William H. Willimon
My prayer on MLK Day: Forgive us the sin of patience
There’s a time for reconciliation, for prayers for unity and healing. This is not such an hour.
Why leaders are a pain: Truth telling in the parish
There's a subtext to lots of sermons I hear, and some I preach: Discomfort is avoidable. Here's my formula. It's the promise of all bogus religion.
When preaching is out of control
I’ll admit it. I like to be in control. I don’t think of myself as a control freak. However, I want there to be a minimum of chaos. On Sunday, for instance, I like to have a general idea of where we are going to be by noon.
It is fine for the Holy Spirit to be invited into our worship, but only to a degree.
The Proust of Norway
Karl Ove Knausgaard forced me to cancel six months of my life in order to fixate on 30 years of his.
Faith Speaking Understanding, by Kevin J. Vanhoozer
Kevin Vanhoozer demonstrates that Christian thought is a more engaging, embodied affair than much that passes for thinking these days.
The Deconstructed Church, by Gerardo Marti and Gladys Ganiel
In The Deconstructed Church, Gerardo Marti and Gladys Ganiel give us a comprehensive and revealing ethnographic study of the worldwide phenomenon known as the emerging Christian movement.
A reply: Resident Aliens at 25
We gather that some of our readers still don't want to talk Christology with us. But it's because of Jesus that the church has trouble in the world.
Invasion of the Dead, by Brian K. Blount
Brian Blount mounts a sweeping plea for bold preaching about the God who invades and routes death. Resurrection, he argues, transforms all of us “living dead” into witnesses.
Lethal prescription
There are few heroes in Sheri Fink's harrowing narrative of overwhelmed health-care workers during and after Hurricane Katrina.
Preaching epiphanies
The story of Jesus, at least the way John tells it, begins unspectacularly. “There was a man sent by God, and his name was John.” What does John do for a living? He is a preacher. We can’t get to Jesus without going through a witness, no epiphany without preaching.
Sunday, January 19, 2014: Isaiah 49:1-7; John 1:29-42
My father-in-law said that when he began ministry six decades ago, pastors were expected to visit the sick, preach and do a little teaching in the congregation....
Obedient faith
Jesus descends into the baptismal waters as an opening act of messianic obedience. Obedience may not be the most glamorous of the Christian virtues, but it’s the one that I’d like to highlight in this Sunday’s account of Jesus’ baptism by John in the Jordan.
Sunday, January 12, 2014: Matthew 3:13-17
When I arrived in Alabama as a Methodist bishop, I asked a distinguished Alabama historian to orient me to my new appointment. He told me a story.
...
The body in question
The two best writers on American ways of death, burial and grieving have given us our best book on funerals.
Interfaith marriage: A reality check
Forty-two percent of U.S. marriages are interfaith. Naomi Schaefer-Riley convinced me that this is one of the biggest stories in religious life.
Making ministry difficult: The goal of seminary
For all their problems, churches are often a good deal more self-critical and boldly innovative than seminaries.
Summoned From the Margin, by Lamin Sanneh
For the last three decades, Lamin Sanneh has been a reliable and perceptive guide for those of us trying to think through interfaith issues, rethink missions and understand Christianity in its global reach. When I discovered Sanneh, I found his angle on Islamic/Christian conversation to be a provocative and refreshing relief from some of the fluff we were getting on that topic. Sanneh’s was also the first voice I heard to renovate the commonly accepted negative view of Christian missions.
God refuses to be God without us
We asked God to say something definite and God,
getting personal, sent Jesus Christ. We were surprised.
The passing of a preacher
When
you enter the Civil Rights Institute in Birmingham—one of Alabama's
great institutions—you are welcomed by Fred Shuttlesworth. You will be
welcomed to this shrine of the Civil Rights Movement by a preacher.
Unexpected Destinations, by Wesley Granberg-Michaelson
What do you get when you take an attractive, intelligent kid born into a loving, happy, Midwestern family and relinquish him for baptism, telling him he is now "engaged to profess Christ"?...