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Old 05-05-2020, 02:03 PM
coksiw coksiw is offline
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Join Date: Jan 2019
Posts: 2,194
That's not Preaching!!

I have done some research about it and I came to the conclusion that we have redefined the word "preaching" and as result "teaching", so you end up with misconceptions when you read the Bible.

The two conclusions I came up with that may be shocking to some are these:

* Preaching (κηρύσσω or εὐαγγελίζω or μαρτύριον): it is to the ones that have not obeyed the true Gospel, and it is about proclaiming aloud the Gospel of Christ and the Coming of the Kingdom. It announcing clear and aloud an event that will happen, is happening, or had happened. In the context of the New Testament is the Gospel. It is not used to describe the discourse to the Church: you don't preach to the church! (don't stone me please ).

* Teaching: explains something, and in the context of the Bible, targeted not to just inform the head, but to transform the heart. That's what you do to the Church.

* Exhorting: that.


The result of this confusion has caused people to misunderstand teaching tremendously. They try to define it and they end up with misconceptions as this: preaching is to the heart, teaching to the mind; preaching is yelling, teaching is telling, preaching is proclaiming the truth, teaching is explaining the truth (this one is close). Another result of this misunderstanding is that teaching for some has become an informational class, about theology, but little about transforming hearts, neglecting it to the point of becoming secondary in some congregations. I have also noticed mistranslations because of the same misconception: e.g. translating the greek word for "exhort" as "preach".

So in the context of the New Testament: Preaching is announcing the Gospel to the ones that don't know it, Teaching and exhorting is what you do to the congregation.



Now, there is one single verse that many like to use to keep saying that "preaching" refers to all public speaking of the word including the Church assembly:

[2Ti 4:2 NKJV] 2 Preach the word! Be ready in season [and] out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching.

Since preaching in the rest of the NT always relates to the lost, could it be that this "preach the word" simply means "preach the word of the gospel to the lost"? I think so. I think Paul is simply encouraging Timothy in a broad sense: church, and lost. Why? Let's see the context:

[2Ti 4:2-5 NKJV] 2 Preach the word! Be ready in season [and] out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching. 3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, [because] they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; 4 and they will turn [their] ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables. 5 But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.

Notice a mix of the subject of teaching with evangelism. Paul was talking in a broad sense, not just about his service to an assembly.

You need the right orthodoxy to have the right orthopraxis. That being said, the redefinition of "preaching" is already with us, but let's not fall into the trap of neglecting or mispresenting teaching to others because we can't define it after preaching has been redefined!

What are your thoughts?

Last edited by coksiw; 05-05-2020 at 03:59 PM.
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