well, i guess that all depends if it's a word as in The Word...
taking a homiletics course these days and we've spent an interesting amount of time studying why preaching has taken on such a negative connotation, even, and sometimes most noticeably, in the Christian community..."don't tell me what to do!"...."well, now you're just preaching at me"..."geez, thanks...that was a good sermon."
for you language buffs, this can best be seen in the contrast between the indicative versus the imperative...our gut level understanding of preaching is the latter rather than the former....but it seems God has some different goals at times for preaching...
while imperative (see: prophetic) preaching has its place...how much better would the Church be seen if we preach indicatively---explaining who God is and what God has done....
after all, we're supposed to be all about reconciliation as Christians, right? so it makes sense we would preach about God rather than just about what other people are supposed to do...
UPDATED:
totally agree with larissa. the imperative ought to follow the indicative. the Bible seems to preach about God's nature first and then what that means for our lives...
i think this is best seen in acts 2 when peter addresses the crowd....first he goes to great lengths to talk about what God's done....with just this, the people were cut through and then they asked "what shall we do?".....peter then gives them the commands....funny how one follows the other....
5 comments:
Dude... this private thing is... a pain. Can you add Natalie? I guess she can't view your stuff.
Oh. I like words. :o)
I agree - good preaching and teaching reveals who God is and what he's about. But good preaching about God also should and will point us toward the implications for our own lives.
that's a great point! i love it when you blog about what you learn in seminary! eh-hem... as opposed to the many celebrities who look like you. ha ha ha...
Funny you mentioned this. I'm just finishing up Rob Bell's Velvet Elvis. He mentions a teacher who said, "'if people were taught more about who they are [in Christ], they wouldn't have to be told what to do.' It would come naturally... the point isn't sin management (Dallas Willard). It is who we are now." (144) This is all in the context of who God is and what He has done. Outstanding book.
Hey Aric...It's Fiore from Back in the day. We used to eat bad breakfast sandwiches at good ole WGHS. Drop me a line when you can I'd love to catch up.
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