Two New Books Helping Me Rethink How I Preach

   Two very different books I’ve read lately have struck me as potentially helpful to me and maybe to you in the vocation of preaching. One is a semi-fictional narrative of a few months in Johann Sebastian Bach’s life, the other by a political speechwriter on great speeches that were, as the title suggests, Undelivered.

   First, on what didn’t get delivered: Jeff Nussbaum has written speeches for dozens of leading politicians in pivotal situations. Undelivered: The Never-Heard Speeches that Would have Rewritten History takes us on a tour of huge speeches that, for various reasons, didn’t get delivered. Eisenhower, if D-Day had failed. JFK, if they had bombed Cuba instead of blockading at sea. Helen Keller’s stinging diatribe on women’s rights. Nixon refusing to resign. Hillary Clinton’s 2016 victory speech. King Edward’s refusal to abdicate the throne. John Lewis’s pre-edited speech from the march on Washington in 1963.

   There is enough illustrative material here to keep a preacher busy for many weeks. But more importantly, Nussbaum explains how speeches are put together, why they work (or don’t) – and thoughtful inquiry into who’s listening, what time it is, when boldness or restraint are called for. How things are structured: his sequence of Attention, Need, Satisfaction, Visualization, Action is more helpful than any I've ever read in preaching manuals. He has an insightful discussion of whether and when we use We or I or You. And attention to little prepositions matters: would John Lewis speak of a march in America, or on America? I kept taking notes to help me rethink how I preach. I wished Nussbaum had taught preaching when I was in school – or today.

    I started with the audiobook, and wished I had the hard copy. But then the audio has real audio of Winston Churchill, John Kennedy, the fiery Emma Goldman. I now own both, and am glad.

   And then a very different read: James Runcie’s fascinating The Great Passion. It’s a novel, but tracking closely with reality. The story of a 13 year old, grieved over his mother’s death, not really wanted by his father, coming to Leipzig to study music. The school’s cantor, J.S. Bach, notices his voice, and takes him in not only as a student but into the Bach family home. It’s sort of a look at how the St. Matthew Passion came together from composition to performance from the perspective of inside the household and among singers and players. That’s how and where preaching comes to be: from somebody who lives in a home with people and situations and weariness and issues.

    A few passages struck me as revelatory for us: “Every time I walked through the streets of the town, I found it strange to contemplate the lives of others going about their daily business, with food to buy, medicines to fetch, debts to collect, money to earn. They were quite unaware of the time, anxiety and dedication we gave to the Passion, or how important we all thought it was.” You’re wrestling a Word from the Lord to the ground as you drive or walk, and no one has a clue. Reminded me a little of Tuesdays with Morrie: on learning of his mortal cancer diagnosis, he looks out the doctor’s window. “Outside, the sun was shining and people were going about their business. A woman ran to put money in the parking meter. Another carried groceries. Morrie was stunned by the normalcy of the day around him. ‘Shouldn’t the world stop? Don’t they know what has happened to me?’”

    The narrative of the Passion’s debut performance feels like my goal in preaching: “The story was the one we all knew. But what the Passion did was to make us feel that it belonged to all of us, here in Leipzig, for the first time. It was not a theological lecture, or a piece of rhetoric, or even an account of an event in the history of Palestine. It had become our story. It was happening now, during this performance, in the present tense, and I could see, on the faces of the congregation below, that they recognized they could do nothing more important than listen because they had become part of it all.” Can my sermon make them feel this story belongs to us, here, now?

    And then, although many citizens weren’t there, “It felt as if all Leipzig was in attendance: saints and sinners, old and young, contents and malcontents, the newly in love and the recently rejected; the disappointed, the forlorn and the forgiving: all God’s creatures, alone and together, hoping that, by listening to this music and being present at this service, they would allay the fear of death and be forgiven their sins and failings.”

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   Check out my book on preaching - not how to preach, but how to continue preaching: The Beauty of the Word: the Challenge and Wonder of Preaching.