Exploring And Proclaiming The Apostles' Creed

Book Summary

Doctrinal preaching has fallen on hard times in recent years. "Exploring and Proclaiming the Apostles' Creed" seeks to stimulate renewed interest in -- and provide useful models of -- Christian proclamation that is truly rooted in the central tenets of the faith. Using the Apostles' Creed as a template for doctrinal, confessional preaching, this book draws together an ecumenical cast of respected biblical scholars and preachers who explain the creed and demonstrate its preaching possibilities. Each of the book's fifteen chapters consists of an essay that explores and illuminates one of the creed's articles of faith, followed by a scintillating sermon that models how that article can be preached as good news today. Contributors: Walter R. Bouman Richard A. Burridge Philip W. Butin Gabriel Fackre David F. Ford Colin Gunton Richard B. Hays Craig C. Hill Scott E. Hoezee Leslie J. Hoppe George Hunsinger Scott Black Johnston James F. Kay Richard A. Lischer Thomas G. Long Lois Malcolm Daniel L. Migliore Richard A. Norris Jr. Steven D. Paulson Cornelius Plantinga Cynthia L. Rigby Fleming Rutledge William M. Shand III Marguerite Shuster Wm. C. Turner Robert Louis Wilken Ralph C. Wood Susan K. Wood Frances M. Young Robin Darling Young Doctrinal preaching has come upon hard times in recent years, both in conservative pulpits where preachers emphasize bChristian livingb while often forgetting the Christian belief that undergirds and informs that Christian living, and in liberal pulpits, where creeds still divide and deeds (particularly political deeds) still unite. This book is an attempt to stimulate renewed interest in the forgotten genre of doctrinal preaching. No, it does not advocate a return to the topical bthree points and a poemb sermons from generations past, but sermons designed to teach what the church has received in and with the gospel of Jesus Christ. The Apostlesb Creed was chosen as a template on which to organize the book because it is written largely in narrative form, it is confessional in nature, it is familiar to most if not all Christians, and it is accepted by nearly all. It also provides a structure that allows us to focus our faith, and moreover, restrains idiosyncratic beliefs. An overview of the doctrine of the Trinity opens the book, and thereafter the creed is broken into fourteen phrasesb"the book thus contains fifteen chapters. Each chapter includes an essay and a sermon. In the essays contributors identify biblical sources of the phrase they are discussing, taking pains to display the broader scriptural witness to the truths the creed encapsulates; they trace how a given doctrine functioned and fared in the history of the church; and they reflect theologically on the confession for our time, frequently surveying the state of contemporary belief. Sermon contributors provide models to show how these articles can be preached as good news today.

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