People love good stories. Children, for sure, love stories and ask for the same story to read over and over again. I don’t know how many times I have read Alice in Wonderland to our boys. I would finish reading a story, and they would say, “Read it again, Daddy.”
Jesus, however, did not tell stories just to entertain; He preached biblical stories, parables, to persuade! Donald Grey Barnhouse was a great sermon illustrator who used illustrations to persuade his congregation to be doers of God’s Word. He said, “All of life is an illustration of Christian doctrine.”
For example, when Barnhouse was driving his young sons to their mother's funeral, they had to stop at an intersection. As they waited, a delivery truck lumbered through the intersection, and its shadow slowly passed over their car. Barnhouse asked his sons, “Boys, would you rather be hit by that trunk or its shadow?” They answered, “Daddy, we would rather be hit by its shadow.” Barnhouse then seized his teaching moment, “Boys, that is exactly what we have experienced with your mother's passing. Because Christ removed the sting of death for believers in his death and resurrection, we walk through the valley of the shadow of death today. Your mother is with Jesus, and we will see her again.”[1]
Jesus also preached biblical stories, parables, to persuade!
1. What is a Parable?
Although Jesus preached sermons like the Sermon on the Mount and the Olivet Discourse, his preferred method of communication was telling stories called parables. Parables are hypothetical stories that illustrate truth and move listeners to action.
The Parable of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10:25-37 is not a true story. Jesus created this fictional anecdote to answer a question about salvation: “What shall I do to inherit eternal life? (Lk 10:25).
Jesus did not invent parables. There is a parable in 11 Samuel 12:1-13. Nathan the prophet preached this hypothetical parable to convict David of his sins of adultery, murder, and cover-up. David repented of these sins because of Nathan’s parable. Jesus similarly preached parables extensively. Parables should lead sinners to repent.
2. Why did Jesus tell Parables?
About two years into Jesus’ ministry, there is a dramatic shift in Jesus’ preaching. Jesus started preaching parables in Matthew 13:1-3. It is noted in Mark 4:33, 34 that from that day “without a parable spoke he not unto them.” Why? Not as some advocate today, because his doctrinal preaching was not working and now, he must only tell stories.
Ralph L. Lewis and Gregg Lewis, in their book Inductive Preaching: Helping People Listen, advocate preaching stories. They provide, as an example, a sermon “Deliver us?” in the Model Prayer.
The sermon has roughly 30 stories from contemporary experiences, history, and nature. There are twelve passing references to Biblical examples. At one point, the preacher asked 19 questions back-to-back, and in another section, 22 questions were asked back-to-back. What is glaringly absent from the sermon is any interpretation of Scripture. No context is provided for the Model Prayer, and no explanation of the Model Prayer nor of the petition “Deliver us.”
In Matthew 12, Israel had rejected Jesus’ offer of the kingdom. Jesus consequently postponed the kingdom and preached parables as a judgment, as he states in his answer to his disciples’ question in 13:10: “Why speak you unto them in parable?” Dwight Pentecost explains, “Because of the rejection of the Messiah, the Davidic form of the theocracy had to be postponed.”[2]
Jesus did not switch to storytelling preaching because doctrinal preaching no longer worked. His parables were doctrines: “And he taught them many things by parables and said unto them in his doctrine [emphasis added]” (Mk 4:2). The primary doctrine in parables was the kingdom. In Jesus’ Parables of the Mystery of the Kingdom, he stated in Matthew 13:19: “When you hear the word of the kingdom, and understand it not, then comes the wicked one.” Often, Jesus prefaced a parable with these words as found in Matthew 13:24, “The kingdom of heaven is like unto a man who sowed seed in his field.” R. T. France declared, “Parables are therefore a preeminently appropriate means for conveying the message of the kingdom of God.”[3] James Edwards agreed, “The most common subject of Jesus’ parables is the kingdom of God, which he illustrated by episodes from everyday life—fishing and farming, housekeeping and family life, royalty and banquets.”[4]
Jesus taught parables for two reasons.
Jesus employed parables to both reveal truth to believers and hide truth from the hardhearted. Jesus explained these two reasons in response to the disciples’ query: “Why speak you unto them in parables?” (Mt 13:10).
First, Jesus spoke parables to reveal the truth to believers.
Jesus informed his disciples that he spoke in parables, “Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven .... For whosoever that has, to him shall be given” (Mt 13:11). Jesus explained his first two parables in Matthew 13. From then on, the disciples should know how to learn from Jesus’ teaching.
Next, Jesus preached parables to hide the truth from the hardhearted.
The second reason why Jesus proclaimed parables is found in Matthew 13:13, “Because” the spiritual interest in some was growing dull. The disciples asked him in Matthew 13:10 why he was now preaching parables. Jesus answered in Matthew 13:11-18 with a prophecy from Isaiah 6:9, 10. Just as the nation of Israel in the Old Testament rejected the prophets and hardened their hearts, so had the Jews of Jesus’ day. The parables were God’s judgment on these hardened listeners. If we reject God’s Word, God’s Word will be more difficult to understand. In Mark 4:11,12, Jesus added “That” or to warn those who reject the truth may be hardened.
There are warnings throughout Scriptures about hardening your heart against God’s Word, such as, “Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness” (Heb 3:8, 15; Psa 95:8).
What Gary Inrig noted about the Parable of the Prodigal Son is true of all parables: “Each parable is ... a mirror before them and opening a window into heaven.”[5] Parables reveal who we are, either hardened sinners or responsive learners. Parables also give us a window through which we can see and learn about God. In the Parable of the Prodigal Son, we see God as a loving Father who does not give up on either rebellious or religious sinners, as depicted in the two sons.
3. Why should we study parables?
One-third of Christ’s recorded teaching is found in parables. Jesus told stories that are common to life and that we easily relate to. Jesus spoke of a farmer sowing seed to persuade believers to sow the Gospel so the unsaved can be saved. Jesus portrayed a shepherd leaving ninety-nine sheep to find one lost sheep, so the unsaved would allow the Good Shepherd to find them. Jesus described a mother threading a needle to illustrate and persuade the rich of the difficulty of those who love money of coming to Christ.
Parables are like the home-spun stories in the Andy Griffen Show. What is your favorite Andy Griffith Show? Did it include Opie, Barney, Earnest T. Bass, Gomer, or the Darlings? We used to watch the Andy Griffith Show and eat dinner when our son Timothy was little. We would be travelling somewhere, and Timothy would ask, “How much longer?” I would say, “About thirty minutes.” Timothy would then ask, “How long is thirty minutes?” I would then reply, “One Andy Griffith Show.” “Oh, okay.”
The parable is also a true-life situation that Jesus turned into a sermon to persuade his listeners. Alan R Cole observed, and Jesus would have agreed that parables are “‘Illustrations’, a system of instruction specifically designed to sift the wheat from the chaff among his hearers.”[6]
David Jeremiah wrote how God used a parable to bring John Bunyan to Christ:
Next to the Bible, the book that has had the greatest impact on the Chrisian church is Pilgrams Progress .... John Bunyan wrote it to illustrate the challenges of getting from earth to heaven, in the language of a journey. In that since, it is a sort of parable. And it was through the reading of the parable [of the Sower] that John Bunyan himself was converted to Christ. He was a blasphemous, godless man before his salvation, but when he read this parable he realized that even the devil knows that a man will be saved if believes the Gospel---so he believed it and was saved![7] This is why we and others should study parables.
[1] Bryan Chapell, Christ-Centered Preaching: Redeeming the Expository Sermon, Kindle ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005), Location 4356.
[2] Dwight Pentecost, The Parables of Jesus (Grand Rapids: Academie Books, 1982) 18.
[3] R. T. France, “The Gospel of Mark,” in NIGTC in Logos on Mark Four.
[4] James Edwards, “The Gospel according to Mark” in PNTC in Logos on Mark Four.
[5] Gary Inrig, The Parables: Understanding What Jesus Meant (Grand Rapids: Discovery House Publishers, 1991), 12-13.
[6] Alan R. Cole on Mark in TNTC in Logos.
[7] David Jeremiah, The Greatest Stories Ever Told: The Parables of Jesus, Atlanta: Walk Thru the Bible Ministries, 2000), 20.