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Back in the early 90s I wrote a paper for a PhD seminar titled, “Narrative Exposition.” Frustrated with the polarity that dominated homiletics, I made the audacious claim that narrative and exposition did not need to be positioned on opposite sides of a continuum but the two could, in fact, be integrated. My thesis was met somewhat skeptically. Now with the publication of Calvin Miller’s Preaching, I feel a sense of vindication.
This is a wonderful book. Miller, has written many wonderful books about preaching, but I expect that this one will become his legacy. The renewed emphasis upon narrative in the homiletic literature these last many years has been welcome, but it is in the combination of word and image, narrative and exposition, that we find the most hopeful way forward.
Miller offers an education in preaching rich in reality. Miller models what he speaks of. In keeping with his emphasis upon proposition and story, Miller teaches the homiletic steps and propositions through use of his vast personal experience in the pulpit and the classroom. The book is rich in both stimulating ideas as well as stories that deepen and delight.
Miller has always been a great writer. His use of language has a way of surprising as it stimulates a profound way of thinking about the task. While it makes for great reading, I’m not sure it serves so well as example. Miller does his best to teach his readers how to work the words, but I fear that most of us might miss the mark. Miller is a one-off, which is to say that his eloquence, cultivated from a lifelong enthusiasm for art and literature, will not be easily reproduced by others. Nor should it be. Preachers need to find their own voice.
On that level, Miller’s work will be helpful. All of us can learn to be more imaginative within our own personalities. We can all become more creative, finding ways to introduce our left brains to our right. Miller says, “Great preaching is a mind-set which allows the preacher to see that storytelling is godly and effective, and any attempt to minimize the importance of story as an illustration of the all-important, almighty proposition is to misunderstand the importance of the art given to all great communicators. Precept and story share equally in comprising the sermon’s communique. Both of them work together in preparing and preaching the image-driven sermon (151).”
If you haven’t read a book on preaching in a long time, read this one. Your preaching will be better for it.