Indexing

Here's some advice for Lutheran pastors and divinity students. You should index. Why index? Have you ever been in a conversation with someone, and he asked a question or presented an argument leaving you without an answer? Have you ever felt like you read something about this topic once upon a time, but now you can’t find the information? Some people read books and underline sentences and words. But then when they want to find that information, they have to page through the entire book, and often the information is lost. Things are better, though not perfect, if you keep a list of main points in the back of the book with page numbers. This way, if you can remember that the information is in a particular book, you can often find the info. you’re looking for. This is basically creating your own, personalized index for that book. This is absolutely a good thing to do, but it’s not enough. What you need is a master index for all your books. If all you have is a few books, finding the book that has the information you want is no problem. But if you have read hundreds of books, it’s a lot harder—even impossible.

A master index that you keep in a word processing document will allow you to keep track of all the information you come across.

• Preaching and teaching with more depth
• Gives more time to gather insights
• Aids memory
• Solutions for apparent contradictions: ready defense
• Trusty backup for emergencies and busy weeks
• Aids thinking and study skills
• Prepares material for future writing

How to make a master index? I use one text document, with all the topics for theology, ethics, history, and whatever else I want to remember in alphabetical order. I have it set up so that each letter of the alphabet is easily searchable. For example, if I just searched on “G,” I would get too many hits. So my headings are “G..”, so that when I search on that, I go right to the beginning of the G section.

Where to get your topics? You can make it from scratch, but I found it helpful to copy the subject index from a short, general theology text. Steven Mueller’s book We Believe, Teach, and Confess has a good subject index for this purpose.

Make sure the main word is the first word of the index entry. So instead of “Martin Luther,” it should be “Luther, Martin”. Instead of “Nature of God” it should be “God, Nature of”. A good index will show you how this is done.

Then you need to have an abbreviated reference system. For example, if I’m taking notes on Johann Gerhard’s Theological Commonplace: On the Nature of God, it would be far too cumbersome to put the author’s name and title on each line where the topic comes up. What you don’t want:

Holy Spirit is Received through Hearing–Johann Gerhard, On the Nature of God and on the Trinity, page 203.

Make a bibliography at end of index with the abbreviations.

Instead, take the first letter of the author’s last name and a number. If this is the first book you’ve read by an author with a last name starting with G, then this book will be referred to as “g1”. Make a bibliography at the end of your master index with the abbreviations/codes you’re using, so that you can always find what “g1” refers to, for example.

Then, you can enter the code into the index and save a lot of space. Here’s an example.

Holy Spirit is Received through Hearing–g1:203

Now, what should you index?

What you should index depends on what you want to find at some later time. As a pastor and theologian, I find it most helpful to find Bible passages dealing with any and every topic. So as I read Holy Scripture, I make lists of index entries and then later enter those entries into my master index.

As Lutherans, we recognize the Lutheran Confessions as being a correct exposition of Holy Scripture, and a binding norm of doctrine among us. Lutheran pastors and commissioned church workers vow before God and the Church to teach and preach in accordance with the Lutheran Confessions. Moreover, the Confessions are a profound source of theological insight, wisdom, and Scriptural exposition. So I love to add references to the Lutheran Confessions to my index.

Of course, as you read other books, you’ll want to make index entries and then enter them into your Master Index, using an abbreviation.

You should read theological journals, especially Logia, CTQ, CJ, and Lutheran Quarterly. Index these using standard abbreviations, or make up your own abbreviation. Be consistent and index either by volume or by date. Note that some journals, like Logia, restart the page numbering in each issue. For them you’ll have to specify what issue it is.

It’s a good idea to keep a physical file system for pamphlets, magazine clippings, handouts, and anything physical that’s too thin to put on your bookshelf. I have a large filing cabinet with one file folder for each topic, sorted alphabetically. It would be a good idea to put the word “Files” in your master index for each folder in your physical files. No need to index the contents of the folders. This way you’ll know at a glance whether you need to go open up your physical files to see if something important is there.

Finally, electronic files. I keep a file on my computer, backed up to Google Drive, with subfolders that match the topics in my Master Index. If I make a subfolder there, I put a 0 in the Master Index. That tells me that there's an electronic folder with documents relating to this topic.

So that's it! I recommend this to you because it will make your life much easier and your ministry more fruitful in the future.