Interpretation through community

In his final installment on "the myth of expository preaching" David Fitch calls on Christians to respond to Scripture not as individuals but as a community:

If preaching starts and ends with the sermon on Sunday, and if the Word is distributed to individuals as portable property to be taken home in notes or a cassette tape, it cannot help but be the means of fostering interpretive violence. The violence comes when we put our own meaning or agenda onto Scripture. The violence comes when the preaching of the Word separates us as individuals each armed with the interpretation we want because we do not come together in mutual submission to discern the Scripture’s meaning for our lives today.

If preaching is to avoid this violence, it must foster communal practices that allow us to submit to one another as the Spirit works to interpret the Scriptures. We do this not as a democracy, but as a Spirit filled community where we submit to each other’s authoritative gifts. Of course, to even think of doing church this way requires a new imagination.

Once again, Dr. Fitch hasn't shown why expository preaching is antithetical to what he proposes. And once again, what he proposes is highly insightful.

Update: Glenn Lucke offers a response to David Fitch (HT: Jollyblogger).