Review - Two books on Preaching

Teaching Preaching as a Christian Practice: A new approach to homiletical pedagogy by Thomas G Long and Leonora Tubbs Tisdale, Westminster John Knox, 238pp, 2009, £19.99
Preacher Rehab: Restoring faith in the sermon by Ron Cassidy, AuthorHouse, 368pp, 2009, £14.99

I suspect that almost the only people who read books on preaching are those who teach homiletics and book reviewers. Many American preachers still regard preaching as a skill to be honed and worked on throughout ministry, but among Anglican clergy, preaching is often regarded as a chore that goes with the job; to be endured by both priest and people.

The College of Preachers and CODEC (based at St John’s College, Durham) have just completed a preliminary research project into how preaching is received in the pews and what congregations think its role should be. Two striking conclusions are: that people look forward to the sermon; that it makes little difference to their attitudes or behaviour. Both of these books try to address these issues of connecting with the congregation and aiming for a Christ-like transformation.

Long and Tisdale’s book is clearly aimed at the academy although its 14 contributors provide something for everyone, especially in the section on the Components of the Practice of Preaching. The burden of the book is a plea to take preaching seriously as an honourable practice which can be taught and learned in a similar way to law or medicine. The problem of course is that in the modern curriculum there is hardly any time devoted to homiletics and it is often regarded as something ‘you will pick up’. There is no bibliography but good endnotes after each of the 15 chapters, which cover topics from the Preaching Imagination, to a very rapid overview of Voice and Diction, to the more spiritual Marks of Faithful Preaching. It’s idiosyncratic, embedded in the USA and moderately useful.

Cassidy’s book is robustly British and, as the title suggests, is a cri de coeur for a renewed confidence in the power of preaching. The emphasis of this book is the ongoing journey of the preacher after the academy, learning ‘on the job’ and with the ever changing demography of the congregation. There are ten chapters: the Preacher’s Problems, Predecessors, Preparation, Privilege, Perseverance… almost a complete set of alliterative Sweet Ps. And it’s all good stuff, well illustrated with helpful overviews of recent homiletic thought and contemporary culture as well as historical insights. At the same time Cassidy’s 40 years in Anglican ministry means it is very realistic and earthed. So there are tips about using and choosing a PA system as well as a critique of Craddock (Fred, not Fanny) and tips on preaching on special occasions. I liked his exploration of John Wenham’s aim of a sermon: placere (to please), docere (to teach), and movere (to motivate). This is certainly a book for the preacher, but it should also be on the booklist of the academy. There is a good select bibliography and helpful endnotes. Neither books have an index which is unhelpful.

I wouldn’t spend £20 on the American book but I might spend £15 on Cassidy’s. So perhaps you should save your money and continue muddling through as dilettantes, but don’t use that word in a sermon and never use irony.

Church Times

Cost of Discipleship

Trinity 14

Deut 30.15-20; Psalm 1; Philemon 1-21; Lk 14.25-33

“Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.” (Luke 14.27)

After the Pope leaves Britain in a couple of weeks time, his next European visit will be to Spain - to Santiago de Compostela and to Barcelona.

I came back last week from a very enjoyable week in Barcelona and I would like to think that the Pope might follow in my footsteps along the beaches; into the wonderful restaurants and noisy bars and clubs;

the local festivals with their dangerous fireworks and human pyramids with small children defying every health and safety regulation known to the European Community; or perhaps a day out to the vineyards where they make Cava around Vilafranca. I remember the start of that day so well, but am much less clear about the ending of the day.

One place where he will certainly follow in my footsteps is into Antoni Gaudi’s magnificent Expiatory Church of the Holy Family, known to most of us who cannot pronounce Catalan as: Sagrada Familia.

On November 7th Pope Benedict XVI will consecrate the Temple as a Basilica.

Gaudi began work on the Church in 1883 and he devoted the last 15 years of his life, until he died in 1926, entirely to the venture.

There was a provisional completion date for 2026, the anniversary of his death. But others think the construction will last into the 22nd century.

When Gaudi was asked why he designed something that would take so long to build he remarked that his client was in no hurry.

Jesus says in our Gospel: “For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost, to see whether he has enough to complete it?” (Luke 14.28)

In fact I think Gaudi had estimated the cost. He knew that it would take his entire life and energy and then some. For him, the cost of his Christian discipleship was to give all he had to laying the foundations of a building dedicated to the Gospel.

All the readings today are about major life choices; about the cost of discipleship.

In Deuteronomy, the People of God are on the edge of the Promised Land and faced with a significant choice:
“I have set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity… Choose life so that you and your descendants may live.”

The Psalm is about the simple choice of the company you keep. Are you nurtured by life affirming friends? Or are you constantly with people who bring out the worst in you?

Then Paul’s brief letter to the wealthy Philemon, who ran a house church in Colossae, is again about choosing the right way. Paul wrote from prison in about AD62 and within a few years he would be beheaded for his faith.

Onesimus (the name means ‘useful’) was a runaway slave who was converted and whom Paul was sending back to his master, Philemon. So Paul makes a little joke about his name: “Formerly he was useless to you, but now he is indeed useful both to you and to me.” (Philemon 11)

Paul reminds them of his own choices which have led him to prison, and urges them to make the right choices – Onesimus to return to his master, and Philemon to welcome him as a Christian brother as well as his slave.

My sister was in Atlantic City yesterday, with crowds of others waiting for hurricane Earl to hit the East coast of America. They were glad that no one was hurt, but they were all a bit disappointed that there wasn’t more to see.

In the Gospel, the crowds are following Jesus, not just for his teaching, and not even just for the occasional miracle; but because they hoped he was the Messiah and was going to rout the occupying Roman army.

So Jesus makes it clear he is calling for recruits and not just spectators.

Using typical Jewish hyperbole, our Lord tells his disciples that their love and commitment to him must make their love for family look like hate in comparison!

Their love and commitment to him must mean that their possessions, their talents, their time are at his disposal.

(Although there are relatively few who are called to follow the way of sister poverty.)

So how does all this cost of discipleship work out for most of us in our western culture?

As with much of Christ’s teaching it is about the place of the heart: the root of our affections. It is about the attitudes that we carry through life.

So making the pursuit of possessions or the love of money is the ultimate folly. For we can’t take it with us, despite the misprint I once spotted in ‘Guide me O thou Great Redeemer… land my safe on Canaan’s side’.

So we work hard to make money, but knowing it is always at God’s disposal. We must be cheerful givers.

And of course we love our families, but we must not idolise them – turn them into gods.
Because they are not. They have feet of clay like us and will sometimes fail us as we sometimes fail them.

Our Christian faith gives us a bigger backdrop and wider concerns to protect us from self-absorption, or absorption by the immediate family.

Learning to listen to God is one of the hardest disciplines of the Christian life. But it is essential if we are to count the cost of discipleship and understand what God is calling us to do.

Mother Teresa died on this day in 1997 and I remember her being interviewed once by the American journalist Dan Rather. He said: “Mother Teresa, what do you say when you pray?”

She replied; “Sometimes I don’t say anything. I just listen.”

So Dan presses her further: “Well when you listen, what do you hear?”

Mother Teresa answered: “Well if I listen long enough and patiently enough, I begin to hear what God is calling me to do, and what it might cost me to do it.”

We come to the altar of God to remember what it cost Jesus.

The occasional inconvenience, embarrassment, generosity, or self rebuke for the sake of Christ is hardly too much to bear.

“Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.” (Luke 14.27)