Download introduction to systematic theology

Kyle Talbot
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Bible Study Methods
Week 3
The Gospel Institute
Bible Study Methods—Week 3:
Tools to Survey the Territory
Grammar
Grammar consists of the basic laws of language behind the relationship between the terms in the
surface structure of the text. Grammar develops the architectural plan of the text. It examines how
each word function with regard to the other words.
Grammatical Element
1. Verbs (action & linking) [double underline]
2. Nouns (persons, places, things, ideas) [underline]
3. Clauses (combinations of verbs & nouns that communicate a complete thought)
4. Pronouns – stands in for a noun (person, place, thing, idea) [line to the antecedent]
5. Conjunctions (links words and clauses) [circle]
6. Prepositions [parenthesis]
7. Adjectives – describes/modifies a noun [arrow to the noun modified]
8. Adverbs – describes/modifies a verb or adjective or adverb [arrow to the word modified]
Kernel Sentence
Languages are similar at the kernel level, where the transference of meaning can occur
Kernel sentence: each individual proposition/idea explicit or implicit in the sentence
Simple Sentence: “The ball is hit.”
Complex: “The ball belonging to the boy is hit.”
 “the ball belongs to the boy” “the ball is hit”
Ephesians 2:8-9
“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of
God—not by works, so that no one can boast”
(1) God showed you grace
(2) God saved you
(3) You believed
(4) You did not save yourselves
(5) God gave salvation
(6) You did not work for it
(7) This is done so that no man may boast
Bible Study Methods
Kyle Talbot
Spring 2016
2
Grasping God’s Word Observation List (Pages 103-104)1
Repetition of Words – Look for words and phrases that repeat
Contrasts – Look for ideas, individuals, and/or items that are contrasted with each other. Look for
differences.
Comparisons – Look for ideas, individuals, and/or items that are compared to each other. Look also
for similarities.
Lists – Anytime the text mentions more than two items, identify them as a list.
Cause and effect – Look for cause-and-effect relationships.
Figures of Speech – Identify expressions that convey an image, using words in a sense other than
the normal literal sense.
Conjunctions – Notice terms that join units, like “and,” “but,” “for.” Note what they are
connecting.
Verbs – Note whether a verb is past, present, or future; active or passive.
Pronouns – Identify the antecedent for each pronoun.
Questions and answers – Note if the text is built on a question-and-answer format.
Dialogue – Note if the text includes dialogue. Identify who is speaking and to whom.
Means – Note if a sentence indicates that something was done by means of someone/something
(answers “how?”). Usually you can insert the phrase “by means of” into the sentence.
Purpose/result statements – These are a more specific type of “means,” often telling why. Purpose
and result are similar and sometimes indistinguishable. In a result clause, you usually can insert the
phrase “so that.”
General to specific and specific to general – Find the general statements that are followed by
specific examples or applications of the general. Also find specific statements that are summarized
by a general one.
Conditional clauses – A clause can present the condition by which some action or consequence
will result. Often such statements use an “if… then” framework (although in English the “then” is
often left out).
Actions/roles of God – Identify actions or roles that the text ascribes to God.
Actions/roles of people – Identify actions or roles that the text ascribes to people or encourages
people to do/be.
Emotional terms – Does the passage use terms that have emotional energy, like kinship words
(“father,” “son”) or words like “pleading?”
Tone of the passage – What is the overall tone of the passage: happy, sad, encouraging?
Connections to other paragraphs and episodes – How does the passage connect to the one that
precedes it and the one that follows it?
Shifts in the story/pivots – Is the passage being used as a key to understanding a dramatic shift in
the story?
Interchange – Does the passage shift back and forth between two scenes or characters?
Chiasm – Does the passage have any chiastic arrangements? (A-B-B’-A’)
Inclusio – Does the passage open and close with similar statements or events?
1
Duvall, J. Scott and J. Daniel Hays. Grasping God’s Word. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2012) p 103-104.
Bible Study Methods
Kyle Talbot
Spring 2016
3
1 Corinthians 4:14-21
I do not write these things to make you ashamed, but to admonish you as my beloved children. For
though you have countless guides in Christ, you do not have many fathers. For I became your father in
Christ Jesus through the gospel. I urge you, then, be imitators of me. That is why I sent you Timothy,
my beloved and faithful child in the Lord, to remind you of my ways in Christ, as I teach them
everywhere in every church. Some are arrogant, as though I were not coming to you. But I will come
to you soon, if the Lord wills, and I will find out not the talk of these arrogant people but their power.
For the kingdom of God does not consist in talk but in power. What do you wish? Shall I come to you
with a rod, or with love in a spirit of gentleness?
Bible Study Methods
Kyle Talbot
Spring 2016
4
Colossians 1:3-14
We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of
your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for
you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel, which has come to
you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and increasing—as it also does among you, since
the day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth, just as you learned it from Epaphras our
beloved fellow servant. He is a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf and has made known to us
your love in the Spirit.
And so, from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with
the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so as to walk in a manner worthy
of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of
God. May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and
patience with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the
saints in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of
his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
Bible Study Methods
Kyle Talbot
Spring 2016
5
Deuteronomy 6:1-3
“Now this is the commandment—the statutes and the rules—that the LORD your God commanded me
to teach you, that you may do them in the land to which you are going over, to possess it, that you may
fear the LORD your God, you and your son and your son's son, by keeping all his statutes and his
commandments, which I command you, all the days of your life, and that your days may be long. Hear
therefore, O Israel, and be careful to do them, that it may go well with you, and that you may multiply
greatly, as the LORD, the God of your fathers, has promised you, in a land flowing with milk and
honey.
Philippians 2:1-4
So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any
affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in
full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others
more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the
interests of others.
Colossians 3:1-4
If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the
right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you
have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you
also will appear with him in glory.
Bible Study Methods
Kyle Talbot
Spring 2016
6
Matthew 6:25-34
Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor
about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?
Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly
Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a
single hour to his span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the
field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not
arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and
tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore
do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’
For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all.
But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.
Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the
day is its own trouble.