If the Bible is the end, your goal is to preach and teach the Bible. You want to transfer as much Bible knowledge as possible. If your goal is to help people grow their faith in Jesus (utilizing the Bible as your most powerful tool), here’s what preaching for faith looks like:

F – Frees. When you preach and teach for faith, your goal is to help free people. People are enslaved to sin, to addictions, to bondage, to mental and emotional struggles, to relational brokenness. When you teach for faith, you never stop at knowledge. Your goal is to free people.

A – Answers. Many times when the Bible becomes the end and not the means, people can become secondary and unimportant. God did not create the Bible in His image. God created people in His image. People matter, and people have questions about God and the supernatural. Preaching for faith elevates the importance that God has placed inside each one of us, meeting people where they are, answering their questions, and creating a bridge from their deeper questions to faith in Jesus.

I – Inspires. To inspire someone is to create an urge within someone to do something. If you preach or teach for knowledge without any resulting action or life change, your preaching and teaching is dead and useless.

T – Teaches. Knowledge is needed for life change. To show someone a new way to live, you have to lovingly show them the faults of their old way, create a motivation to change, and chart a path forward. You need to accurately illuminate biblical truth in its original context, carefully lift out timeless truths that apply across the millenium, and then powerfully drive home specific application about how our lives should change.

H – Heals. People walk away better than before. They walk away challenged, more hopeful, more enlightened, more equipped, more encouraged. Preaching and teaching for faith heals our brokenness and allows us to bear more fruit of the Spirit in our lives.