The Journey and Promise of African American Preaching


Book Description

The Journey and Promise of African American Preaching is a constructive effort to examine the historical contributions of African American preaching, the challenges it faces today, and how it might become a renewed source of healing and strength for at-risk communities and churches. --from publisher description




The Word Made Plain


Book Description

Preaching mediates the word of God into a cultural matrix. And no American preaching has done so more effectively and powerfully than African American preaching, claims noted homiletician James Harris. Known for its rhetorical strength, social-justice orientation, and dead-on connection to the community's lived experience, black preaching is here analyzed and proposed as a model for all preaching. Harris grounds black preaching in the self-understanding of the historic black church and its most prominent preachers, from Martin Luther King Jr. to Samuel Proctor. Harris also explores the hermeneutical and aesthetic dimensions of preaching, especially at the intersection of sacred text and the broader culture. He then lays out the specific distinguishing characteristics of black preaching, including verbal cadence and rhythm, use of gestures, and, most thoroughly, the narrative model of the sermon. His last chapter, ''Preaching Plainly, '' provides specific instructions on how to put the sermon together employing this model.




Preaching Promise withing the Paradoxes of Life


Book Description

Paradoxes have become characteristic of the world we live in - poverty and privilege, empire and oppression, migration and enclaveseeking, war and peace, justice and injustice, reconciliation and revenge. During the 2016 Societas Homiletica annual conference held in South Africa, these paradoxes served as a rediscovery of the calling of preachers to deliver the promise that lies within life's contradictions. A divine promise brought forth by the grace of God and the gospel of Christ - embodied in and through us by the Spirit of Christ. This promise may take many forms and calls for discernment and often interrupts the status quos in surprising, shocking ways. It is a promise that interrupts, in order to comfort.




The Promise-Plan of God


Book Description

What is the central theme of the Bible?Given the diversity of authorship, genre, and context of the Bible’s various books, is it evenpossible to answer such a question? Or in trying to do so, is an external grid being unnaturallysuperimposed on the biblical text?These are difficult questions that the discipline of biblical theology has struggled to answer.In this thoroughly revised and expanded edition of his classic Toward an Old Testament Theology,Walter Kaiser offers a solution to these unresolved issues. He proposes that there is indeeda unifying center to the theology and message of the Bible that is indicated and affirmed byScripture itself. That center is the promise of God. It is one all-encompassing promise of lifethrough the Messiah that winds itself throughout salvation history in both the Old and NewTestaments, giving cohesiveness and unity to the various parts of Scripture.After laying out his proposal, Kaiser works chronologically through the books of both testaments,demonstrating how the promise is seen throughout, how the various sub-themesof each book relate to the promise, and how God’s plan to fulfill the promise progressivelyunfolds. Here is a rich and illuminating biblical theology that will stir the emotion and theintellect.




Providence


Book Description

New from Best-Selling Author John Piper From Genesis to Revelation, the providence of God directs the entire course of redemptive history. Providence is "God's purposeful sovereignty." Its extent reaches down to the flight of electrons, up to the movements of galaxies, and into the heart of man. Its nature is wise and just and good. And its goal is the Christ-exalting glorification of God through the gladness of a redeemed people in a new world. Drawing on a lifetime of theological reflection, biblical study, and practical ministry, pastor and author John Piper leads us on a stunning tour of the sightings of God's providence—from Genesis to Revelation—to discover the allencompassing reality of God's purposeful sovereignty over all of creation and all of history. Piper invites us to experience the profound effects of knowing the God of all-pervasive providence: the intensifying of true worship, the solidifying of wavering conviction, the strengthening of embattled faith, the toughening of joyful courage, and the advance of God's mission in this world.




Hope in Times of Fear


Book Description

The Resurrection accounts of Jesus in the Gospels are the most dramatic and impactful stories ever told. One similarity unites each testimony--that none of his most loyal and steadfast followers could "see" it was him, back from the dead. The reason for this is at the very foundation of the Christian faith. She turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus. (John 20:14) Hope in the Time of Fear is a book that unlocks the meaning of Jesus's resurrection for readers. Easter is considered the most solemn and important holiday for Christians. It is a time of spiritual rebirth and a time of celebrating the physical rebirth of Jesus after three days in the tomb. For his devoted followers, nothing could prepare them for the moment they met the resurrected Jesus. Each failed to recognize him. All of them physically saw him and yet did not spiritually truly see him. It was only when Jesus reached out and invited them to see who he truly was that their eyes were open. Here the central message of the Christian faith is revealed in a way only Timothy Keller could do it--filled with unshakable belief, piercing insight, and a profound new way to look at a story you think you know. After reading this book, the true meaning of Easter will no longer be unseen.




Everything You Need


Book Description

Do you feel unprepared to be a difference maker in the world? In Everything You Need, New York Times bestselling author and beloved Bible teacher Dr. David Jeremiah equips you with eight critical tools from God’s Word to empower you to live confidently, act boldly, and never stumble. Are you searching for greater confidence, purpose, and peace in your life? Are the distractions and pressures of this world weighing you down? If you’re overwhelmed, there’s help at your fingertips—help that will give you everything you need to walk life’s journey with resilience and strength. In Everything You Need, bestselling author and Bible teacher Dr. David Jeremiah uses 2 Peter 1:3–11 to show you the path to spiritual and personal transformation through some of the critical tools the Lord provides—diligence, virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, kindness, and love—to help you live boldly and confidently. Dr. Jeremiah also highlights the extraordinary resources God has already provided for your growth: His divine power and precious promises. Everything You Need contains: Specific ways to take your divine gifts and develop eight remarkable character qualities Inspiring stories and practical truth to help you walk and work with confidence as a member of God’s kingdom Knowledge to strengthen you to soar above your circumstances and make the most of every opportunity It’s time to unpack all that God has provided and take your next step toward a life of confidence in His promises. You already have everything you need!




Preaching Must Die!


Book Description

The real question for homiletics in our increasingly postmodern, post-Christian contexts is not how we are going to prevent preaching from dying, but how we are going to help it die a good death. Preaching was not made to live. At most, preaching is a witness, a sign, a crimson X marking a demolition site. The church has developed sophisticated technologies in modernity to give preaching the semblance of life, belying the truth: preaching was born under a death sentence. It was born to die. Only when preaching embraces its own death is it able to live. This book, then, is a bold homiletical manifesto against preaching in support of preaching, and beyond preaching to the entire worship experience. It troubles modern homiletical theologies in light of the trouble always already at work within preaching. Hereby, it supports a way of preaching--and teaching preaching--that moves counter to the "wisdom of this world." It aims to joins in God‘s self-revealed counterlogic of superabundance that saturates and thereby breaks open worldly systems of thought and practice. The purpose of this book is to expose preaching to its own death-to help it embrace its death-so that it can discover what eternal and abundant life might look and feels like.




According to Promise


Book Description

Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. – 2 Corinthians 7:1 The first part of this book is meant to be a sieve to separate the chaff from the wheat. Use it on your own soul. It may be the most profitable and beneficial work you have ever done. He who looked into his accounts and found that his business was losing money was saved from bankruptcy. This may happen also to you. If, however, you discover that your heavenly business is prospering, it will be a great comfort to you. You cannot lose by honestly searching your own heart. The second part of this book examines God's promises to His children. The promises of God not only exceed all precedent, but they also exceed all imitation. No one has been able to compete with God in the language of liberality. The promises of God are as much above all other promises as the heavens are above the earth.




Signs of Promise


Book Description