North American Anglican Press is proud to announce The Foolishness of God by J. Brandon Meeks for release on July 3. Stay tuned for pre-sales, as well as articles on the topic by Dr. Meeks.
Preaching seems to have fallen on hard times in recent years. The pulpit has been marginalized, the sermon has been trivialized, and priests and ministers have felt the pressure to leave the study for the board room. Now we are counselors, executives, program directors, and political pundits—too often forgetting that God has called us first to be preachers. Preaching is utter madness. But it is precisely through the insanity of the preached Word that the foolishness of God is made manifest—a folly that upends the world’s wisdom, a weakness that demolishes all other power structures—the proclamation of the Crucified God who gives life to all who believe. The Foolishness of God urges us to remember our heritage without resting on our laurels. In these pages, God’s spokesmen are called to blow the dust from atop the sacred desk and preach the Word as though lives depended upon it—because they do.
“This is one of the best little books I have ever seen on preaching…”
Rev. Dr. Gerald McDermott,
Beeson Divinity School
“…This arresting collection of essays—addressed primarily to Anglican preachers—is a passionate call for the renewal of preaching as a sacramental encounter with Christ.”
Rev. Dr. Hans Boersma,
Nashotah House Theological Seminary
“…This book will be among the first I recommend to my students on the holy and fearful task of Christian preaching.”
Rev. Dr. R. Lucas Stamps,
Associate Professor of Christian Theology,
Anderson University
In The Foolishness of God, Dr. J. Brandon Meeks offers a rationale for preaching endorsed and empowered by God in a world that often sees preaching as foolish and, at best, optional. The perennial question, “Is there any word from the Lord?,” is raised at this crucial time and Meeks emphatically responds, Yes!,” in this doctrinal digest. The work is a condensed compendium of a theology of preaching and exudes the pulsating heartbeat of the essence of preaching—its content and not its contour; its substance and not its style; its doctrine and not its delivery. It is an exposé of God portrayed in preaching and demonstrates how to speak responsibly about God from a doctrinal standpoint.
Dr. Robert Smith Jr.,
Charles T. Carter Baptist Chair of Divinity,
Beeson Divinity School;
Author, Doctrine that Dances: Bringing Doctrinal Preaching and Teaching to Life
“This book will be an excellent resource for all preachers in the Anglican tradition and indeed for Christian preachers in any tradition. Brandon Meeks restores for us the vivid colour, texture and tone of seminal preachers and poets like John Donne and George Herbert, and shows how their approach is both possible and available to us. More importantly he argues convincingly that their vision and skill is more relevant, more desperately needed than ever. If you want to renew your own range, vision and expression as a preacher, then this is the book for you.”
Rev. Dr. Malcolm Guite,
Girton College,
University of Cambridge
Brandon Meeks has given us a delightfully unusual, profound, and helpful book on preaching: delightful for its readable unacademic style peppered with telling illustrations and wit. He is profound in his use of symbols and metaphors, opening up God’s world through the lens of Christian faith: and helpful in the pragmatic aids and insights for the preacher…. His use of kerygma and didache (in their right order) makes the book itself a wonder and effective sermon to the reader, inspiring us with confidence to preach more effectively.
Rt. Rev. Dr. C. FitzSimons Allison
Bishop of South Carolina (Retired);
Former rector of Grace Church, NYC
Author, The Rise of Moralism: The Proclamation of the Gospel from Hooker to Baxter; Honorary American Canon of St. Andrew’s Cathedral, Aberdeen, Scotland.
J. Brandon Meeks (PhD, University of Aberdeen) serves as Theologian-in-Residence at his parish in Arkansas and is the author of God, the Universe, and Everything Else.
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