Visualizing Stories
Artist unknown
I’m thinking I read slower than most, because I have to spend time visualizing what I am reading in order to better internalize the text. When I speak, teach or preach. I can’t imagine a better way to understand what God is saying to you in Scripture than to visualize yourself in the text.
Preachers aren’t meant to spit out facts regarding a passage, but rather take someone by the hand and escort them to a place where God can speak to them through the Living Bible. Escort almost gives the feeling of being a tour guide. I have this mental picture of the tour guide at Disney World describing what lies ahead and to the side of the boat like the Jungle Cruise. It’s the tour along the Amazon or Nile that is the story, but it’s the tour guide that draws your attention to the part of the river that further unveils what the story means to you.
Teaching is about sharing mental pictures. I have heard of a preacher being described as a projector. A projector at a movie theatre doesn’t make the film it is showing, but it does make it possible for me to watch the film and understand the story being told. So far, preachers are tour guides and projectors. The visualizing suggested in the text is working wonders for me.
We are all teaching what the Bible means to us by the way we carry ourselves. You can see the impact someone has in their life by the understanding they have of the gospel and their relationship with Jesus. We should all see ourselves as preachers and teachers in sharing the gospel with a troubled world by the way we walk in it with the Lord.
Can people see a life-giving relationship with Jesus Christ in you? Does the love of Christ pour out of you when you share your story? I ask myself these questions regularly. During this season of Lent, I am asking God to show me if there is any way in me that keeps me from Him (Ps 139:23-24). At times, I don’t like the answers, but it gives me a base point to see where I am with my walk. I encourage you during this season of Lent to search yourself through using God’s eyes and obediently let God lead you back to Him.