Jan
30
2010
Kaiser C. Walter, Jr. Preaching and Teaching from the Old Testament: A Guide for the Church. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003. 222 pp. $18.99
Walter Christian Kaiser, Jr. entered Wheaton College in 1951. While at Wheaton he majored in Bible and minored in Greek and philosophy. He was married just before his final year of study at Wheaton Graduate School.
In 1964 Kaiser began a two-year term of teaching at both Trinity and Wheaton. In the fall of 1966 he joined the Trinity faculty on a full-time basis. He completed his Ph.D. dissertation in 1973. In 1980 Kaiser assumed the responsibilities of vice president and academic dean of Trinity and continued in that office until June of 1992. In the fall of 1993 he accepted an invitation from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary to serve as the first Colman M. Mockler Distinguished Professor of Old Testament. He retired from the presidency of Gordon-Conwell on July 1, 2006. Currently he is President Emeritus and Distinguished Professor of Old Testament and Ethics at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in Hamilton, MA.
Kaiser has numerous publications that mostly deal with the Old Testament.
Kaiser states in the introduction there remains a distressing absence of the Old Testament in the church (10). He argues the Old Testament was the Bible of the early church. All the saints can agree because Jesus, Paul, and all the apostles studied the scriptures. The scriptures they studied were what we know as the Old Testament. Kaiser gives four major theses that can be found in chapter 1 of his book.
First of all, the Old Testament is the powerful Word of God. He argues that it leads us to Jesus the Messiah (20). Also, it deals with the questions of life. Finally, the Old Testament was used as the exclusive authority in the early church.
The intended audience is the church. However, Kaiser uses some scholarly words that simple church people may not know, but it is nothing that a good dictionary can not fix. There is a table of contents and the book breaks down into two parts. The first part is the need to preach and teach from the Old Testament. The second part is how to preach and teach the Old Testament.
In the first part of the book, Kaiser talks about the need to preach and teach from the Old Testament. He gives us some things to think about when talking about the Old Testament. Furthermore, he gives reasons why the church should hear the Old Testament. Moreover, he gives the reasons why the church lost the Old Testament in its preaching the first place. He argues “if we are to have a balanced and full ministry, we must preach the whole counsel of God to the whole person” (44).
Kaiser starts talking about the art and science of expository preaching in chapter four. He introduces some terminology that most church members will not know. However, for the trained church member, Kaiser covers some good hermeneutical terminology that the church needs to implement. In accordance with hermeneutical rules, Kaiser said, “…we must first ask what the author meant” (52). He teaches us to apply hermeneutical rules to our interpretation of scripture; even the Old Testament.
In part two, Kaiser gives the how to preach and teach from the Old Testament. He covers the literary genres of the Old Testament. In the rest of the book he covers the literary genres of narrative, wisdom books, prophets, laments, Torah, praise, and apocalyptic.
In the genre of narrative or narration, Kaiser gives the elements of the narrative text. They are the scene, plot, point of view, characterization, setting, dialogue, leitwort, and structure. He goes on to give an example of preaching a narrative text. In the genre of the proverb, he says, “In some ways, proverbs are not all that different from narratives, for in some sense, proverbs arise out of a recurring story” (84). He also gives an example of preaching from a wisdom proverb (95-99). To simplify the paper, Kaiser goes on to give an example of preaching for all the genres of the book. Finally, there are two appendixes that act as working papers to close out the book.
This book is a very logical easy read. The vocabulary would not be good for the average church member, but it is great for the trained church leaders. The argument about the lack of the Old Testament in the church is valid. Many churches do not present the Old Testament and the sheep lose two thirds of God’s word. Kaiser presented his case in the need to preach and teach the Old Testament and then went on to tell how it is done. Kaiser accomplished his task to present the argument to the church and now the church must respond.
This book is an introductory book that Kaiser could have gone into more depth with. As a beginning Old Testament student, I felt like some other aspects should have been introduced or covered. The praise genre got three pages before the example on how to preach it. I feel the number one thing most Christians lack is praise and thanksgiving, so he should have covered more. The overall value this book offered me is great. I want to be a pastor and preacher that give the whole counsel of God to the church. I think every church member should read this book. Kaiser is an Old Testament scholar and he presents his case clearly with practical help on how to implement the Old Testament in the entire presentation to the church.
