This post continues our look at ministers who use Accordance. If you would like to share your story, please email [email protected].
This week’s installment is a bit different in focus as Dr. Brian Tabb has given us permission to adapt a section of his Themelios review of the Accordance 10 Ultimate Collection. In this post, Dr. Tabb details how a pastor might use Accordance in sermon preparation.
Let us consider how a pastor could use Accordance Bible Software to prepare a sermon on Genesis 1:26. First, the pastor could quickly set up a workspace to display several English Bibles—for example, NIV and ESV with Strong’s—alongside the morphologically tagged Hebrew Bible (BHS–W4). Moving the cursor over the Hebrew text automatically highlights the corresponding word in the parallel texts, which clearly draws attention to key translation differences, such as mankind (NIV) and man (ESV), rendering אָדָם, and rule (NIV) and dominion (ESV) for וְיִרְדּוּ.
Key terms such as צֶלֶם and דְּמוּת may be studied by triple clicking on the word to open the preferred Hebrew lexicon (HALOT) in a new panel next to the text search or by right clicking on the word to reveal various search options (more on this below). The pastor could then consult various reference tools, such as “Cross References,” which yields 48 (!) parallel passages, or “ESV Cross References,” which lists twelve parallels, each of which may be instantly viewed by hovering one’s cursor over the reference.
For further study on “image of God,” the pastor could consult the substantial entries by Merrill in the Dictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch (IVP) and Bray in the New Dictionary of Biblical Theology (IVP), as well as Genesis commentaries by Matthews (NAC) and Kidner (Tyndale).
The pastor could utilize the user notes module (Command+U) to keep track of notes for particular verses and could copy and paste relevant quotations and verses into a word processor or presentation slideshow.
Brian Tabb, PhD
Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Assistant Professor of Biblical Studies
Bethlehem College & Seminary
Minneapolis, MN