Crossing
Bridges (Preaching)
Barbara
Brown Taylor, Paul Scott Wilson, and Luther
Scripture:
Acts 17:16-34
Paul,
being Paul, refuses to lie low, even when he really should. Instead, he finds
the busiest place he could, and mixes it up with the philosophers offering up
their truths on the open market. There, spitting their philosophy, are
Epicureans, who among other things avoid and deride superstition, and Stoics,
who speak of the unity of all people and kinship with God. It is worth noting
the location of this marketplace, the Hill of Ares. This hill is associated
with the first trial, where Ares is acquitted of killing another god’s son,
though he was in fact guilty.
In this
saturated marketplace of ideas, Paul is misunderstood. Folks hear him describing
Jesus’ resurrection, and think he’s telling them about two gods, Jesus and his
consort, Resurrection.
I put
all of these pieces onto the table, because the author of Acts wants us to see
how, after the crowd’s initial misapprehension of Paul’s proclamation
(resurrection as a goddess) Paul builds bridges with his listeners.
He
quotes two different philosophers and a poet. He shows the Stoics a point of
agreement, we are all God’s sons, and relativizes the idols, something that the
Epicureans might have approved of. Then, he even uses the geography to point to
Christ. Here, the King of War, guilty of murder, is none the less found innocent
of killing another god’s son, but what Paul proclaims is something stranger
still, God’s son, the Prince of Peace, innocent of all wrongdoings, found guilt
and executed.
The
Bridge:
There is a space between text and
context, the Scriptures and our life in the Year of Our Lord 2024. One of the
tasks of the faith is moving the bible into the heart of the reader and the
hearer. For example, if I was preaching the above section of scripture from
Acts to all of you, I might take some time to consider what a modern-day
Epicurean or Stoic looks like, what stories we might tell that are highly
charged mirror images of the Christ story. All this to speak the Gospel in
idioms that you understand, to prepare the soil for the Spirit to gather the Gospel
in your heart. So, today we’ll look at how three thinkers, Barbara Brown Taylor, Paul Scott Wilson, and Luther, conceive
of the Bible crossing into our day to day through preaching.
From The
Preaching Life:
“No
other modern public speaker does what the preacher tries to do. The trial
attorney has glassy photographs and bagged evidence to hand around; the teacher
has blackboards and overhead projectors; the politician has brass bands and
media consultants. All the preacher has is words. Climbing into the pulpit
without ropes or sound effects, the preacher speaks—for ten or twenty or thirty
minutes—to people who are used to being communicated with in very different
ways. Most of the messages in our culture are sent and received in thirty seconds
or less and no image on a television screen lasts more than twenty, yet a
sermon requires sustained and focused attention. If the topic is not appealing,
there are no other channels to be tried. If a phrase is missed, there is no replay
button to be pressed. The sermon counts on listeners who will stay tuned to a
message that takes time to introduce, develop, and bring to a conclusion.
Listeners, for their part, count on a sermon that will not waste the time they
give to it.”—Barbara Brown Taylor
Think of the Preacher’s improbable
hope, with nothing more than the spoken word, we’ll cross this bridge from
scripture to the hearer’s soul!
“Most of us would be hard pressed on Sunday morning to say
whether we are in church because we believe or because we want to believe. Like
the father of the epileptic boy in Mark’s Gospel, we do both: “I believe; help
my unbelief!” (9:24) The preacher balances on the round top of the semicolon
along with the rest of the world. I cannot preach without belief, but neither
can I preach without some experience of unbelief. Both are built into the human
experience of the divine, and each tests the strength of the other. The
movement of the sermon, like the movement of Christ in the world, is meant to
lead from doubt to faith. We may begin by knocking on God’s door, unsure
whether anyone is now or has ever been at home, but when the door opens and we
are led inside, doubt becomes moot. Our host takes it from us and hangs it in
the closet with the dustpan and galoshes.”—Barbara Brown Taylor
Part of
crossing this bridge is a movement from doubt to faith, unbelief to belief.
You’ll know you’ve reached the other side because the claims of the Faith are
believable, if not forever, if not for everyone, at least in the moment, for
the day. We’ve been given belief for the day, our Daily Bread even. This is a
continual movement, and that’s okay. Unbelief is not a sign of unfaithfulness, but
part of the journey of faith. “I believe; help my unbelief.”
“Something happens between the preacher’s lips and the
congregation’s ears that is beyond prediction or explanation. The same sermon
sounds entirely different at 9:00 and 11:15 A.M. on a Sunday morning. Sermons
that make me weep leave my listeners baffled, and sermons that seem cold to me
find warm responses. Later in the week, someone quotes part of my sermon back
to me, something she has found extremely meaningful—only I never said
it.”—Barbara Brown Taylor
Two things
to point out here.
1. Context! Even the different composition of parishioners
from 9 and 11:15 worship is enough to make the word hit differently. The
hearers have to be considered when preaching—that bridge must be crossed.
2. Ultimately it is God’s doing. Sure the preacher can and
must do the hard exegetical work of understanding the text and the context, but
the bridging of the two has something ephemeral and mysterious to it. I never
said it, but it was heard!
What the
Word does:
For Lutherans the Word
acts in two ways, as Law and as Gospel. As a caveat, Hebrew Scripture can be
experienced as Gospel just as much as the Greek New Testament can be
experienced as Law.
For that
matter, within worship the Word is administered in the reading of scripture and
preaching of it, as well as during the Confession of the Church and in communal
prayer as well. This connection between the sermon and confession and prayer
tells us something important about the sermon. The sermon is the preacher’s
confession at that time and that place, preached on the edge of prayer; this is
why preaching someone else’s sermon is not only ineffective, but slaughters the soul.
So, you
will know that text has met context when it is experienced as Law and Gospel. But
what does that look like?
We
experience scripture as Law in two ways, as a mirror and as a window. As a
Mirror it is a device that shows us ourselves, warts and all. We are stuck by
the reality that we have fallen short, that we are in fact sinners. As a Window
scripture allows us to look out at the world and notice injustices and ways
malice is not being restrained.
We experience scripture as Gospel when
we receive it as a love letter. Just as the Mirror showed us as we are, the
Gospel shows God as God is; God is the one who loves us and will never abandon
us, who will die for us so that we might live with God.
Connecting
Word and World:
Paul Scott
Wilson gives an interesting way of constructing a Law/Gospel sermon, to ensure
that text meets context. It is a four-part sermon structure.
First, an experience of the text as Law, or Trouble in
Wilson’s language. Then, the preacher points to an analogous type of trouble in
the world is lifted up for the congregation.
Third, the preacher points to the text speaking a word of
love and mercy, Grace in the Text, as Wilson calls it. Then, finally, in a move
parallel to the move from Trouble in the Text to Trouble in the World, the
preacher proclaims a sighting of Grace in the World.
Conclusion:
So, putting
it all together: using the weak medium of words, translating Scripture to a
variety of audiences, the faithful are regularly moved from doubt to faith. This
is not the preacher’s doing, but the Holy Spirit’s.
The Word, read,
preached, confessed, and prayed, is experienced by the hearer as a Mirror and
Window, as well as a Love Letter.
One method of preaching a solid Law/Gospel sermon is to
point out where there is trouble and grace in word and world.
