I found this excellent quote by William Arnot in his exposition of The Parable of the Lost Sheep:

...the difficulty lies more in the way of the scientific expositor, whose task is to express the meaning in the form of logical definitions than in the way of the simple reader of the Bible, who desires to sit at the feet of Jesus, and learn the one thing needful from his lips. In this, as in many other portions of Scripture, a hungry labourer may live upon the bread, while it may baffle a philosopher to analyze its constituents, and expound its nutritive qualities. A devout reader may get the meaning of the parable in power upon his heart, while the logical interpreter expends much profitless labour in the dissection of a dead letter.

A great reminder that preachers are first, simple and devout readers who desire to sit at the feet of Jesus, and second, scientific expositors and philosophers. His sheep do not need a great deal of scientific exposition to understand what Jesus teaches in the Parables. He who has ears will hear.

I need to do a better job of getting out of His way when preaching the parables.

And another nugget. This time from Arnot's exposition of The Lost Coin:

It is better to forego for the time even precious morsels of instruction, than to obtain them by doing violence to those exquisite analogies which the parables present.