Musings on Spiritual Matters

In this series on the parables, I have been applying some post-liberal perspectives in preaching these lessons.  I believe that preacher’s make the mistakes of explaining the parable.  Preachers will break down the parable into three points, which is probably one of the worst forms to use for a parable.  Also, I like to note, I have done this too.  But even if one does not use a university format for a parable, one can still miss the meaning through doing too much exegesis of the text.  One explains all of the background, the characters, and the meaning, and sometimes this might be best, but the parables were often told to be left hanging.  Using a method of science, and breaking the parable apart into its various components really misses the point of a parable.  So instead of explaining the text, you want to take the study that you have done, and create the experience of the parable.  What is the feeling that the hearer had.  For an example, the parable of the good Samaritan asks the question to justify himself.  Jesus then tells the parable, and the lawyer has to admit that the Samaritan is the neighbor in the text.  We have preached this story, but what is the feeling that you want to give the listeners in your congregation.  How can they experience this parable again?  Look at the experience within the text and recreate this.  So in other words, do what you can to make the hearers what to justify themselves.  We have been doing this a lot in this parable, but if we do this, someone might get hurt, or it is unsafe.  So we feel that we can pass by the other side, because it is unsafe to help.  You get the picture, I hope.  So mostly to preach a parable through a post-liberal perspective you want to recreate the vibe for your people that the first people experienced.

Related posts:

1. Preaching the Parables Badly
2. Refresh Preaching
3. How To Improve Preaching
4. Advice on Preaching–Bulletin Points
5. Review of “Preaching Jesus”

Tags:

This entry was posted by Matthew on Tuesday, June 21st, 2011 at 10:38 am and is filed under Church News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.