Expositors Collective: Expository Preaching, Bible Teaching and Sermon Preparation

A sermon can be carefully structured, biblically researched—and still fall flat. What gives faithful preaching life?
In this episode of the Expositors Collective podcast, Pilgrim Benham speaks on the art of preaching at our training weekend at Reliance Church in Temecula, California. Drawing from Ecclesiastes 12, he asks preachers to think beyond the mechanics of sermon preparation without neglecting them. How do study and lived obedience give a preacher confidence? What makes biblical truth clear to ordinary listeners? How can a preacher speak courageously while caring for the people in the room?
Pilgrim also presses into the difference between informing a congregation and calling them to respond to God’s Word. His message is a lively, pastoral challenge to prepare diligently, speak plainly, and depend on the Holy Spirit rather than technique alone.
Pilgrim Benham is the Dean of Students at Calvary Chapel Bible College in Bradenton, Florida, where he also teaches on campus and online. He has planted churches and pastored since 2002, serves on the pastoral team at WestChurch, and coaches preachers.
Calvary Chapel Bible College:
https://calvarychapelbiblecollege.com/
Listen to Pilgrim’s earlier Expositors Collective appearances:
How to Help New Preachers Grow in Confidence and Clarity — Pilgrim Benham (on preaching mentorship)
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/how-to-help-new-preachers-grow-in-confidence-and/id1397572249?i=1000758363921
AI, ChatGPT, and the Ethics of Sermon Preparation — a panel featuring Pilgrim Benham
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ai-chatgpt-and-the-ethics-of-sermon-preparation/id1397572249?i=1000771816636
Expositors Collective equips, encourages, and mentors the next generation of Christ-centred preachers through training, conversation, and practical resources:
https://expositorscollective.org/
Expositors Collective is part of the Calvary Chapel Cooperative, a family of ministries working together to strengthen churches and support faithful leaders:
https://calvarychapelcooperative.com/

What if a sermon gets the facts right but misses the way God chose to tell the story?
Mike Neglia talks with Grace Campbell about why biblical genre matters for Bible interpretation and expository preaching. Scripture comes to us as narrative, poetry, wisdom, letters, parables and apocalyptic vision—not as interchangeable containers for three-point outlines. How can preachers attend to both what a passage says and what it does, helping listeners encounter the text rather than reducing it to a set of propositions?
The conversation moves from the Good Samaritan and Revelation to Ecclesiastes, where Grace shares how a family crisis changed the way she heard the book’s language of joy, grief and life’s fleetingness. For pastors and Bible teachers, this is an invitation to teach Scripture on its own terms.
About Grace Campbell
Grace serves alongside her husband Tom at Amazing Grace Community Church in West Cork, Ireland, working with children, teenagers and women. They are parents to Perran and Lily. She spent 12 years with the Irish Bible Institute and continues as adjunct faculty, teaching Bible Interpretation. Grace loves helping people engage with the Bible’s varied literary forms and “taste and see” that the Lord is good.
Resources Grace mentioned in the conversation
• Jeffrey D. Arthurs, Preaching with Variety: How to Re-Create the Dynamics of Biblical Genres
https://www.kregel.com/preaching/preaching-with-variety/
• Gordon D. Fee and Douglas Stuart, How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth
https://zondervanacademic.com/products/how-to-read-the-bible-for-all-its-worth-4th
• William W. Klein, Craig L. Blomberg and Robert L. Hubbard Jr., Introduction to Biblical Interpretation
https://zondervanacademic.com/products/introduction-to-biblical-interpretation
• Leland Ryken and Tremper Longman III, eds., The Complete Literary Guide to the Bible
https://www.christianbook.com/the-complete-literary-guide-the-bible/leland-ryken/9780310230786/pd/230786
• J. Kent Edwards, Effective First-Person Biblical Preaching: The Steps from Text to Narrative Sermon
https://zondervanacademic.com/products/effective-first-person-biblical-preaching
• Haddon W. Robinson and Torrey W. Robinson, It’s All in How You Tell It: Preaching First-Person Expository Messages
https://bakerpublishinggroup.com/products/9780801091506_its-all-in-how-you-tell-it
• BibleProject
https://bibleproject.com/
Further reading recommended by Grace
• Eugene L. Lowry, The Homiletical Plot: The Sermon as Narrative Art Form (expanded edition)
https://www.wjkbooks.com/bookproduct/0664222641-the-homiletical-plot-expanded-edition/
• Kevin J. Vanhoozer, Is There a Meaning in This Text? The Bible, the Reader, and the Morality of Literary Knowledge
https://zondervanacademic.com/products/is-there-a-meaning-in-this-text
• Kevin J. Vanhoozer, “The Semantics of Biblical Literature: Truth and Scripture’s Diverse Literary Forms,” in Hermeneutics, Authority, and Canon, ed. D. A. Carson and John D. Woodbridge
https://wipfandstock.com/9781597521185/hermeneutics-authority-and-canon/

What do you say when a family is grieving and you have been asked to preach? How do you honour the person who has died, make room for sorrow, and speak of the hope of Christ without offering easy answers?
In this vintage Expositors Collective interview, Paul talks with Mike Neglia about the work that happens before a funeral sermon is written: being present with the family, listening to their memories, and understanding whom you are preaching to. They discuss the place of a eulogy, how to offer biblical hope without speaking past people’s grief, and what a pastor can say when the deceased’s faith is uncertain. Paul also reflects on particularly painful circumstances, including a death by suicide.
This is a conversation for pastors and preachers who want to serve grieving people with honesty, tenderness, and confidence in the resurrection.
About the guest
Dr Paul Beasley-Murray is a Baptist minister, former principal of Spurgeon’s College in London, and former pastor of churches in Altrincham and Chelmsford, England. He has conducted hundreds of funerals and written extensively on pastoral ministry. His book There Is Hope: Preaching at Funerals draws on that experience to help preachers prepare biblically grounded, compassionate funeral sermons.
Resources
There Is Hope: Preaching at Funerals — Paul Beasley-Murray, published by IVP: https://ivpbooks.com/there-is-hope
A Loved One Dies: Help in the First Few Weeks — Paul Beasley-Murray’s free booklet for grieving families: https://www.paulbeasleymurray.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/A-Loved-One-Dies.pdf
Paul Beasley-Murray’s website: https://www.paulbeasleymurray.com/
“Preaching the Gospel at Funerals” — Brian Croft, 9Marks: https://www.9marks.org/article/preaching-the-gospel-at-funerals/
“On Funerals” — Preachers Talk, episode 56: https://open.spotify.com/episode/1IDYkfjCE7XWyvAaRvEU9m

Who is helping to shape your tomorrow, and whose future are you helping to shape today?
In episode 451 of the Expositors Collective Podcast, Pastor Danny Ramos explores the heart of Christian mentorship and explains why investing personally in others is among the most rewarding and fruitful forms of ministry.
Recorded at the Expositors Collective training event at Reliance Church in Temecula, California, Danny builds his message around Paul’s words to Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:1–2: receive what has been entrusted to you, then pass it faithfully to others who will do the same.
Danny answers three practical questions: What is mentoring? Why does it matter? And how can someone find a mentor? He describes mentoring as “walking with someone today in a way that shapes your tomorrow”—a transformative relationship in which wisdom, experience, character and ministry are shared through life together.
Using the memorable picture of an experienced surgeon training others at the scrub sink, Danny shows why instruction alone is not enough. Emerging leaders need opportunities to prepare alongside mature believers, participate in real ministry, reflect upon what happened and continue the conversation afterward. Some lessons are taught, but others can only be caught through shared experience.
Mentorship may happen for a season and may involve several different people throughout a lifetime. It can take place in person, through ministry teams, books, articles and trusted voices from a distance. But the process reaches maturity when the person who has been mentored begins investing in someone else.
Danny offers four practical steps for those seeking mentorship:
• Pray — ask God to bring the right person into your life.
• Look — observe someone’s walk with the Lord and relationships with others.
• Ask — request time to shadow them and learn about their habits and availability.
• Invest — begin mentoring someone less experienced and invite them to serve alongside you.
This message will encourage pastors, Bible teachers and ministry leaders to pursue accountable relationships, recognise their blind spots, develop the gifts of others and faithfully entrust the gospel to the next generation.
About Danny Ramos
Pastor Danny Ramos has been married to his wife, Wanda, for 51 years. His ministry journey began in the late 1980s as a youth pastor with a focus on discipleship. Looking back over more than three decades of ministry, Danny believes that mentoring those who desire to serve the Lord is both deeply rewarding and an especially fruitful method of ministry.
Danny is currently semi-retired from Maranatha Chapel in San Diego, California, while continuing to teach Bible studies and counsel young couples.
Key Scriptures
2 Timothy 2:1–2
James 3:1
Proverbs 27:17
Resources mentioned
The Other Half of Discipleship: Why We Learn Life-on-Life — Tom Nelson
https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/the-other-half-of-discipleship
Preaching and Preachers — D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones
https://zondervanacademic.com/products/preaching-and-preachers
Maranatha Chapel
https://www.maranathachapel.org/
Expositors Collective
Expositors Collective equips, encourages and mentors the next generation of Christ-centred preachers through training events, podcast conversations and practical resources for the faithful teaching of God’s Word.
https://expositorscollective.org/
Expositors Collective is part of Calvary Chapel Cooperative, a family of ministries working together to strengthen churches, cultivate healthy leaders and encourage cooperation throughout the Calvary Chapel movement.
https://calvarychapelcooperative.com/
#PastoralMentorship #ExpositoryPreaching

What should a preacher do when the Bible addresses a culturally explosive issue? Can a sermon be useful but insufficiently centred on Christ? How much of the preacher’s own life belongs in the pulpit—and what happens after you preach a sermon that simply did not work?
In episode 450 of the Expositors Collective Podcast, Mike Neglia moderates a lively preaching Q&A with Dr Alan Stoddard, Cody King, Bryan Stupar and Dr Danny Hyde, recorded at the Expositors Collective training event at Reliance Church in Temecula, California.
The panel begins with the challenge of preaching controversial Bible passages faithfully. How can pastors refuse to avoid difficult texts without chasing viral moments, adding needless offence or apologising for Scripture before they have explained it?
From there, the conversation turns to Christ-centred preaching. The panel considers whether moral instruction and practical advice have a place in sermons, why application must flow from the gospel, and how preaching can leave people under condemnation rather than bringing them to the grace and transforming power of Christ.
They also offer candid counsel about personal testimony. Stories can establish trust and illuminate a passage, but they can also make the preacher the hero, manipulate emotions, embarrass family members or turn the pulpit into a therapy session.
Finally, the panel recommends formative books and Bible-study tools, explains how prayer should run through the entire sermon process, and answers an honest question every preacher eventually asks: What do I do after preaching a bad sermon?
This warm, practical and sometimes very funny discussion offers encouragement for pastors, Bible teachers and emerging preachers seeking to handle God’s Word with courage, humility and faithfulness.
Topics include:
• Preaching culturally charged and controversial passages• Avoiding cowardice, unnecessary offence and political tribalism• Moralistic sermons and Christ-centred application• Conviction, condemnation and the transforming power of the gospel• Using testimony without making the preacher the hero• Personal illustrations, emotional manipulation and protecting your family• Essential books and Bible-study resources• Prayer throughout sermon preparation and delivery• Learning from a disappointing sermon• Trusting the Holy Spirit when preaching feels weak

Resources mentioned:
Blue Letter Bible
https://www.blueletterbible.org/
Biblical Preaching — Haddon W. Robinson
https://bakerpublishinggroup.com/books/biblical-preaching-4th-edition/2257110
Communion with God — John Owen
https://banneroftruth.org/us/store/christian-living/communion-with-god/
What Does It Mean to Fear the Lord? — Michael Reeves
https://www.crossway.org/books/what-does-it-mean-to-fear-the-lord-tpb/
Delighting in the Trinity — Michael Reeves
https://ivpress.com/delighting-in-the-trinity
About Expositors Collective:
Expositors Collective equips, encourages and mentors the next generation of Christ-centred preachers through training events, podcast conversations and practical resources for the faithful teaching of God’s Word.
https://expositorscollective.org/
Expositors Collective is part of Calvary Chapel Cooperative, a family of ministries working together to strengthen churches, cultivate healthy leaders and foster cooperation throughout the Calvary Chapel movement.
https://calvarychapelcooperative.com/
As we celebrate episode 450, please consider following Expositors Collective on social media and leaving a review on Apple Podcasts. Your review helps more pastors and Bible teachers discover the programme.
#ExpositoryPreaching #SermonPreparation