A helpful blog on Applying Narratives

posted by Don Johnson

Today I’d like to highlight a blog post I ran across called:

Implications or Applications?: Preaching Biblical Narratives

Lest the average reader be put off (i.e. average reader = not a preacher) this article is helpful for personal application as well. When you read the narrative sections of Scripture, how do you make personal (or preaching) applications so that the passage has direct relevance to life today?

The question is a difficult one, as many books in the homiletics libraries attest. In this post, professor William Barrick, formerly of The Master’s Seminary, offers helpful insight and advice.

Here is a sample:

Even the New Testament itself leaves some application to the sanctified mind interacting with the written Word of God. Paul’s list of the “works of the flesh” (Galatians 5:19–22) concludes with “and things like these” (v. 21). The list is incomplete and the apostle, by the leading of God’s Spirit, expects us to add to the list those works that belong to the flesh but have not been listed.

Read the whole thing. You will find the post helpful, I’m sure.


Don Johnson is the pastor of Grace Baptist Church of Victoria, Victoria, BC, Canada.