📖 Doctrinal Preaching — Unit 2: The Method of Sermon Construction

Note: this method is drawn from the CTS preaching course (WiseSpeak), and much of it will be familiar if you took that course. We give it again here on purpose — to reinforce afresh how to put structure on a sermon before we turn that structure loose on doctrine, unit by unit.

Day 1 — From Text to Idea

Unit 1 set the vision; this unit puts the tools in your hand. The doctrinal preacher works with a small set of terms, and learning them is the difference between a sermon that wanders and one that goes somewhere.

Text. The word means “to weave.” The text is the thread on which the whole sermon is woven — the passage of Scripture that is its basis. Idea. The idea is the general topic of the sermon, and it must come from the text, not be carried to it. Donald Miller laid down a rule that has shaped a generation of preachers: the theme of the text and the theme of the sermon must be the same. If they are not, the text is no longer a text — it is a pretext, a starting point for the preacher’s own thoughts.

Examples of an idea include faith, the kingdom of God, hope, law, works, love, fasting, baptism, family. Each is a real biblical idea — but each is far too large to preach in one sermon. Try preaching on faith: you could speak of the qualities of faith, the demands of faith, examples of faith, men of faith, or the reasons faith matters — and each of those is itself a full sermon. The idea is the raw quarry stone. It must be cut down before it can be set in a wall.

Day 2 — The Probing Question (the Interrogative)

Once you have the idea, you ask a question of it. This probing question — the interrogative — is the hinge of the whole method, because the question you ask determines the sermon you will preach. The news writer uses these same questions to produce a story. Rudyard Kipling gave us the easiest way to remember them:

For preaching, Kipling’s six become eight by adding which and how much. So the eight interrogatives, and what each one opens up:

Interrogative	What it opens
Who / Whom	people
Which	choices or alternatives
What	means, value, objectives
Why	reasons, definitions, characteristics
When	kinds, phases, conditions
Where	places, sources, results
How	sequences, ways
How much	quantity, cost, effort

The probing question is formed by joining the idea to one of these in a full sentence: take the idea of hope and ask, “Who has hope?” or “Which kinds of hope are valid?” or “Why is hope necessary?” Each question is the doorway to a different sermon.

Day 3 — The Keyword (the generative step)

The keyword arises naturally from the interrogative. It is usually a plural noun, and it is the single most important word in your sermon’s structure — because the keyword is what unites the outline. Every point of the sermon will be one particular instance of the keyword.

Three rules govern it. First, it is always plural — almost without exception your keyword ends in ‑s; if it does not, and is not an irregular plural like “people” or “men,” it is probably wrong. Second, only one keyword per sermon, just as you use only one interrogative. Third, avoid generic words like “things.” “Three things about prayer” is not a keyword; it is laziness. The keyword should be as specific as the actual content of your points.

Watch one idea — immersion — turn under different questions; the keyword changes, and so does the whole sermon:

Interrogative	Keyword it yields
Who was immersed?	people (who were immersed)
Which kinds of baptism?	types of baptism
What are its effects?	effects (identification, subjugation, multiplication)
Why have it?	reasons (commanded, modeled, meaningful)
When should it be done?	times
Where may it be done?	places
How is it practiced?	ways

One idea, seven sermons — and the keyword chose each one. The same thing happens with the idea of faith: people of faith (men who believed God); effects of faith (seeing the invisible, doing the impossible, believing the incredible); times for faith (when discouraged, when distracted, when disappointed); ways we show faith (by word, by walk, by witness); reasons to have faith (for the abundant life, for the eternal life); even amounts of faith (enough to cover our sorrow, enough to fill our lives, enough to move our mountains). One idea, and the interrogative chose the keyword, and the keyword generated a different sermon every time. This is why the interrogative and the keyword together are the generative heart of the method.

Day 4 — Subject, Objective, and the Two Directions

A clear subject is what keeps a sermon from wandering. I remember walking through the woods with my father as a boy. I would have been hopelessly lost — every tree looked the same — but my father pulled out his compass at intervals; it gave him a fixed point of reference, and we did not wander. The subject of a sermon is its compass.

The subject is the keyword plus a modifier — anything that describes or limits the keyword. Three forms are common: the adjective (“seven deadly sins”), the prepositional phrase (“ways of knowing we have security”), and the subordinate clause (“qualities that God possesses”). The subject answers the question, “What is the sermon about?” Its value is chiefly to the preacher, keeping him aware of his direction; and the people, taking notes, can write the subject at the top of the page and each point beneath it.

Then comes the objective — the goal of the sermon. It answers a different question: “What do I want people to do?” Phrase it as an action, not a feeling, because right actions carry right beliefs with them. A useful formula begins, “People will…” — “People will respond during the invitation to receive Christ,” or “People will set aside a specific time each day this week for prayer.” Concrete, measurable, and it gives the conclusion a destination.

Finally, the two directions of movement. Deduction reasons from the general to the specific: begin with a general statement — “God is great” — and break it into specific points (great in His knowledge, great in His power, great in His presence). This is the way of topical preaching. Induction reasons the opposite way, from the specific to the general: begin with the points the text supplies and let them build to the subject. It is something like the game show Jeopardy — the answer is given in the text, and you must find the question. This is the way of textual and expository preaching.

Day 5 — The Method at Work, and the Analysis

Here is the whole method running at once, in a sermon on the doctrine of last things. The idea is the return of Christ; the interrogatives are visible right in the points; each point stands on its own text:

Interrogative → Point	Anchor text
When? — No one knows the day	Matthew 24
What? — What will happen at His coming	1 Thessalonians 4
What will we become?	1 John 3:2

The preacher arranged those three points (deduction, topical), yet not one floats free of Scripture — which is the Unit 1 thesis proved in practice. A topical sermon can be every bit as biblical as an expository one, provided every point is anchored in a verse. A Good Friday sermon I have preached more than once shows it: “The Seven Words of the Cross” — idea, the Cross; keyword, words; subject, the seven words of the Cross. A word of pardon (Luke 23:34), a word of promise (Luke 23:43), a word of provision (John 19:26–27), a word of pain (John 19:28), a word of dereliction (Matthew 27:46), a word of triumph (John 19:30), a word of commitment (Luke 23:46). Seven points breaks the usual rule of three to five, so when I preach it I use no subpoints — as a rule, when a sermon has more than three points, drop the subpoints; the people cannot hold a long outline and a layered one at once.

Two of Cook’s working maxims name the difference between the inductive forms. In the textual sermon the points come from the text but the preacher supplies the explanation — the text supplies the skeleton; the preacher supplies the flesh. In the expository sermon both the points and their explanation come from the text — the preacher is the messenger; the text is the message.

Finally, a preaching analysis is the reverse exercise: going through a text by induction to discover its interrogatives and keywords. It is not the same as an outline of the chapter; it begins with a question and contains the subject of the passage. Master the analysis and you can preach any text in the Book. Unit 3 begins applying all of this, doctrine by doctrine, starting with Revelation.

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