Imagination: Returning to the Source
By Judith Hoch Wray

"I will not cheat the congregation by handing them a souvenir from my trip on the river when I can take them along on the voyage and let them feel the current and the water for themselves."

In Imagining a Sermon, Thomas H. Troeger, guides those who would preach gracefully through experiences of "imaginative theology" and creative sermon construction.

Troeger balances Martin Luther's and John Calvin's warnings against the imagination with observations about the effect of television on expectations and style for the post-modern preacher. Imagination divorced from grace and truth is corruptible; yet, the writer assures us, if the power of God's grace is as magnificent as the Protestant reformers claimed, then grace can redeem even the corruption of the human imagination.

And redeemed we are, from unimaginative and boring sermons, as we assimilate many of the insights offered in this lively book on preaching.

While reflecting on the suspicion of all authority that now pervades our culture, Troeger invites us to stand on new places and to preach from perspectives. Exploring a nonÄverbal remedy for a malady common to all preachers, i.e., overdosing on words, he hears Johann Sebastian Bach answer the question about the difference between dead and living sermons.

And though with muted, feeble voices
the glory of the Lord be praised,
If [the] Spirit send the word on high,
then does it seem the loudest cry
that yet to heaven has been raised.

"I say to all preachers: Follow the pull of the Spirit to return to the Source, to God who made you and Christ who redeemed you. Understand all of your imaginative work as an effort to return to the Source."

--JKHW