JY: Welcome to GearTalk, a podcast on Biblical theology. Today, Jason DeRouchie and Tom Kelby talk about the acronym TOCMA. Why do these 5 letters matter for Christians today? This is the third part of a three-part series on biblical interpretation.

TK: Welcome to GearTalk, Tom and Jason here, and this is the third part of a series of podcasts we’re doing on biblical interpretation. We actually have a Jason-made-up word here that we’re going to be talking about today. So Jason, what’s this word you made up and why do I care?

JD: So the word is TOCMA. TOCMA. And it’s an acronym, each letter standing for a word. And my point in TOCMA is to try to help us remember the five key things that should be part of our biblical interpretation. So if we’re preparing a sermon or a Bible study, step by step, the key areas that we need to keep in mind when it comes to our biblical interpretation. So TOCMA stands for these 5 words: Text, Observation, Context, Meaning, Application. Even in that order. TOCMA. And so Tom and I want to talk about these five different areas that are part of what biblical interpretation is. And so we’ve broken them down into these five categories with a question that relates to each one, and then actually each one has a full assortment of more questions, but we’ve got a general question that attempts to capture what we mean by each of these five TOCMA areas.

TK: So if I said “text”, here’s the question: What is the makeup of the passage? So imagine, for instance, I am leading a Sunday school class, something like that, and we’re going through the book of Ruth. So the text is Ruth, but I’m probably not – maybe I am – I’m probably not going through all of it in the first time that we’re together. So that’s my question though: What’s the makeup of what we’re talking about? Text. What else should I be thinking about in terms of the text, Jason, as far as boundary markers?

JD: Right, so by makeup we’re talking about things like content for sure. So if we’re in the book of Ruth, we’re thinking “Oh, this is not poetry. This is a story. This is historical narrative” and historical narrative has its own set of rules. We’re thinking about what is the subject matter of this. So not only the literary form, but OK, this is specifically the story about a young woman and a mother-in-law and a Redeemer, a Redeemer from Bethlehem, and that plays into really all of biblical theology, because what Boaz is for Ruth is what Jesus is going to be for all the world. So what’s the literary form? What’s the subject matter? Are there other similar genres that we’ve learned something from that we might want to parallel with this text? Ruth is filled with wisdom. Or how about – there’s only two places in all the Bible where a woman of noble character is mentioned: Proverbs and here in this passage, in Ruth. So text deals with issues of genre.

But like you already said, it also deals with issues of boundaries. Whenever we go to preach, we need to have a place to start and a place to end, and we want to be thinking about it in light of the boundaries God has given. So in English we’ve got paragraph breaks. Our translators have put headings in our Bible which can be helpful but may not be helpful. We already noted a few weeks ago or a few episodes ago how in Genesis chapter one, we only get six days, but the seventh day is actually in the first 3 verses of Chapter 2. So the boundary of that passage, if we are preaching the initial creation narrative, we’d want to make sure we were preaching from Genesis 1:1 to 2:3 and disregarding that chapter break because it’s not God-inspired.

So we’re talking about, yes, the boundaries of the passage and then considering within that passage, what’s the flow of thought? How is it structured? Just initially, what’s the basic structure of the passage? So we’re talking about an outline. Can you make an outline of the passage? A key third element that deals with text has to do with those little footnotes that we get in our Bible every once in a while that send us down to the bottom of the page and they say “This is what it says” or “We’re following the Greek translation here, but the Hebrew says this,” and so the question becomes, well, which text do I use? And here’s where you might, if you’re only looking at an English Bible, comparing as we said in the last couple of podcasts, comparing different translations could help us know are there any what scholars call textual variants where maybe the NIV followed one text and the ESV actually followed a different text. And then we would want to maybe open up a commentary or a study Bible and see – did they talk about it at all?

Text criticism is what this is – criticism not in a negative view of the Bible, but evaluating the textual tradition. And by God’s grace we have solid, godly men and women who have worked to give us the Bible faithfully. And so the question of establishing the passage’s original wording is something most of us are not doing. We’re able to trust our ESV or our NIV or our NASB. We’re going to follow what they did because I’m trusting these men and women were seeking the Lord and wrestling hard, and they have worked very hard and given us a good translation.

TK: A help there is if they put something at the bottom of the page and it will say, for instance, it might say “Hebrew” and then it’ll have a comma and then it’ll say “Greek” and then they’ll give a different option. What they’re showing you is that they recognize there’s two different choices about a particular word or something, but they’ve put their preferred choice up in the text. And it doesn’t mean that they’re saying they’re inspired, the people who translate our texts, but they’re helping us. They’re saying, “We think this is what the text should say.” So Psalm 22 is an example of that, where the Hebrew text at a certain point – it’s the part where our Bibles say “they’ve pierced my hands and feet” – the Hebrew text says something different. Well, they put that in a footnote and they let us know that. So it’s just a help.

JD: That’s right. And there’s thicker, more technical tools that actually clarify why they made the choices they made, but most of us don’t have time in a weekly sermon to wrestle with such things. But being aware of what’s on the footnote and even comparing two different translations can help us have a good sense of if there’s any major issues we need to be aware of in this particular passage. So part one, step one is asking, “Well, what’s the makeup of the passage? I want to make sure I’ve got the right boundaries, I understand what kind of literature it is, I’ve got a basic sense of its outline.” So text.

TK: Jason and I have a friend who is a surveyor, so he surveys property. And just thinking – a good example is if you said “Hey, can you come and survey our land for us?” and he’s going to say first, “OK, where are you talking about?” And I have to give him a general idea of where we’re talking about so he can even know, OK, where do I start? That’s what we’re talking about. Text. What’s the makeup?

JD: Yeah, yeah. This is just the first step. We need to know where to start our investigation and what the boundaries are in which we’re going to do that work. How about number 2 Tom? Observation. TOCMA. T. O – Observation.

TK: So observation, the idea is I’m observing the text, I’m looking at it. And I’m looking for the grammar, so the makeup, how words fit together, phrases, that sort of stuff. So what is the package I’m looking at here? Is it lots of speeches? How are arguments flowing in this? So words that are repeated, or concepts that seem to be showing up over and over again? That sort of thing. So I’m just reading, and it is one of the most comforting things I think people can say about interpreting God’s Word is this: the best thing you can do is read and read and read the text. So observation.

JD: Yeah, making careful – a careful look at actually what’s there and asking ourselves, well, how is this passage communicated? We might say, oh, all the gospel accounts are telling the story of Jesus. But as Dr. Schreiner noted when we were with him, Matthew actually communicates the life of Christ in a special way, in a unique way that’s different from how Mark and Luke talk about Jesus. And so here we’re not just thinking about how is a whole book communicated, but how is this particular passage communicated? There are similar accounts in the Gospels. And when we compare how Matthew words it versus how Mark words it, all of a sudden we see, oh, they actually include something – Matthew says something that Luke doesn’t, or that Mark doesn’t include, and we have to say, why is that? That has to do with, well, how is this passage communicated? What exactly is he getting at?

So in the end, we’re talking about things like grammar. We’re talking about tracing the argument, following the “becauses” and the “therefores” and the “ands”. And then focusing in on those keywords, doing basic word studies because sometimes – I mean passages are made up of words and some of them are really loaded with important information. So that’s observation. How is the passage communicated? That’s our key question. How is the passage communicated? So we’ve done T, we’ve done O – text, observation. How about number Tom?

TK: Context. So where does the passage fit? And there’s certain kinds of context. So we mentioned the book of Ruth. So there’s a historical context and we’re told right away this fits in the time of the judges. So I’m just basically orienting myself. And we do this all the time in other parts of life, too. We’re going to somebody’s house we’ve never been there before. Obviously, phones and things have changed how we use maps, but when we want to find out what’s it like where you live – are you out in the country? Are you in a city? Whatever. Well, here, where does this thing fit historically? Where does it fit? And then literary-wise, where does it fit too? So where does it fit in the Bible, in the story being told?

And it’s one of the things we’ve argued here as far as talking about how Jesus’ Bible likely was arranged with the Law, the Prophets, and the Writings. The book of Ruth would have served – would have landed at the beginning of the Writings, so it wasn’t right next to the Book of Judges, for instance. Well, that’s something that I would be thinking about in context of why is this book in the Writings? What is it saying? Why is it right before the Book of Psalms? What does that tell me? What does it tell me that all these people seem to be – talking historical context – seem to be like Boaz and the people who work in his fields seem to be lovers of Yahweh and obeying him when it says this is in the time of the judges? What do I learn by that? So thinking hard about context, yeah.

JD: Yes. So context, both historical placement, the social setting, any historical details that the author either assumes or mentions explicitly. But then Tom focused principally on the literary context within the whole Bible. But there’s also that question of, OK, if I’m just jumping into the middle of a book, having a sense for what comes just before and what comes just after, that’s literary context. Understanding well what sets up this story, and at this point in the narrative in the life of Christ, for example, what is it that we just learned about that sets us up?

For example, I think of Matthew 11 ends with Jesus calling people: “Come to me, all you who are labor and heavy laden. I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and gentle of heart, and you shall find rest for your souls.” Period. End of the chapter. Well, chapter 12, very next verse, Jesus is walking through the grain fields with his disciples and it is a Sabbath controversy which is all about rest, and Jesus declares himself to be Lord of the Sabbath. So I think those two passages are working together. But if all we did was jump into the Sabbath text, we might miss that OK, Jesus has just set this up.

TK: That’s really good.

JD: Matthew has already prepared us to be thinking about the context of rest by Jesus’s earlier statements, and that’s what leads us right in to the discussion. So context is the third step. TOC – context. Where does the passage fit both historically and literarily? Number four – M – meaning. Now this is where we’re heading, right? We want to understand what the passage is all about. We have established the text. We’ve made good observations. We’ve considered what comes before and what comes after, where it fits in time. Now we come to, What does the passage mean? And here we’re dealing principally with issues of theology. We’ve moved from basic exegesis, trying to understand what the passage is saying to now, what the passage is meaning, what exactly does God want for us? What are we supposed to understand about him, what are we to understand about faith? And so we’ve moved into the sphere of theology, and in this sphere we basically have two different sides that we want to be thinking about. Tom, what are those two different sides?

TK: At this point – and we’ve talked about them before – so biblical theology is understanding how the Bible, the story in the Bible progresses, integrates, climaxes in Christ. So it’s saying, OK, how does this passage, what I’m looking at here, fit into that overall flow that’s happening in God’s Word? Where does this fit right here?

JD: And that’s so key. We’re not just talking about biblical theology as a discipline. What’s at stake in this step of interpretation is really asking, what does my passage contribute to that overall story that’s going to climax in Jesus? Are there other authors that use my passage, or is my passage using other authors? You know how the Old Testament can use the Old Testament or the New Testament can use the Old Testament. Scripture – is this an example of that? Or is there a theme that’s been building ever since the Book of Genesis that is now finding one of those patterns that Dr. Schreiner talked about, those repetitions of the story over and over, but now in new words, and we’re seeing it again, this recurring pattern? All of that would be that biblical theology, and we’re saying, what does our passage contribute to this overall movement of God that’s going to climax in the person of Christ?

TK: Just – I’m looking at my Bible right now and Ruth is open. So English Bible. Ruth is open, Ruth 1. But Judges is right there before it and thinking, OK, both of those books we have to say fit within biblical theology, both matter, but they’re doing something different. And people have struggled with both books, wondering what to do – is Ruth just a love story? And we have to say no, it fits into the story of Christ and his people. How about the book of Judges? That also fits. It’s just doing something different. But in meaning, what does the passage mean? I have to do the hard work to say, what is this book saying?

So Book of Ruth, couple quick thoughts. One is it ends with a focus on David. That David matters, and ultimately, why does David matter? David matters because he is the one whom the promises are spoken to, that his seed will build the temple and sit on the throne forever. I care where David came from. My salvation depends on it. So biblical theology was the one category. Systematic theology – how does this passage fit together with the whole Bible in terms of doctrines? So in relation to the gospel, but doctrines that we’d say this is teaching me something about God. This is teaching me something about his character, his nature. So I’m looking for then, meaning – biblical theology and systematic theology.

JD: I remember preaching Jeremiah 31, the New Covenant text, and I preached through the whole text and then I came to one of the culminating parts of the sermon, and I wanted the people to understand theology, systematic theology, and I said this passage is one of the reasons why I personally have become – I hold to Baptist doctrine, meaning that I only baptize believers. I believe that’s what God would want for me because it says that everyone in the New Covenant will know the Lord because everyone in the New Covenant’s sins will have been forgiven. And so I don’t think that we should be – I’m looking at that passage and I’m thinking, one of the questions I asked myself is how does this relate to doctrine? Well, that passage didn’t tell me anything about angels or demons, it wasn’t specifically focusing on, say, the Holy Spirit, or even telling me more about the nature of Scripture. But it did tell me something about the covenant community. We call that the doctrine of the church.

And so I drew attention to that in my sermon, how it seemed as though it’s telling us something about how we’re to think about the new covenant community that now we call the church, made up of men and women from every tongue and tribe and people and nation, ultimately, who have identified with Jesus by faith. So systematic theology is part of our interpretation, and it can really serve our people to have us once in a while pause and say, “Now in our statement of faith, we hold to this. This passage is pointing to this particular truth that we claim in our statement of faith to cherish. I just want you to see it’s in the Bible.” And so that’s how doctrine is being informed by specific passages in our Scriptures.

TK: And then finally, so TOCMA, the A is application. Why does the passage matter? And it is vital that we actually get to this spot in our preaching and in our teaching.

JD: And application is not just about doing, it’s about feeling, feeling appropriately about what we have studied and then living it out in our daily lives in a way that ultimately ends – and this is the ultimate goal of all biblical interpretation – worship, doxology, the glorying in who God is as the living God over all things. We want our people to arrive at the end of our sermons worshipping God more, having their lives surrendered to him more. And so we ask specific questions about application like: What did God want me to know in this passage? Or was this passage more designed to motivate me to act in a certain way? Is this passage supposed to confront me over sin? Is it supposed to awaken my affections for the greatness of God, the beauty of salvation? We want to take our applications where the passage calls us to take them, not where we just feel, “I’d like to talk to my people about this.” Our biblical passage is not just a launching point for us to do what we want to in a sermon. Rather, we want to be controlled and even let our applications be controlled by the text.

And I’m certain, Lord willing, we will have other podcasts that could focus solely on what do I need to be thinking about when it comes to applying God’s Word. But this is the sphere of practical theology. So we address biblical and systematic theology under M – meaning, and A is practical theology that deals with just faith and practice in everyday life. Embracing the promises of God to carry us through suffering and to develop our holiness. About applying, living out the law of Christ and discerning what does this mean in this specific moment. Practical application answering the question: Why does the passage matter?

TK: Jason, I’ve been with you enough to have seen you in the morning. You spend time in God’s word. Would you say that this TOCMA that you’re talking about is something that we practice also not when we’re preaching or teaching, but also when we’re reading God’s word on our own?

JD: Oh, that’s a good question. How much does TOCMA impact my devotions? I think every step of this fivefold process is impacting my devotions all the time. I’m always asking these kinds of questions. They’re just – I mean, this isn’t just about preparing a sermon or a Sunday school or small group lesson. It’s also just about learning how to be good readers of Scripture so that we can grasp what God wants us to grasp. And all five of these questions – What’s the makeup of the passage? How is the passage communicated? Where does the passage fit? What does the passage mean, and why does the passage matter? – all five of those are questions we need to be asking any time we open up Scripture. And with that, if we’re a Sunday school teacher or a small group leader, trying to help our people read their Bibles this way, right?

But it doesn’t have to be a formal structure like “OK, I’ve got a box and I need to check off. Did I look at text? Check. Did I do observation? Check.” When we’re learning how to study the Bible, it can feel that way. In fact, I’ll even give assignments. We’re going to give some text-based assignments, some observation assignments. I’ll send my students home and I’ll say, “OK, here’s 2 Chronicles 7:14. ‘If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I’ll hear from heaven and I’ll heal their land.'” And I’ll say, “Tomorrow when you come to class, you need to have created 50 observations of this passage. Go.” That’s an assignment that I would give to help people begin to think about, “OK, what is an observation? This is wide open, fair game. What do I need to think about? And you want me to make fifty of them on this one verse? Is that possible?”

Can I take Acts 1:8? “The Spirit of the Lord will come upon you and you will be my witnesses from Jerusalem and all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth.” Could you make 50 observations on that verse? To do so will require you to really slow down your reading. But there is great benefit to read for depth, and not just for distance. And this kind of approach helps us read the Bible for depth.

I heard one preacher say once that if you rake for leaves, you’ll never find diamonds. So we can approach the Bible simply by raking the surface, or we can get out our shovels and start digging. And there’s a benefit to raking leaves. I mean, truly, in the same way that there’s a benefit to reading large chunks of Scripture all at once. But then there’s also a benefit to digging holes and seeking diamonds, and we want to be people who become able to do both and help our people learn the benefits of both.

TK: That’s good. That’s really good. All right, friends, I pray – Jason prays – this is a help to you. I pray it’s a help to me too. I love God’s Word and I am praying that, as I think it’s D.A. Carson has said, that it masters me, that I don’t make it my goal to master it. So text, observation, context, meaning, application – TOCMA.

JY: Thanks for joining us for GearTalk. The material talked about today is outlined in even greater depth in Jason’s book “How to Understand and Apply the Old Testament”. Check the show notes for a link to the book. If you have questions about biblical theology you’d like us to address in future episodes, email us at [email protected]. Also check out handsdownflow.org for more resources.