Power in the Pulpit

 

I recently preached a sermon on "Powerful Preaching" from Romans 16:25-27. I was looking for a quote by Jerry Vines in his book Power in the Pulpit. I logged into a digital book service, queried "powerful preaching" and clicked the wrong link.

I opened a book by Liz Shercliff called Preaching Women: Gender, Power and the Pulpit. I was curious and wanted to see what the lady preacher had to say about powerful preaching. I read the book, so you don't have to. 

"This is a book by a woman preacher, for women preachers, about women’s preaching. One of my ambitions is to challenge some traditional thinking and practice.

Thought showers among ministers and those training for ministry tend to focus on themes of teaching, feeding, inspiring, challenging and comforting. At root such models adopt a ‘preacher knows best’ stance. Authority might be attributed on the basis of: knowledge: because the preacher has studied commentaries and read erudite books and worked on the text for some time….

The assumption is that the preacher knows more than their hearers do about the matter in hand. And so preaching becomes the transmission of knowledge from one person, the one who has it, to other people, the ones who don’t. The preacher is at the centre of the preaching model, as disseminator of the word to their hearers. The preacher decides what needs to be said. The preacher chooses what points to make.

It is a patriarchal privileged power paradigm of preaching.

I define preaching as ‘the art of engaging the people of God in their shared narrative by creatively and hospitably inviting them into an exploration of biblical text, by means of which, corporately and individually, they might encounter the divine’. Here, the preacher is host. The table to which people are invited has been carefully laid, taking into account who will be there and what they need. A meal has been carefully selected and meticulously prepared. It is both a communal and a personal event. Guests are welcomed in, conversation will flow – sometimes among just a few, sometimes as community. It will be a unique experience for all."

 

Jerry Vine's book was about powerful preaching, but her book is about power (authority) in the pulpit. She's not in favor of it. Paul, the arch villain of liberals everywhere, said people would be strengthened and changed by preaching in Romans 16:25-27. The Greek word Paul used does not mean "the art of engaging people in their shared narrative," but rather, "that which is proclaimed by a herald or public crier, a proclamation by herald." It doesn't surprise me in the least that a rebellious woman, who chose, as a profession, to rebel against God and His order, redefines preaching in her own image. It's hilarious to me that her woke feministic example of a woman preaching is her in the kitchen making supper.  

"As a woman preacher, I have found the idea of preacher as declarer of truth, possessing words from God to be delivered direct, hard to espouse."

 As a Christian, I found the idea of a lady preacher hard to espouse.

 Doesn't the Bible speak about women being silent in the church in 1 Corinthians, and isn't 2nd Timothy pretty clear on the matter? HA! You would say that wouldn't you. One simply cannot read the Bible and believe what it says. One must insert the text into a historical construct, only then can you understand the text is saying the opposite of what anyone with reading comprehension can clearly see in the text. She finds the idea of a preacher as a declarer of truth a difficult pill to swallow. So rather come to the conclusion that she wasn't made to do the job, she decided it was better to continue her rebellion and twist the scriptures. It's the Bible that must be wrong, not her.

"Paul, on the other hand, was an old-school Pharisee. He had been raised with a patriarchal narrative – he was a Roman citizen, structure and hierarchy were important; he was a Pharisee, keen on racial purity. Perhaps there was more than theological concern alone behind Paul’s instruction. Given that we have only one half of the conversation, it is impossible to put the whole into a context, but I wonder whether we take seriously enough Paul’s call, to both his sisters and brothers, to be mature in thinking: ‘Brothers and sisters, do not be children in your thinking … in thinking be adults (1 Cor. 14.20).

Despite this, by the time the second letter to Timothy was written (at least 60 years after Paul’s death), an imperative against women’s leadership had crystallized. Canonization of the New Testament worked against women, for it came at a time when they had no voice; they were trapped in a vicious circle."

 You don't deny Paul said what he did, you shake your head at his old fashioned notions. Had Paul lived today, I'm sure he would have been more sophisticated. Besides, we don't know what the Corinthian Church asked him, so it's really a mystery. As for Second Timothy, that wasn't Paul (don't read 2 Timothy 1:1) because it disagrees with my paradigm, so it had to be written after the Patriarchy had already got their death grip on the churches.

 "It is not enough to dismiss [the Bible] as hopelessly out of date or irredeemably sexist, as some have done. It will not do to accept some bits but not others. Even if we fail to see it, others will surely notice a lack of integrity in a position that encourages us to ignore some biblical texts while taking others at face value. Taking the Bible at face value, we surely conclude that women should neither lead nor preach. Between these two poles, we must, as women preachers, find a coherent, authentic stance about the Bible."

 At least she is honest about her approach of deception. She uses Christian Feminist Theology as a system to interpret the text. Some of the terms she uses come from Critical Theory. She comes to the Bible as a "victim" of the patriarchy, and filters everything through that context. You read yourself into the Bible and if the Bible disagrees with you, find a way to explain it away, or just blame man, preferably a white man. Don't ignore the Bible, she says, rather reinterpret in a different light.

 Satan didn't deny what God said to Eve, that if she ate the fruit she would die, but he just said God was wrong. Eve had to look at the command of God from a different "power paradigm." God had power and didn't want Eve to have it too. You just have to adjust your way of looking at things, and then do whatever it is you want.

 The only problem with this approach, is it's wrong. Sooner or later, you'll come face to face with the Truth, and give an answer to Him.