Today Perkins teaches us how to rightly handle the word of God which he also calls right 'cutting': 'Right cutting is the way in which the Word is enabled to edify the people of God'.
Perkins says that there are two elements to rightly 'cutting' the word:
(i) resolution or partition;
(ii) application.
Thus in Chapter Six we read about the resolution of a text: 'Resolution is the unfolding of the passage into its various doctrines, like the untwisting and loosening of a weaver's web'.
Then in Chapter Seven Perkins tells us how to apply the text to what he identifies as seven common spiritual conditions:
(i) unbelievers who are both ignorant and unteachable;
(ii) unbelievers who are teachable but ignorant;
(iii) unbelievers who have knowledge but have never been humbled;
(iv) unbelievers who have already been humbled;
(v) believers;
(vi) those who have fallen back;
(vii) churches with both believers and unbelievers.
In resolving a text, Perkins had some good advice about the use of analogies: 'It is also legitimate to develop analogies or allegories. These are arguments drawn from things that are like each other. Paul used them often (e.g. 1 Cor. 9:9). But they are to be employed with the following caveats:
1. They should be used sparingly and soberly.
2. They must not be far-fetched, but appropriate to the matter in hand.
3. They must be mentioned briefly.
4. They should be used for practical instruction not to prove a point of doctrine. '
In order to avoid error, I think we can go to an extreme and nearly do away with analogies altogether.
But, as Perkins says, analogies are very handy for practical instruction.
Read Chapters 8 (Varieties of application), 9 (The use of the memory), 10 (Preaching the word) and 11 (Public prayer), and the Summary.
Please post your own notes and thoughts in the comments section below.
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