By LeRoy Lawson
A Great Improvisation: Franklin, France, and the Birth of America
Stacy Schiff
New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2005Â
Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places: A Conversation in Spiritual Theology
Eugene Peterson
Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2005
One Year to Better Preaching: 52 Exercises to Hone Your Skills
Daniel Overdorf
Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 2013
Sometimes it pays to look pathetic””or eager””or greedy. I don”t know exactly what my friend saw in my face, but before I left his house that evening he gave me two books. The first was a bit of nonsense featuring a character we both enjoy, John Mortimer”s Rumpole and the Penge Bungalow Murders. A delightful tale of the brilliant but eccentric English barrister Horace Rumpole, husband of “she who must be obeyed,” but not of sufficient dignity to be critiqued on these pages.
The other, though, was. Stacy Schiff”s A Great Improvisation: Franklin, France, and the Birth of America offers encouragement to the reader despairing over the state of American politics today: polarized by partisanship run amuck, shouting, name-calling, blind to the facts, dedicated to character assassination””in a word, mean. Alas, it has always been so, even in the days of our founding.
Asked to name the oldest and shrewdest of the founding fathers, you”d quickly point to Ben Franklin. Today he is regarded as the quintessential American. The man was hailed as a scientific genius, sought for his sagacity, feted in the parlors of wealth and prestige, courted by the nobility. Had it been around then, the Nobel Prize would certainly have been his. A universally admired man””in France, that is, but not in the United States, whose Congress sent him as commissioner to Paris to negotiate loans and materiel for waging the war against England. While there his countrymen back home treated him with bitter suspicion and derision.
Maybe it”s just in the DNA of a democracy, this propensity America has always had for abusing its leaders. Washington had to take it, as did Lincoln, and for that matter, can you name a president who hasn”t? We respect our officials, once they are safely out of office.
Schiff”s biography of the great man offers neither praise nor scorn. On her pages, Franklin is human, perhaps all too human. Yet he did snag the money and military assistance that were largely responsible for underwriting””perhaps even making possible””the creation (by improvisation, not by unified strategy) of our nation. As you read, though, you”ll recall the much later French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau”s appraisal: “America is the only nation in history which has managed to pass directly from barbarism to degeneration without the customary interval of civilization.”
Life and Spirit
If I were asked to name my favorite contemporary Christian writer, I wouldn”t hesitate long before naming Eugene Peterson as at least high among my favorites. What a gift he gave us with The Message, his commonsensical translation/interpretation of the Bible. I have also long felt personally indebted to him for his reasonable treatment of the book of Revelation in Reversed Thunder. This longtime pastor has thought passionately, loved intelligently, and written illuminatingly about the Word of God.
I wasn”t surprised, then, to read Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places with such engagement. Admittedly, I am biased. I have lived a schizophrenic life, one foot in the pulpit and the other on the campus. Peterson”s writing gives evidence of his more than 30 years as a pastor; it also is proof he”s no slouch academically. The man has studied, researched, and documented; he has also preached to and pastored a flock. He understands.
The result is a spiritual theology that tolerates no wrenching of head from heart. As he says, “Spiritual theology is a protest against theology depersonalized into information about God; it is a protest against theology functionalized into a program of strategic planning for God.” It is living life to the fullest in the consciousness that God is, God relates to and has desires for us.
Peterson takes his title from Gerard Manley Hopkins”s lines,
For Christ plays in ten thousand places,
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
To the Father through the features of men”s faces.
By drawing from Hopkins, Peterson signals that for him spirituality and sensuality are partners in serving God, not enemies. That is, the Spirit (wind, breath) moves through life, and life is experienced and expressed through the senses. Peterson traces this movement of the Spirit in creation, in history, and in community. He does not overlook the social dimension of the Christian discipline. We do not “walk alone.”
As always, you can count on this author to offer rich interpretations of Scripture. You”ll especially enjoy his treatments of Genesis 1 and 2, John 1, and portions of Mark, Exodus, Deuteronomy, and Acts. He leans heavily on his Trinitarian theology, but it does not get in the way of his desire to let the Scriptures speak for themselves.
I have long been suspicious of our far too casual reference to our “spiritual life.” Perhaps that”s why I so enjoy this man”s writing. He doesn”t separate “spirit” from “life.” All that I am, all that I do, is my spiritual life, don”t you think?
Professor and Preacher
Now for a book for the preachers among us. Daniel Overdorf”s One Year to Better Preaching: 52 Exercises to Hone Your Skills is a rich recent discovery.
Fifty-two exercises? Surely the man jests, you say. Just how many ways will it take, anyway, to spice up my preaching? Hmmm. About 52, it appears.
I first met Overdorf when he was a kid. His preacher father had invited me for a brief revival meeting, back in the day. I don”t remember much about the meeting, but I do remember the warm hospitality in the Overdorf home””good food, good conversation, transparent Christian living, and lots of popcorn. Truly memorable.
Fast-forward a few decades. Now that boy is the esteemed professor of homiletics at Johnson University and, if this book is any indication, he deserves his reputation as one of the school”s finest teachers. Whether you are just getting started or have been plying your craft for a lifetime, you”ll find here a host of ideas that”ll energize the preacher and engage the preached to. From the expected (exegete the text; let the verbs do the heavy lifting; know your listeners) to the surprising (go to the movies; invite your congregation to text you during your sermon; talk to an artist; pay attention to the ladies [and the men, too!]; read fiction; teach preaching to high schoolers; and on and on) this proliferation of ideas will take you far more than 52 weeks to apply.
Each chapter includes exercises to strengthen homiletical muscle and testimonies from some preachers who tried them. A real bonus is every chapter”s “resources for further study.” These include books, articles, and, of particular interest to this bookish reader, addresses for Internet sites worth visiting.
I”m trying to figure out how I can best steal his stuff for my courses!
LeRoy Lawson is international consultant with CMF International and professor of Christian ministries at Emmanuel Christian Seminary, Johnson City, Tennessee. He also serves as a Christian Standard contributing editor and member of Standard Publishing”s Publishing Committee.
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