At the 2008 Together for the Gospel conference, Ligon Duncan, the senior pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Jackson, Mississippi, preached an excellent sermon entitled, "Sound Doctrine – Essential to Faithful Pastoral Ministry."

I've listened to this sermon about three times.  In this sermon Duncan shows that the church needs solid, healthy, weighty theology.  The church especially needs systematic theology.  In his estimation, and I think rightly so, the Bible isn't just one long narrative.  It's more than a story and it takes sound systematic theology to understand it.

I wish all Southern Baptists would listen to this sermon.  It seems particularly relevant to missionary work.  Good scholarship, biblical exegesis, and detailed theology are always needed on the field.