Why Did Jesus Speak in Parables?

Preachers across the world try to model Jesus' communication style. Jesus spoke in parables quite often when talking to the disciples and to the masses. A parable is defined as "a usually short fictitious story that illustrates a moral attitude or a religious principle". In other words, Jesus used illustrations of sorts. Remember that the people of his time were your average, everyday kind of folk; most were uneducated and worked the land for their livelihood. So Jesus spoke to them in terms they would best relate and understand. Today we call that being "relevant". He drove home his point using stories about farming (parable of the seeds in MT 13...a parable any gardener can relate to) and cooking (parable of the yeast, also in MT 13). Preachers do the same thing with illustrations. We make a point, and then make it contextual with a story from our experience in order to relate our story to the biblical story.