As iron sharpens iron,
one person sharpens another. (Proverbs 27:17)
“Christian preaching is always and only biblical preaching. The sermon’s content, shape, style, tone, and impact are derived from the biblical text. Disciples know that the power of God’s word to achieve its purposes is not in doubt (Heb 4:12).” - Common Good
“So what I would do with Matthew 11 is outline the various options, give a few reasons why each are plausible, and then make some application.” - C.Leaders
A. In 1982 a book appeared in the United States that revolutionized thinking about the way American corporations are run and the way business should be done in our country. That one book sold more than 6,000,000 copies and spawned a new effort to make business more effective and productive.
B. The book was In Search of Excellence by Thomas J. Peters and Robert H. Waterman, Jr.
Last month, I introduced the concept of expository preaching, an issue which can no longer be restricted to discussions between preachers, or reserved for Seminaries and Bible College classrooms. Today, exposition has become an identity marker by which to evaluate churches. In his book, Nine Marks of a Healthy Church, Mark Dever lists expositional preaching as mark number one.
A sermon delivered at Calvary Baptist Church, Derby, Kansas. Reprinted with permission from As I See It, which is available free by writing to the editor at dkutilek@juno.com.
Tonight, I want us to study a single word in the NT: proskartereo. It looks and sounds like a perfect candidate for use in a Jeopardy category: “twelve-letter Greek words that are difficult to pronounce”!
This word caught my attention as I ran across it at various times over the years in my studies of the NT in Greek, and I thought its various occurrences and uses rather interesting.
It is a compound word, composed of the preposition pros, which means, “to, toward, in the direction of” and kartereo, a verb with the root idea of “to be strong, firm.” So it literally means “to be strong toward something or someone.” As used in the NT, the word carries the sense and meaning “to be devoted to, to be dedicated to, to focus on, to be committed to, to persist in” some purpose, object or person.
This word is used ten times in the Greek NT, six of which occur in Acts. I want to briefly note each of these uses.
Reprinted with permission from Doug Kutilek’s As I See It, (May, 2010) with some editing. AISI is sent free to all who request it dkutilek@juno.com.
Reprinted with permission from Faith Pulpit, November/December ‘05
Discussion