Expositional Listening?
The church I am blessed to pastor, New Covenant Christian Fellowship, is about to begin a new sermon series through First John. So I thought it seemed wise to
consider how to capitalize on what we hear from God’s Word. We of course are
familiar with the warnings in Scripture about what we do with God’s truth.
James 1 for example reminds us to “Be doers of the word, and not hearers only,
deceiving yourselves.” To hear the word but do nothing about it is like someone
forgetting what they look like after looking in a mirror!
But how do we listen? Every parent in human history knows when
a child is hearing but not really listening. So what are some ways we can
ensure that we are both hearing and listening?
Thabiti Anyabwile, a pastor in Grand Cayman who also has an excellent blog, has written a very helpful book called “What is a Healthy Church Member?” The first mark of such a person is that he or she
is an “Expositional Listener.” Here’s how Anyabwile defines this: “Listening for the meaning of a
passage of Scripture, and accepting that meaning as the main idea to be grasped
for our personal and corporate lives as Christians, is what we mean by
‘expositional listening.’” To listen well means that we are predisposed to
“listening for the voice and message of God as revealed in His word.”
Having
established the definition, he gives six practical ideas that can help to
foster more attentive listening to God’s word.
- Meditate on the sermon passage during your quiet time. [In particular, he’s referring to the passage that will be preached on the following Sunday.]
- Invest in a good set of commentaries. [Or you might invest in a good study Bible, such as the ESV Study Bible and the ESV Gospel Transformation Bible. The Reformation Study Bible is also quite good.]
- Talk and pray with friends about the sermon after church.
- Listen to and act on the sermon throughout the week.
- Develop the habit of addressing any questions about the text itself. [In other words, if you’ve got a question about the passage, make sure you try to answer it!]
- Cultivate humility.
For more details on this concept, check out the article as it appears on the 9 Marks website, or get a copy of “What is a Healthy Church Member?”
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