Notes on Preaching

Preaching wields a place of primacy in the life of the church. The proclamation of God"s word in the ecclesial context should not be assumed, minimized, or relegated to something that is merely tolerated. Rather, preaching has a glorious tradition and ongoing function which has enduring relevance in the world. The goal of this study is to assess the role and nature of preaching with a view to encouraging its fresh appreciation in the context of the believing community and in the hearts of preachers themselves.

Mid-America Journal of Theology, 2017

Homiletic, 2013

Based on new empirical studies we explore how churchgoers listen to sermons in regard to the theological notion that "faith comes from hearing". Through Bakhtinian theories presented by Lorensen and the empirical findings presented by Gaarden, the apparently masked agency in preaching that infuses faith can be described as a polyphony of voices, which is not limited to the liturgical room or the sermon, but is activated by it. This polyphony creates a room, where the churchgoers, through different kinds of dialogical interaction, categorized as associative, critical, and contemplative, create new meaning and understanding. It is not a room that the listener or the preacher can control or occupy, but a room that both engage in. The preacher as facilitating an implicit dialogue: the empirical perspective How do churchgoers listen to sermons when they participate in services? The traditional protestant theological conviction ascribes an inherent religious function to the listening process, as "faith comes from hearing" (Rom 10:17). 2 In the original Greek text, the verb come is not explicit, but it has nevertheless been understood as comes in the 3rd person singular. Our question is: Who or what initiates this faith to come? The sentence "faith comes from hearing" is an indirect passive construction which masks the primary agency of faith. It seems to be implied that God is behind the mask, as only God himself can inspire faith. However, the passive construction of the sentence is open to interpretation. How are we to understand this masked agency in preaching? In this article we will suggest that this agency can be interpreted in accordance with the way contemporary people listen to preaching. The empirical survey at the heart of this essay is a part of Marianne Gaarden's Ph.D. dissertation in progress. The project includes 29 interviews with churchgoers from five different churches and five interviews with the corresponding ministers. 3 The churches are all 1 Gaarden teaches homiletics at the Pastoral Institute in Aarhus. She is the co-author of Pastoralteologi (Copenhagen: Anis, 2007), and Gudstjenesten: En antologi (Aarhus University Press, forthcoming 2013) This article is a part of Gaarden's Ph.d.-dessertation forthcoming 2014. Lorensen is visiting scholar at Duke University Divinity School in the period 2012-2013. She is the author of Preaching as a Carnivalesque Dialogue-between the 'Wholly Other' and 'Other-wise' Listeners (Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, forthcoming 2013). 2 The Greek text (Nestle-Aland 26th edition) is:"". Direct translated: "Then faith [comes] from hearing, and hearing through [the] word of Christ". In the 21st Century King James Version, it is translated: "So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God". In NRSV "So faith comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes through the word of Christ." 3 The research was designed the following way: Right after the sermon, the pastor announced from the pulpit that he or she was participating in this project. When the churchgoers left the service, they were handed a piece of paper with the three questions: 1.What did you experience in the worship? 2. What did you hear in the sermon? 3What did the sermon do to you? In this way, the informants (the unpredictable number of people who were willing to give an interview) had the opportunity to write down their answers immediately after the service. These answers formed the basis of the interview, which lasted approximately one hour and took place either the same day or the day after. 12 The preacher is only partly facilitating this interactive event as also many other factors in the entire worship contribute to this process, as the hymns and singing, the church room with other churchgoers, prayers and readings, the liturgy with the Eucharist etc.

Acts 2,5-6 talks of the crowd that gathered in Jerusalem for the annual Pentecost feast. It describes them as 'devout men from nations under heaven'. This description could be an exaggeration, but it is a literary way of telling the readers that uncountable number of people went for the feast. The presentation posits species from every continent as present. They did not visit Jerusalem to listen to Peter's preaching about the resurrected Christ. Their visit was an annual pilgrimage for Jewish agricultural feast called 'Pentecost'. Undoubtedly, they were not interested in stories about Christ who as at the period was regarded as an insurrectionist, a brigand and a robber who died infamously. Truly, perception of an unusual sound necessitated their gathering together but staying on to listen to Peter talk about an infamous man and the historical conversion of about three thousand (3000) men (Acts 2,41) invites a sober reflection on the method used by Peter to pass on his message. If the early Christians were able to move the world at a time when Information Technology and pedagogical methods were not so much in vogue, then the method they adopted is worth being studied. The contemporary era is witnessing the decadence of mainline Churches-Catholicism, Anglicanism, Methodist, Presbyterianism, Lutheranism etc. On the other hand, Pentecostalism and Easter Transcendental Meditation have attractions on a geometrical increase. Evidently therefore, the problem is not with man's incredulity or nonacceptance of Christocentric method. The submission of this paper is that the problem lies with our method of presentation. Therefore, this work confines itself in the main to an examination of what used to be the case, a look into the present and a suggestion on the way forward. EXORDIUM This paper begins her taunting and thought-provoking investigations into effective preaching with Overman's (1992) description of the method adopted by our primogenitors in the preaching ministry right at the inception of Christianity. According to him, Christianity engaged and

This article seeks to categorise different forms of Anglican preaching, highlighting the real breadth due to the Liturgical and Reformed context. Proposals are offered for varying strategies demanded by this range of forms, commending an application-driven, extemporaneous style.