Towards Understanding of the Practice of Proclamation: The Core Element of Russian Baptist Worship, Timofey Cheprasov, 2015

hat are considered to constitute “reading of the Bible,” such as preaching, instead contribute to its gradual removal from the church’s everyday life and practice. Addressing practical ways of how the Bible is brought into Russian Baptist communities, it is possible to identify two distinct ways. These are preaching and small group Bible study. In previous chapters, it has already been shown how the practice of preaching, which traditionally is seen as a primary tool for bringing the Scripture into the church, often yields opposing results. In Chapter 5, | have referred to Sipko’s reflection on the damage that preachers’ authority produces in Russian Baptist churches, ‘usurping’ the right of the Church to read and interpret biblical truth. In a similar way, small group Bible studies often limit the circle of the interpretive interests of its participants to the discovery of what a particular text means. Either by addressing some commentaries of the Bible or by asking a simple question — ‘Is everything clear? Do you have questions?’ Unfortunately, the frequent response to the first question is ‘yes,’ and the second is ‘no,’ with people assuming they understand the meaning, or being afraid to reveal their ignorance of wider biblical context, thus °° Ibid., pp 40-41, italics of McClendon. 207 choosing not to engage in discussion, making no further attempts to deepen their understanding of the text, nor to discover its practical application to their lives. However, when teaching (and discussion) does not go beyond ensuring superficial understanding of the meaning of words and sentences that constitute biblical narrative, the transformative power of biblical text is severely restricted, if not annulled. In addition, the use of the Russian Baptist ‘traditional’ approach to interpretation leads to the Bible being interpreted via numerous references to other biblical passages, at best helping people to memorise some bits of the Bible, whilst often leading to confusion and an inability to explain what a particular text means for the life of the church. Another problem is the intolerance that is often present in churches in relation to any interpretation, which differs from the developed traditional (which received its shape during the Soviet period) understanding of various Scriptural texts. The problem is that such hermeneutical conservatism not only rejects new ways and approaches to interpretation, but, which is more important, labels them as heretical and sinful,°* thus making communal reading practically impossible. | must take a pause at this stage to re-emphasise the point that | made at the very beginning of this dissertation. This work is neither an attack at “imperfect” interpretive strategies of Russian Baptists, nor a usual call to simply re-design their preaching style by introducing some more “sound” or more popular “western” alternatives. While | believe self-criticism is something im