For 50 years, Journal for Preachers has sought to inspire fresh, Spirit-filled preaching in churches across the globe. Our contributors represent the very best of what preachers can be: wise, creative, theologically nimble, and deeply invested in crafting sermons that are rooted in rigorous biblical reflection and thoughtful social analysis. In a world awash with soundbites, hot-takes, and half-truths, what JP offers is needed now more than ever before.

But JP is more than just a rich archive of sermon resources. We strive to nurture a community of preachers who are committed to dialogue, collaboration, and thinking together about what it means to preach the gospel faithfully in our complex and conflicted world. As one of JP’s former contributing editors, Barbara Brown Taylor, once put it, “Reading Journal for Preachers is like talking with wise colleagues about how and why we do what we do.” Our aim is to convene the type of conversations preachers are longing to have with the hopes that doing so helps you find your authentic preaching voice and re-discover joy in ministry.

Mindful of the history and legacy of this journal, I consider it a tremendous privilege to take on the role as JP’s next editor. Those who have gone before me are towering figures in the church and the academy—Erskine Clarke, Cam Murchison, Walter Brueggemann, Tom Long, Jessica Patchett, and Mark Ramsey. I want to faithfully steward what they and others have built even as I also hope to extend the journal’s reach and impact. In the issues to come, you will see us doing that in two ways.

First, we will seek to curate content from an ever-wider range of preachers who represent diverse cultural, racial, and theological traditions. We want to hear from tall steeple pastors as well as those serving in rural parishes or planting new church startups. We are eager to engage ordained clergy as well as lay preachers, bi-vocational pastors, chaplains, artists, scholars, and others whose unique voices and experiences can deepen our sense of what transformative preaching looks like today.

Second, while we will continue to engage our long-time readers we also want to reach new audiences. One of the ways we will do that is through our new, user-friendly website that was created through a partnership between JP and Emory’s Center for Digital Scholarship. The website will give you access to a searchable archive of the nearly 2,000 articles and sermons that have appeared in JP since 1977. You will be able to filter by year and liturgical season, or search by themes and topics—all without having to log in through a library system.

I am excited to be a part of this new chapter of JP’s history, and hopeful about what God might do through our collective work.