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

len powers.” Thus, he attempts to offer a corrective to the narrative preaching approach, °§ Fred B. Craddock, As One Without Authority: Essays on Inductive Preaching, 3 ed. (Nashville, Abingdon Press, 1979, originally published in 1969), p 57. °* Campbell, Preaching Jesus, p 123. 6° John C. Holbert, Preaching Old Testament: Proclamation and Narrative in the Hebrew Bible (Nashville, Abingdon Press, 1991), p 49. °° Campbell, Preaching Jesus, p 141. *7 Ibid., p 142. °8 Campbell, The Word Before the Powers, pp 140-141. 209 by developing an alternative. | believe the main issue that is at stake here, is inadequacy of any approach to preaching as the main or even the only way of introducing the Scripture into the community of faith. No approach or style of preaching can address a variety of issues related to communal interpretation of the Bible, or the lack of it (and its projection onto the communal life), thus it can be easily criticised as reductionist. Hence, a clear understanding that preaching (regardless of its style) must be seen as one, often limited, facet in a complex subject of communal hermeneutics might be a reconciling solution, as well as a way forward.” Addressing the subject of practices of reading the Bible in the community, | do not plan to perform an in-depth research on how small group Bible studies are organised and led in Russia. Nor is it my intention to analyse all possible dangers of preaching. Rather, such references to potential barriers on the way to making biblical interpretation a communal practice is an attempt to remind us that when a group of people is gathered around an open Bible, this does not mean that they are inevitably becoming the community of interpreters. Neither does listening to great amounts of preaching make the listeners into experienced readers and interpreters of the Word. Therefore, Baptist communities must make a conscious effort in transforming the focus of their engagement with the Scripture, from mere (and inevitably shallow) listening, whether through preaching or a small group Bible study, to deeply self-involving transformative ongoing communal experience. Fowl and Jones develop a similar argument saying that the biblical text has to be read ‘over-against ourselves’ and not only ‘for ourselves.’ This means that rather than approaching the Bible with questions about its meaning, Christians have to allow the Scripture to talk to people, asking its own questions and raising concerns about their lives. They argue, ® This subject is further developed by Brown, in Transformational Preaching, as he dedicates one of the chapters to the differences between teaching and preaching. He argues that preaching must be seen as ‘a persuasive discourse,’ a motivational ministry, which confronts the listeners with biblical truth. Teaching on the other hand, aims at providing ‘understanding of biblical truth.’ (Transformational Preaching, pp 31-