Geoffrey StevensonCritiques

Not as helpful as the best books on preaching I've read -- which are mostly by David Day -- but definitely worth reading. (And David Day agrees, as he has a very approving quote on the front cover.) Some chapters cover familiar territory, but others do break new ground, at least in my experience. These include chapters from actor Geoffrey Stevenson on "The act of delivery" and "Communication and communion" which have useful summaries on voice projection, variety, voice control, microphones, acoustics, PA and Powerpoint. "Preaching in community" discusses the role of the congregation, which includes a few experiences from preachers who involve others in the preparation stage. In the final chapter titled "Preaching in a mission-conscious church", Stephen Wright notes some ways that preaching is being pulled into different shapes, both in seeker-sensitive settings, in post-modern contexts, through people advocating greater use of imagery to balance the word-heavy recent history of exposition. Ideally Wright would continue to investigate and reflect on these, and produce a follow-on to this book covering these experiments in 'new wineskins'.