The Fallen Condition Focus and preaching

Bryan Chapell, in the May-June 2005 edition of Preaching magazine, writes about the "Fallen Condition Focus" and its impact on preaching. Chapell defines the FCF as

the mutual condition that contemporary believers share with those for whom the text was written that requires the grace of the passage to manifest God's glory to his people.

In addition to helping relate a passage's original context to our own, a FCF helps the preacher give credit where credit is due:

Since fallen creatures cannot correct or remove their own fallenness, identification of the FCF forces a sermon to honor God as the only source of hope rather than merely promoting human fix-its or behavior change . . . . The acknowledgment of human fallenness that undergirds the text's explanation and the sermon's development automatically requires the preacher to acknowledge the bankruptcy of merely human efforts and to honor the wonders of the divine provision.

Amen. Chapell has put together an excellent article.

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