A current book I am reading and loving is “The Christ-Centered Expositor” by Tony Merida (Pastor and Professor). You can find Tony on Twitter. You may think this is a book just for preachers. Wrong you would be! It is a helpful book for anyone who desires to grow when it comes to explaining the Word of God to others.

Here is an excerpt from the book that reminds us of the very real danger of Christ-less sermons:

We must avoid Christ-less sermons. Often expositors miss the forest of the Bible (God’s redemption in Jesus) for the trees (a particular passage). According to some hermeneutical plans, one could preach through the book of Nehemiah verse by verse and never mention Jesus-and the sermon would be classified as expository! (Michael here…I can not comprehend preaching even one passage from the Old Testament without talking about Jesus much less an entire book!) What is wrong with this method? It has missed the greater context of the whole Bible. Every expositor should try to identify where the selected passage is located in redemptive history. Is it before the cross or after it? I am not proposing that we try to “find Jesus under every rock,” but I do want to contend that despite some discontinuity, the Bible is one Christian book. I am not advocating “extra Jesus” but faithful exegesis and theological application, which consider both the details of a text and the broad contours of Scripture. D.A. Carson says, “The entire Bible pivots on one weekend in Jerusalem about two thousand years ago.” We must remember this as we dive into any passage. In fact, Jesus told the disciples that the Old Testament pointed to himself (Luke 24:25-27, 44-47). No Jewish rabbi should be able to sit comfortably under our preaching from the Old Testament. Expositors should work hard at finding the redemptive connections within the text and make grace-filled application of it.”

The Christ-Centered Expositor by Tony Merida