Book Review: Guide to Preaching and Leading Worship

Information about the book

A Guide to Preaching and Leading Worship by William H. Willimon.  Westminster John Knox Press, Louisville, 2008 (Previously published in 1984)

Summary

Quoting the introduction, "This handbook is a practical guide to enable you to be an effective preacher and liturgist.  Too much is at stake in the life of the church for us pastors to be anything less than competent committed, and well-informed "servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. (1 Cor. 4:1).  Topics included are planning the service, public prayer, sacraments, and preaching.

Impressions

I purchased the book to be used as a reading for a CLM class I am leading.  The session where we'll discuss this book is one centered around planning worship, so I hope it will be a help for them.  It is focused on being the pastor, with the assumption that pastors are clergy.  My CLM students may (or may not) be assigned as "pastors" to churches, so I hope they can see the information around the bias toward it being for clergy.

I do think it provides good information regarding the planning of worship and preaching.  I am especially impressed with the emphasis on evaluation and how to go about change.  I especially like the chapter on prayer, and think it will be helpful to the CLM students.  I like the emphasis on using lectionary readings for biblically-based sermons.

I did find some of the Bishop's proclamations about worship to be - pardon me - not up to date. For example, the rule that scripture should be read only from a bound book, with no modern paraphrasing seems out of step with modern worship where young people bring their phones to the lectern to read.  I'm not sure he would find the Common English Bible to be appropriate (at least not when this was written).  The idea that preaching is the realm of the pastor (only) - and I may be misunderstanding him in this - seems to exclude lay activity - although I love the statement that lay people should be included in planning and implementation of worship and should be well trained.