Sample Analysis: Narrative
I have suggested a path towards analyzing the “structure” of a biblical narrative by focusing on setting, characters, and plot. Let’s try this out by analyzing a story that you may have never considered preaching a sermon from – the sordid tale of Judah and Tamar in Genesis 38. Our tendency might be to pass this one by as too steamy for a general audience, and maybe not even that important. It appears oddly inserted in the middle of the Joseph story as something of a detour that may be best ignored. Think again. On careful analysis, it may be one of the most important stories in this part of Genesis.
Sample Analysis: Poetry
I have described the basic structure of Hebrew poetry as built around parallel couplets and triplets that are ultimately grouped into larger strophes to provide the overall logic of the poem. An outline of a poem begins with analyzing the smallest units (parallel lines) and expanding to the larger units (groupings of couplets and triplets into “strophes”). As an example, let’s analyze Psalm 46.
What Kind of Language? Outlining a Preaching Text
Most biblical texts fall into one of three broad language categories: Prose, Poetry, or Story. Though they often overlap in many ways, each of these communicates, challenges, and shapes us differently. In fact, like the three modes of transportation to Australia, they give us such different journeys that the perspectives they give of the same truth might seem widely divergent, even when the destination is the same.
In your preparation process, these differences become impossible to ignore the moment you begin to try to outline the meaning of the text. Let’s think about each of these language categories specifically from the perspective of how we would outline the text.