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

in sharing their insights on how the text speaks into their lives — the list of such practices can go on. However, since the focus of this study is not to prescribe a solution, but rather to stimulate further reflection, | am not going to offer an expanded list of steps or practices that every church has to introduce into its everyday life and ministry. This is a process that every congregation needs to go through depending on its context and resources. At this stage, it would suffice to say that there are no quick fixes or instant solutions, or fit-to-all strategies of turning a church into the community of biblical interpreters. However, the process of searching and trying various methods, of growing new Bible interpreters and learning from them, of discerning individual and communal gifts and listening to God’s newly discovered voice is rewarding by itself, both for the whole congregation and its leader(s).’° ”® The following story might serve as an example of the necessary ‘creativity’ in developing a congregation into a community of interpreters. Serving as a pastor in a small Baptist church in England, the question of bringing the Bible into the community has been central to my understanding of the church and its ministry. However, this meant a major change for a congregation that was more accustomed to the pastor holding a central role in teaching, preaching, and leading their worship. Apart from trying to engage our members in small groups for regular Bible study, as an attempt to lead them towards fuller involvement in the ministry of the church, there was one seemingly insignificant thing, which produced unexpected results particularly in some of our younger people. This something was the removal of the pulpit from the preaching event. | started to preach being on the same level as the rest of the congregation (there was no other platform apart from the pulpit itself), and there was nothing between the preacher and the congregation (neither a pulpit, nor a lectern). To my great surprise, apart from a number of slightly dissatisfied older members, who still consider the pulpit as an important attribute of pastoral preaching, several young people shared with me that the absence of “the barrier” between the pastor and the congregation helped them to stop thinking that only special people (like a minister) could be involved in teaching the Bible. Thus, they felt they could participate in church ministry. They became involved in public reading of the Bible as part of the worship service (something they were not willing to do at first), in preparing and sharing “children sermons,” and two of them have asked if they could also try preaching ‘at some point.’ 213 Conclusion The focus of this chapter was on practices of reading the Bible in the community. | have argued that the interpretive strategy adopted by Baptists was based on their understanding of two senses of biblical text — its literal an