the

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Summary of Key Concepts