Abstract
Two recently published books of sermons focused on Old Testament texts offer contrasting and yet complementary approaches to the task.
The collection of sermons and prayers by Walter Brueggemann was first published in hardback in 2004, and has now appeared in this paperback edition. It consists of 26 poems/prayers; a paper on the Preacher as Scribe; 23 sermons preached at various locations; and a helpful index of biblical references.
The chapter with which the book opens offers a hermeneutic lens through which the later sermons may be read. Here, preaching is defined as truth speaking to power, and four biblical confrontations are offered as examples: Moses to Pharoah; Nathan to David; Elijah to Ahab; Daniel to Nebuchadnezzar. Each story is considered in context and thoroughly exegeted, before the obvious preacherly move of telling the audience to follow the example of these characters is turned on its head and the problematic aspects of applying the model ‘truth-speaking-to-power’ are acknowledged. These include the pragmatic tension involved in having a job, perhaps in ministry which has both preaching and administrative duties, which demands in most cases the wielding of power of some sort. But it also includes the postmodern suspicion of the categories of truth and power, and problematic task of identifying where each of these lies. For Brueggemann, the solution lies in recovering the notion of the Bible as text, and these stories of confrontation as textual rather than historical or factual. The imagination of scribes distances us from the actuality of events: the act of ‘scribal refraction’ recreates something which has theological value for later readers. The task of the preacher is to share in this task and to ‘re-text’ the community to which the sermon is addressed: the preacher’s job is to ‘keep that confrontation between truth and power alive and available to the community through acts of textual interpretation and imagination’ (p. 13). It is also to point to the key character in all of these dramas, God himself.
To do this, the preacher must be immersed in the text and confident the text is the word of life. He or she must also be aware of the potentially damaging and damaged presuppositions about the text which his or her audience brings to the hearing of the sermon, and attend to them in the engagement between text and what is said about it. Truth may speak to power through texts, but not through the preacher simply advocating the truth of what is stated in the text. Rather, the preacher is to take on the function of a ‘pastoral therapist’, trusting the text to speak to the age-old needs, illusions and repressions of its hearers, through the power of the Spirit. The scribe allows old texts to become new songs for people longing for a new way to be, without haranguing or scolding. In the example of Nathan speaking to David, Nathan offers David relief from the burden of his belief that he was immune from the givenness of the Torah, rather than harsh judgement. Through careful engagement with the text, ‘the Preacher-Scribe invites the congregation to ponder the deep voicing of failure, the givenness of Torah, the costly way of forgiveness, and the wonder of beginning again in a post-forgiveness life’ (p. 15). The Preacher-Scribe, for Brueggemann, carries a heavy responsibility thus to retext his or her community, so the church may be free and filled with hope and courage.
Before we assess Brueggemann’s theory of preaching as it is demonstrated in his sermons, we turn to the Introduction of Fleming Rutledge’s recent collection of sermons preached from 1975 to 2010 on Old Testament texts. Here are offered fifty-five sermons on texts from Genesis to Malachi, many, but by no means all, preached at Grace Church, New York where Rutledge served for 14 years. In her Introduction, Rutledge asserts the need in modern preaching to recover the revelatory declaration that runs throughout the Old Testament: ‘Thus says the Lord’. For her, the Old Testament is to be understood as the ‘operating system’ behind the New Testament; and while the Old Testament cannot but be read by Christians in light of the Christ event, nevertheless the Old Testament must be allowed to speak for itself and reveal ‘a comprehensive view of who God is’ (p. 4). For Rutledge, while the Jewishness of Jesus has been rediscovered in New Testament scholarship, the understanding of God offered in the Old Testament- notions of the election of Israel, the righteousness of God as both noun and verb, the jealousy of God and his role as Lawgiver- have been neglected in preaching.
After addressing practical concerns such as the tension between lectionary-based preaching and expository preaching of a whole biblical book, Rutledge turns to discuss the role of the hearer of the Old Testament. Like Brueggemann, she advocates a move away from rational literal mindedness. Quoting Ellen Davis, she encourages an imaginative approach which is open to ‘the strange new world of the text’ (p. 19). The preacher’s role is to allow him or herself to be reshaped by this strange new world and its revelation of God, rather than imposing his or her own worldview onto the text. Again following Davis, Rutledge warns against the sort of preaching which takes a ‘heroic’, prophetic stance towards the text, potentially excluding some of his or her hearers, and instead recommends an ‘ironic’ approach. This foregrounds the preacher’s uncertainties and ambiguities, and places trust in God alone, rather than the cleverness or certainty of the preacher. The position taken is not one of authority over the hearer or the text, but as a channel of the Word. This approach, argues Rutledge, ‘is not in the least sentimental or evasive, but addresses the core of human existence’ (p. 20)- a position similar to although not identical with Brueggemann’s vision of preacher as ‘pastoral therapist’ or ‘preacher-scribe’. Where she perhaps places a different emphasis from Brueggemann is in her rejection of Bible study as an invitation ‘to go deeply into ourselves’ (p. 23). Rather, the Word of God is a source of wonder and amazement, coming from outwith and beyond the hearer: and can only be accessed when the text is interrogated for what it says, rather than what is says to us. The difference in stress should not be overplayed, but is significant.
Space does not permit analysis of a wide range of the sermons on offer in both books, but a comparison of two sermons preached on the same text may be illuminating. Brueggemann’s sermon on the story of the widow of Zarephath (1 Kings 17.8-16) was preached to a Presbyterian Church in Pennsylvania in 2000, and is entitled ‘Disciples of the Great Connector’. Rutledge’s sermon on the same text was preached ‘in a prominent, prosperous church in a university town’ (p. 138) in 2003, and is entitled ‘The Little Church in the Wilderness’.
Brueggemann begins by drawing comparisons between the context of the text and today: one of ‘anxious, fearful scarcity’ (p. 71). He signals that this story offers traces of an alternative reality that might change even the lives of its modern day hearers. For into the desperate situation of the woman, Elijah brings news of God’s abundance- and then demonstrates it. But the sermon does not end with that proclamation. The oddness of the story is highlighted, the call to Elijah to leave all he knew and find ‘a nameless widow from an unknown village in enemy territory’ (p. 73). The context in which the sermon was preached, just after a presidential election in which school vouchers, Social Security and healthcare provision were issues of debate, is brought into dialogue with the situation of this woman, with the comment that ‘the God of the Bible is like that, a magnet for the ones who drop off of the royal screen’ (p. 73). The unthinkable has happened here, preaches Brueggemann: the abundance of God overrides the deep scarcity of this one woman. And from here, this story, he argues that in God’s kingdom, material abundance may override the pervading anxious scarcity in which many live: and the message is aimed at those who have least. He then goes on to argue that in order to meet need with fullness, there has to be human connectors, such as Elijah. In practical ways, the hearers of this sermon are invited to become such connectors, to ‘give up the tired assumptions of the old, failed Kings of Israel, to sign on for a reoriented world of abundance for the vulnerable by human connection’ (p. 75). The ‘wonder of conviction’ awaits his hearers’ response, and the connection is strengthened by the drawing in of the story of the widow giving her mite in the temple, watched by Jesus (Mark 12.38-44). Jesus, in v.44, verbally connects the profligate ‘abundance’ of the wealthy with the situation of the ‘widow’, who has nevertheless contributed what she had. Brueggemann closes with the observation that Jesus ‘is the great connector…and we are his disciples in making connections’ (p. 75).
In Rutledge’s sermon on the same text, the style is much more conversational. After a personal reminiscence, the character of Elijah is discussed and exegeted at length: he is defined by the fact that he ‘thinks big and acts big’ (p. 139), but he acts on behalf of God rather than on behalf of those in the world with power. His experience in the wilderness is a test of his ‘authenticity as a man of God’ (p. 141), as is his willingness to go to enemy territory and to depend in his need on a penniless widow. Quoting a sermon by the nineteenth century preacher F.W. Krummacher, Rutledge extols the role of divine providence in bringing the prophet and the widow together in this dangerous place. The widow herself renews Elijah’s faith, by witnessing to the Lord God, and through this, he discerns God’s plan and ability to take a small amount of food and multiply it to meet the needs of others beyond their imagining. The picture evoked by Krummacher is of the formation of ‘a little church in the wilderness’ (p. 142): the faith of the widow and Elijah leads to them sharing the insights of divine wisdom together, even seeing ahead to the coming of the Christ.
Rutledge offers out of this rather startling image a personal message to the prominent and prosperous church she is addressing, which she labels a ‘little church in the wilderness’. She draws on her experience of the American church scene to warn that the country is in danger of ‘losing its soul’ (p. 143). The problem is that Elijah’s God, the one of whom he proclaims ‘As the Lord of Israel lives, before whom I stand’, is no longer preached or believed. The active agency of the living God is rarely evoked, and instead it is human activity which is placed in the centre. ‘The problem is that we start thinking that this human activity is what drives the engine of the church. The living God of Elijah does not seem to be in view’ (p. 144). However, the church at which the sermon was preached, Rutledge assures her hearers, has the potential to make a difference on two grounds. Here there is a tradition of preaching which is theological and biblical, taking seriously the Living God and his Word; and allied to this there is a tradition of active involvement in the social needs of the world. In the combination of these traditions lies the potential to uphold the word of God to those in power in the world. In this ‘little church in the wilderness’ is represented both the public face of the church, in the model of Elijah; and the quiet, day to day face of the church, in the model of the widow. And through the working together of both, God makes a difference in the world.
Both sermons are powerful and undoubtedly speak to their contexts. Perhaps the major difference between them, which is in line with the introductory comments of each book, is the emphasis placed on the agency of God. Both relate the text to the experience of their hearers, although Brueggemann is more explicit about the connections between the reimagined, existential context of the text and the congregation addressed. For him, the message is one of transformation of individuals through action; while for Rutledge the primary message is that God does intervene in situations of crisis- although a response is expected. The two preachers come to the text from a different angle, and the resulting sermons have overlapping concerns, very different styles and leave the hearer in a different place. However, both take the text of the Old Testament very seriously indeed and, for this, all fellow preachers should be grateful and inspired.