Since 1977, the Journal for Preachers provides a unique resource for the high calling of proclaiming the gospel.

Published quarterly in time for Advent, Lent, Easter and Pentecost, this valuable periodical is available by subscription — $18 a year in the U.S.

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Advent Foreword

     "The Advent texts," writes Meda Stamper, "give us space in which to remember why we need a savior. They press us to name the things from which we and the earth are awaiting redemption, the reasons why God needs to be born to us anew." Surprising isn't it to hear about "remembering" in relationship to Advent with its thrust toward the future — the season of waiting and watching and hoping. Yet Stamper in her introductory article on "Preaching the Advent Texts" says the texts give us space to look back, space to name the brokenness of our lives and of the world and to confess why we need a savior. Stamper urges Advent preachers to remember that remembering is a starting point for Advent preaching.  Even before a preacher calls a congregation to sing and pray "O come, o come, Emmanuel!" we need to remember and confess why we "in lonely exile," why we with our "sad divisions," why we who live beneath "death's dark shadows" need a savior. Only with such remembering will waiting, watching, and hoping carry the deep urgency that springs from desperate need. Stamper's article provides a guide for the preacher through these powerful Advent texts.
     Tom Walker in his article "Returning to the Border: Hope in Advent" uses the border between wilderness and promised land in Deuteronomy to link memory with Advent hope. Even God, Walker notes, is called to remember — to remember God's own promises and to come and "settle us all in the promised land, once and for all." In his article "Hope-Holders: Notes and Reflections on Preaching Hope in Advent," Leighton Ford asks: "Across the decades of my life, what have I learned about Advent and hope that could be fresh, substantial, hopeful?" By remembering deeply, the theologian/evangelist Ford carries us deep into Advent texts and Advent hope and provides the preacher rich resources for faithful Advent preaching.
     In "A Famine of the Words of the Lord in the Land: A Critical View of Global Pandemics from a Public Health Practitioner," the distinguished public health scientist and church person Donna Stroup urges preachers to end our silence about — to remember — the worldwide HIV/AIDS pandemic . Her article, she says, is in response to the silence of the pulpit, "this famine of 'the word of the Lord,' and is intended to be a help to preachers who take up the challenge of preaching to address the HIV pandemic." Her article is a call to preachers for bold remembering of millions who suffer, for remembering biblical texts that call us to compassion and action, and for hoping that does not despair.
     Three advent sermons follow. Walter Brueggemann's "The Poem: Subversion and Summons," and Sam Wells's "It's Working" were both preached in the chapel of Duke University and, as readers of this journal will anticipate, challenge both the heart and the mind. Shannon Johnson Kershner's sermon provides the startling image of "John the Baptist – The Holy Homemaker." In the "Protagonist Corner" Wain Westbury calls on congregations to remember — especially during Advent — college students who are so often forgotten. And in "One New Book for the Preacher," Rabbi John Friedman recommends Sacred Trash: The Lost and Found World of the Cairo Geniza. After reading Friedman's account of revealing and fascinating "sacred trash," you may want to remember to keep your old sermons.

Erskine Clarke