The four voices of preaching

the long version

The Four Voices of Preaching is not a "How to" book. Rather, it provides a map, not only of contemporary homiletic theory for the first quarter of the 21st century, but also a way of identifying the voice that often unknowly speaks a preacher or anyone who speaks form or out of a religious perspective. Almost all "how to" books can be readily located by this map in one of four quadrants of its Matrix that works the tensions of answer vs. ambiguity appeals with communal vs. individualistic appeals. After identifying each of the four voices in Chapter 1, the book devotes a chapter each for the Teaching Voice, the Encouraging Voice, the Sage Voice, and the Testifying Voice. The argument is that each voice, if conducted with authenticity and excellence, calls forth from listeners a specific kind of response that is "significantly" different than the desired response from the other voices. The claim of the book is that over time, it is the assumptions about faith at the heart of the appeals that shape the matrix that shape the nature of faith and how it is normatively experienced by parishioners.