Synopses & Reviews
Testifies to the presence of God as both our post-earthly hope and our present-world existence.These thought-provoking sermons by Ralph Wood, a layman who has taught religion and literature for many years, seek to till new soil in the fertile field of Christian faith and life. They draw on a wide range of reading not only in Christian theology but also in both classical and contemporary literature and culture. And they also mine Woodżs own professorial and personal experience in dealing with both the old and the young amid "the chances and changes of life."Wood squarely engages the American "culture of death" by wrestling with such vexing questions as sexuality and marriage, war and peace, abortion, racial injustice, and abuse of the elderly. By grounding his homilies in specific times, places, and quandaries, Wood demonstrates that Christianity remains a vigorous set of doctrines and morals precisely as preaching and ethics give shape to our worship and living in the here and now. Focusing not so much on our "getting to heaven," Wood's Preaching and Professing shows concretely how the gospel "gets heaven into us."
Table of Contents
Preaching and hearing -- Introduction: The primacy of preaching in Protestant worship -- Be hearers of the Word and not doers only -- The minister as parson, preacher, and pastor -- Hearing the voice of God -- The church -- "Compel them to come in" : the Gospel as divine command, not consumer choice -- The world's heroes and the church's saints -- A call for a latter-day reformation of the church -- Wrestling Jacob and being named by God -- Suffering and service -- The no-people who have become God's people -- The call of the crucified -- The suffering that makes for character -- Christians as the little ones, the hobbits of the world -- A farewell sermon to a faithful people -- The rock that springs with the water of life -- Doctrine and the moral life -- Christians and Jews : wayfarers through the wasteland -- The scandal of our redemption -- Loud, dogmatic, and certain : good Christian words -- Thou shalt not slay either bodies or souls -- Hurrying toward hell -- Baptism in a coffin -- The Christian year -- Waiting, watching, and enduring to the end -- Jesus as both Savior and Lord -- Hosanna to the King who rides upon a donkey -- This cup -- The call of the cross and the table -- Unwearied hearts ascend -- The vocations of ministry and marriage -- A fiery red-head called to the ministry of word and sacrament -- A rock breaker and a stone builder -- The redeeming comedy of marriage -- A latter-day Rachel and Jacob -- A marriage built on the solid rock -- An unhaloed Mississippian saint -- A man of godly fear and suffering obedience -- Feasting on manna and turnip greens -- A grotesque act of repentance -- A woman whose name and life sparkled -- A teacher who demanded pandemonium -- A man alive while dying -- A woman who waited for the Lord God -- A fearless and funny preacher of the Gospel.