Some of us are guilty on Sunday morning of preaching biblical ideas in a most unbiblical way.

When many of us begin preaching on the Bible, we resort to propositions. In the modern world, everything gets rendered down to four spiritual laws or three simple steps. Many of us preachers act as if we are being paid to make everything simple, contained, explained, and fixed. But this is not the primary biblical way of dealing with the truth.

PROPOSITION VS. NARRATIVE

My colleague at Duke, Dan Via, once commented that "The Bible tends to be propositionless." The typical biblical way of dealing with the truth is through narrative, rather than through abstract propositions.

Take for instance, the Ten Commandments. What could sound more like propositions than this? "You shall not have other gods before me. You shall not kill. You shall not steal."

However, these are not abstract propositions about the way the world works, but are rather secondary and derivative of a prior narrative: "I am your God. ...