Book Review: Stories by Willimon

Stories by Willimon

Author: William H. Willimon

Publisher: Abingdon Press, paperback, 251 pages

Reviewed by Rev. Garth Wehrfritz-Hanson

Will Willimon needs no introduction to many preachers and professors of homiletics—especially here in North America. In addition to his life as a preacher and professor, Willimon is also a prolific writer, having published over 65 books, and thousands of periodical essays, and blog posts. He has also served as a popular keynote speaker at numerous clergy study conferences. 

Contents

This volume consists of a Forward; Part One: Sowers; Part Two: Seeds; Part Three: Senses; Part Four: Secrets; Story Title Index; Scripture Index, Theme Index; and Credits. The volume is a collection from a variety of Willimon’s writings from various sources over the years.

Willimon’s writings include—among other genres: sermons, theology, humour, prophetic exhortations, satire, fiction, personal reflections/autobiography, lament, and more. 

The following examples, one from each part, hopefully inspire readers of this brief review to purchase or borrow this volume from the library.

In Part One: Sowers, here is a brief citation from Willimon’s advice to someone who, in a letter, asked him how to preach like him. The piece is titled “So, You Want to Preach?” Willimon advises: “So, you want to preach? Fall in love with words. Collect clichés and burn them. Read all the plays (sonnets too) of Shakespeare. Poach from the poems of Yeats, consume the short stories of O’Connor. Fall in love, and out again. Be in pain. Get lost. Roam. Come back home. Get saved. In sin, be bold. Gape at your people when doing visitation. Listen to their lives, their lies, their dreams, their hopes. Keep notes. Listen. Attend one of our first-rate theology schools (pp. 20-21).” 

In Part Two: Seeds, Willimon tells a brilliant parable titled, “Teach ‘em a Lesson.” The parable’s main character is a successful, yet merciless business leader, chair of his church’s board, Chamber of Commerce, and Rotary. After he dies, God the Judge commands: “Forgive him! It’ll teach him a lesson (p. 50).”

In Part Three: Senses, Willimon, in a sermon he preached at Duke University Chapel on December 7, 1986, titled “Jews and Christians, All in the Family,” re-tells Luke 15:1-32. He concludes: “The younger brother had succeeded in locking out his brother, he had the whole house to himself, but alas, he had locked out his loving father as well (p. 122).”

In Part Four: Secrets, Willimon humours readers in his piece titled “Feedback,” in which he shares from his collection of responses to his writing. “Criticism of liberal theology won me this fusillade: No Dr. Willimon, we will not march back into the dark ages of narrow-mindedness, bigotry, and closed thinking. If I had my ways, you would be banished from the pages of every church magazine, defrocked and silenced. Just imagine what he would do to me if he weren’t open-minded” (p. 208). 

For preachers—and others—who love stories, this volume will humour, inspire, offend, encourage, critique, challenge, instruct, affirm and more. 

Book Review: One Hundred Tons Of Ice

One Hundred Tons Of Ice and Other Gospel Stories

Author: Lawrence Wood

Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press, paperback, 184 pages, including Credits, Bibliography, and Notes

Reviewed by Rev. Garth Wehrfritz-Hanson

The Author

At the time of publication, Lawrence Wood was pastor of Fremont United Methodist Church in Fremont, Michigan. Previously he served in Harbor Springs and Alanson, Michigan. He is a graduate of Northwestern University and Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary. His writing has appeared in The Christian Century. He is currently senior minister at St. Andrew by the Sea, a community church in Gulf Shores, Alabama. 

Contents

This volume begins with a section entitled Overture, followed by four parts: Summer, Fall, Winter, Spring. Each of these four parts contains several chapters. The chapters are thematic in nature, and the chapter titles often reveal the theme. Here are a couple of examples: In Summer, one title is Dixon, Illinois. In Fall, one title is the Peaceable Kingdom, which also includes a black and white image of the familiar painting of the same name by artist Edward Hicks. 

A Few Brief Examples

In Overture, Wood begins with a wonderful story about a couple and their Newfoundland dog surviving an episode of falling into ice-cold water after the ice they were on gave way. Afterwards, the husband became more cognizant of the holy in the ordinary stuff of life. Wood then goes on to cite a quotation from an insightful ninety year old layperson: “The last book of the Bible is still being written, and I’d like to add a verse or two.” Wood then suggests: “Maybe that is what preaching is all about—telling the sacred story of our own day.” (p. 2) 

In Summer, Wood shares a story about actor Fred Astaire and commercial exploitation. Another story I’d never heard of relates how “The Great Molasses Flood” (pp. 34-35) was a disaster killing and injuring many.

In Fall, Wood tells the story of Mr. Jefferson’s Bible and the Jesus Seminar—both of which decided what sayings and doings of Jesus were authentic, ending up with much different Gospels than those in the canon. We need the variety found in our canonical Bible. In Jesus and Mrs. Fish, Wood tells the story of the affluent Mrs. Stuyvesant Fish. She was not impressed with high society and ostentation, yet she extravagantly entertained them. She epitomized the greed of “more is never enough,” saying: “We’re not really rich. We have only a few million.” (p. 88)

In Winter, Wood ponders the question, what did Jesus look like? He includes the legend of Veronica’s handkerchief image of Jesus’ face; the legend of the Shroud of Turin; Michelangelo’s Jesus; French painter Leon Lhermitte’s portrait of Jesus; and Warner Sallman’s familiar portrait of Jesus. Wood concludes: “We are created in the image of God and are called to be the body of Christ, and believe it or not, that is his true likeness.” (p. 116) In the book’s title story, One Hundred Tons of Ice, readers will discover the story of “the Ice King,” (p. 142) Frederic Tudor, and where he sold the ice. It is a story of “one person’s ‘junk’ is another person’s treasure.” Everyone and everything is useful to God. 

In Spring, Wood includes a story called Here Today, in which readers learn about John James Audubon and his encounter with what he estimated were one billion passenger pigeons in 1813. By 1914, the last bird died in the Cincinnati Zoo, making the species extinct. The Old Rugged Cross, as the title suggests, relates the story of the hymn’s origins. Wood also reflects on Simon of Cyrene carrying Jesus’ cross as well as the would-be followers of Jesus carrying their crosses. 

Pastor Wood shares some priceless stories in this volume—stories that are endorsed by Professors Thomas G. Long, David Buttrick, and William H. Willimon on the back cover. Highly recommended to preachers and others who love stories. 

Food for thought for preachers

The following quotations on preaching are from renowned professor of homiletics, Tom Long:

1 “Every 50-75 years, preaching in North America has a nervous breakdown.”

2 “Nothing invigorates preaching like having something to say.”

3 “Good preaching is hard work done under pressure.”

Book Review: Best Advice for Preaching

Best Advice for Preaching

Author: Edited by John S. McClure

Publisher: Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998

170 pages, ISBN 0-8006-2997-3, Paperback

Reviewed by Rev. Garth Wehrfritz-Hanson

For starters, a confession: I’ve been rather tardy in reading this work and reviewing it, even though it has sat on my bookshelf for several years now.

   This volume, edited by Professor John S. McClure, is a compendium on the art and craft of preaching in the late twentieth century North American context, from an ecumenical perspective. The contributors are clergy and professors from most of the mainline Protestant and Roman Catholic denominations. Altogether, there are twenty-seven contributors.

   The book has a well-organized structure, consisting of a preface, and ten chapters. The chapter titles are as follows: 1. The Calling of the Preacher; 2. Getting a Message; 3. Patterns in Sermons; 4. Collecting Supportive Material; 5. Organizing Material; 6. Polishing the Sermon; 7. What to Do while Preaching; 8. Coordinating with the Rest of the Service; 9. Feedback; 10. Essential Resources for Preaching. Each chapter was organized by a homiletician, begins with a brief introduction, followed by the following sections: Goals, Instructions, Things Encouraged And Discouraged, Best Answers to Questions, Conclusion, and Bibliography. Some of these chapter sections may also have sub-sections.

   Even though one contributor organized the chapters, there are an abundance of quotations from other professors and clergy in each chapter. Readers will find themselves inspired and most likely even provoked by these quotations; which may well lead preachers to further dialogue, debate, study and practice.

   Here are three examples of quotations cited: In chapter three, Patterns in Sermons, organized by Professor Thomas G. Long, he cites the following quotation from William Sloane Coffin: “It is a good idea to keep making fresh what is familiar. For example, preach a series on the Lord’s Prayer, the Sunday liturgy, or the Twenty-Third Psalm.” (p. 49)

   Chapter five, Organizing Material, organized by Professor John S. McClure cites the following quotation from Barbara Lundblad: “I encourage preachers to be guided by the form of the Scripture itself. Scripture offers at least the following shapes: visual images, narratives, parables, letters, prayers, songs, conversations, laments, teachings, oracles, visions, and more.” (p. 70)

   The catchy title of chapter seven, What to Do while Preaching, organized by Professor Mitties McDonald de Champlain, cites the following quotation from Fred Craddock: “Once the sermon begins, the total self becomes servant of that message—the voice, the face, the hands, the mind, the emotions, the imagination. All one is and has is burned as fuel in the preaching. One is aware of everything and of nothing. The message is delivered by re-experiencing it in public, and when it is finished, one is both exhausted and exhilarated.” (p. 115)

   After reading the final chapter, Essential Resources for Preaching, organized by Professor Thomas E. Ridenhour—I realized how dated this volume is. Although Professor Ridenhour offers some excellent resources for preaching, nonetheless since 1998, when this work was published, there has come into the forefront a wealth of resource material for preaching on the Internet—none of which the author cites in this chapter.

   In conclusion, I do recommend this volume, with the qualifier that it needs to be remembered there are limitations for contemporary preachers insofar as the work omits significant resources widely available online.

     

  

Rev. Gardner C. Taylor died on Easter Sunday

One of the distinguished preachers in the English language, The Rev. Dr. Gardner C. Taylor, died on April 5, 2015-Easter Sunday. He was an important mentor for Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., as well as for many white preachers. Read the whole thing and watch a PBS video here. 

My New Ebook

Today I am "self-publishing my new ebook, Salt for Sermons. Check it out at the page link above.

Homiletics professor and preacher Fred Craddock dies

One of the outstanding homiletics professors and preachers of the twentieth and early twenty-first century, Fred Craddock, has recently died at 86 years of age. 

   He was a creative teacher and preacher, who emphasized what became known as “inductive preaching.” This form of preaching involved the listeners to make their own conclusions concerning the ending of the sermon, which Craddock often left open-ended. Craddock was a master at story-telling—I highly recommend his book of anecdotes called Craddock Stories. Since he often told stories and parables, he was also regarded as an inspirational model of "narrative preaching." 

   I never had the privilege of meeting him in person or studying under him. However, I have viewed a couple of videos of him available online—you can Google his name to find them. What I like about him is his folksy, down-to-earth style, and his southern U.S. drawl. He truly was a servant of God who blessed and inspired many a preacher and parishioner. LORD rest eternal grant your servant Fred Craddock. 

   Perhaps the following video will inspire you in your preaching (if you’re a preacher), as well as encourage you in your faith journey.