Preaching to People in Pain: How Suffering Can Shape Your Sermons and Connect with Your Congregation - Softcover

Matthew D. Kim

Softcover

ISBN 10: 154096129X ISBN 13: 9781540961297

Publisher: Baker Academic, 2021

Synopsis

Christianity Today 2022 Book of the Year Award (The Church and Pastoral Leadership)

Southwestern Journal of Theology 2021 Book of the Year Award (Honorable Mention, Preaching/Ministry/Leadership)

Offering an important corrective to a pain-averse culture that celebrates individualism and success, veteran preacher and teacher Matthew Kim encourages pastors to preach on the painful issues their congregations face. Through vulnerability and self-disclosure, pastors can help their congregants share their suffering in community for the purpose of healing and transformation. The book includes stories, shares relevant Scripture texts imparting biblical wisdom, and offers best practices for preaching on specific topics. Each chapter ends with discussion questions and a sample sermon.

About this title

About the Author

Matthew D. Kim (PhD, University of Edinburgh) is the George F. Bennett Chair of Preaching and Practical Theology, director of the Haddon W. Robinson Center for Preaching, and director of Mentored Ministry at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in South Hamilton, Massachusetts. He is the author of Preaching with Cultural Intelligence, the 2018 Preaching magazine Book of the Year.

From the Back Cover

"Insightful and beautifully instructive"

Veteran preacher and teacher Matthew Kim encourages pastors to preach on pain to help their congregants identify and share their suffering in Christian community for the purpose of healing and transformation.

"Each week, the people in our pews carry with them loss, grief, and suffering, and they long for a way to meet God in the midst of their struggles. When sermons focus only on the victory of the Christian life, this makes walking the way of Jesus more difficult for those who are in pain. Kim helps those of us who preach take up the holy responsibility of proclaiming that every part of our lives--including our sorrow and pain--is something that we address as a church and is, more importantly, a place to encounter God."
--Tish Harrison Warren, Anglican priest; author of Liturgy of the Ordinary and Prayer in the Night

"Kim is a battle-scarred, veteran pastor familiar with suffering and a master teacher of preaching. His perceptive, poignant book will pluck up your courage and inspire you to preach powerful sermons that birth hope in the lives of people who suffer."
--Ken Shigematsu, pastor, Tenth Church, Vancouver, British Columbia; author of Survival Guide for the Soul

"An insightful and beautifully instructive book on preaching to people who experience pain--on all sorts of levels. Preaching to People in Pain is an important contribution to pastoral ministry, to preaching, and to the field of homiletics. Kim is to be commended for addressing this tender and fragile but often overlooked aspect of the preaching task."
--Scott M. Gibson, Truett Seminary, Baylor University

"With wisdom and courage Kim invites preachers to name their own pain for the sake of their own health and the health of their congregations."
--Mandy Smith, pastor and author of The Vulnerable Pastor and Unfettered: Imagining a Childlike Faith beyond the Baggage of Western Culture

"Frederick Buechner famously wrote that the preacher should not be like the captain of a ship 'who is the only one aboard who . . . does not know that the waves are twenty feet high.' Preaching to pain clearly indicates that we understand that there are waves. Confessing our own pain as part of that process indicates that we have had to navigate the waves too. Kim addresses the waves and rides them with his readers to teach us all how to navigate life's storms by the light of our Savior's heart."
--Bryan Chapell, pastor emeritus, Grace Presbyterian Church; president emeritus, Covenant Seminary; author of Christ-Centered Preaching

From the Inside Flap

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Edition details

• Publisher: Baker Academic
• Publication date: 2021
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 154096129X
• ISBN 13: 9781540961297
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 240