I am grateful — eternally grateful — for the early writings of Sidney Greidanus, who began to help me understand this way of looking at the text; and for the providence of God that had me simultaneously in grad school at a time that narrative theory was being vigorously explored for its communication power. My goal herey is to relate to you how these lines of thought may coincide to help us see how story principles apply to Gospel exposition.
One way to consider how we may preach the Bible’s story line in all that it communicates is by considering the insight of Kenneth Burke, perhaps the 20th Century’s greatest speech theorist. Burke helped us see that all persuasion must have certain narrative contours in order for communication to occur. To help us see the narrative dimensions of all communication Burke provided us with his pentad, a simple anatomy of story elements that he would later call his five children: act, scene, agent, agency and purpose. The play and interplay (or ratio) of these children not only reveal the nature of story in general, but also help us understand how to expound the truth of Scripture in a way that stays true to the story line the Bible wishes to tell.
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ACT
By revealing the holy nature of the God who provides redemption and the finite nature of humanity that requires redemption, the law and the prophets point to the necessity of a Redeemer and prepare the human heart to seek Him. Because of the great disproportion between our best works and God’s righteousness, we are always and forever incapable of the righteousness that would reconcile us to a holy God — our acts are insufficient. Our best works are judged but “filthy rags” in the Old Testament (Isaiah 64:6), and the Savior echoes, “When we have done all that we should do, we are still unworthy servants” (Luke 17:10). Thus, in context the text is never about moral instruction — our acts — alone, but always about our dependence on the Savior to be and do what his Word requires. Someone must act on our behalf, and all Scripture in various ways is revealing the need for God to act for us.
SCENE
Christ-centered exposition of Scripture does not require us to reveal Jesus by mysterious alchemies of allegory or typology, but rather identifies how every text functions in furthering our understanding of who Christ is, what the Father sent Him to do, and why. The goal is not to make Jesus magically appear from every detail of Hebrew narrative or every metaphor of Hebrew poetry — such practices have led to allegorical errors — but rather to show where every text stands in relation to the person and/or work of Christ whose grace achieves our salvation. No text occurs in isolation from the big story. Since the proclamation and promise of Genesis 3:15, there has always been a salvation scene upon which the commands and teaching of Scripture are overlaid even as they further explicate the features of the scene.