Proclaimer Blog
And after the Bible reading…
…that’s where the sermon usually comes in our services, maybe with a hymn or song in between if you like that kind of thing. I wonder, though, whether the goal of comprehensible proclamation means we should sometimes tinker with this standard procedure, and allow the preacher a few minutes on his feet setting the scene for the reading of the passage, so that the congregation will better understand it when it’s read, before he then launches into the rest of the sermon.
This is something I have done occasionally, and I found myself wanting to do it again recently when preaching on chs.2 and 3 of Hosea (or rather Hosea 2:2-3:5, as I think that the natural break is after 2:1, as in the NIV, rather than at the end of ch.1, as in the ESV). I found myself looking at that passage, thinking: If this is read without introduction, I suspect that all but the keenest with the best memories will spend most of their time not so much taking the reading in but wondering who this ‘mother’ and ‘wife’ is 2:1, who the people with bizarre names are (2:23), and so on.
I’ve known some churches that have encouraged the person reading the Scripture in the service to give a sentence or two of introduction before the reading, either composed themselves (having rightly appointed to that task only people with a decent knowledge of Scripture), or else given to them by the preacher. I’d prefer to take this to its logical conclusion at let the preacher do it his way.
You might be able to bring some deep principles to bear on this seemingly small issue: shouldn’t Protestant principles lead us to have Scripture simply read publicly, before someone steps up to interpret and proclaim it? Should Scripture appear ‘wrapped up’ in commentary like this, rather than in a sense appearing in its own right in our worship?
But my concern is pragmatic: to promote the greatest possible comprehension of and engagement with the word of God in public worship. And that is a great Protestant theological principle too.