Walter Brueggemann - The Collected Sermons of Walter Brueggemann, Volume 3

The Collected Sermons of

Walter
Brueggemann

Volume 3

Also by Walter Brueggemann

from Westminster John Knox Press

Abiding Astonishment: Psalms, Modernity, and the Making of History (Literary Currents in Biblical Interpretation series)

Cadences of Hope: Preaching among Exiles

Celebrating Abundance: Devotions for Advent

Chosen? Reading the Bible amid the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

The Collected Sermons of Walter Brueggemann, Volumes 1 and 2

First and Second Samuel (Interpretation series)

From Judgment to Hope: A Study on the Prophets

From Whom No Secrets Are Hid: Introducing the Psalms

Genesis (Interpretation series)

Gift and Task: A Year of Daily Readings and Reflections

A Glad Obedience: Why and What We Sing

A Gospel of Hope

Great Prayers of the Old Testament

Hope for the World: Mission in a Global Context

Hope within History

An Introduction to the Old Testament: The Canon and Christian

Imagination, Second Edition (with Tod A. Linafelt)

Interrupting Silence: Gods Command to Speak Out

Isaiah 139 (Westminster Bible Companion series)

Isaiah 4066 (Westminster Bible Companion series)

Journey to the Common Good

Living Countertestimony: Conversations with Walter Brueggemann (with Carolyn J. Sharp)

Mandate to Difference: An Invitation to the Contemporary Church

Many Voices, One God: Being Faithful in a Pluralistic World (with George W. Stroup)

An On-Going Imagination: A Conversation about Scripture, Faith, and the Thickness of Relationship (with Clover Reuter Beal)

Power, Providence, and Personality: Biblical Insight into Life and Ministry

Reverberations of Faith: A Theological Handbook of Old Testament Themes

Sabbath as Resistance: New Edition with Study Guide

Struggling with Scripture (with Brian K. Blount and William C. Placher)

Texts for Preaching: A Lectionary Commentary (with Charles B. Cousar, Beverly Roberts Gaventa, J. Clinton McCann, and James D. Newsome)

Truth Speaks to Power: The Countercultural Nature of Scripture

Using Gods Resources Wisely: Isaiah and Urban Possibility

The Vitality of Old Testament Traditions, Second Edition (with Hans Walter Wolff)

A Way Other than Our Own: Devotions for Lent (compiled by Richard Floyd)

The Collected Sermons of

Walter
Brueggemann

Volume 3

Walter Brueggemann

2020 Walter Brueggemann

Foreword 2020 Westminster John Knox Press

First edition

Published by Westminster John Knox Press

Louisville, Kentucky

20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 2910 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

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Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A., and are used by permission. Where scriptural translations depart from the NRSV, they are the authors own renderings, sometimes in liberal paraphrase. Scripture quotations marked CEB are from the Common English Bible, 2011 Common English Bible, and are used by permission. Scripture quotations marked ESV are from the The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked HNV are from the Hebrew Names Version and are in the public domain. Scripture quotations marked NIV are from The Holy Bible, New International Version. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. Scripture quotations marked NKJV are from The New King James Version. Copyright 1979, 1980, 1982, Thomas Nelson Inc., Publishers and are used by permission. Scripture quotations marked NLV are taken from the New Life Version, copyright 1969 and 2003. Used by permission of Barbour Publishing, Inc., Uhrichsville, Ohio 44683. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked RSV are from the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright 1946, 1952, 1971, and 1973 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A., and are used by permission.

Book design by Sharon Adams

Cover design by Lisa Buckley Design and Rebecca Kueber

Cover photo: Tna Gutierrez

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

ISBN13: 978-0-664-26581-6

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for
Will Willimon

Contents

No one who hears Walter Brueggemann preach forgets the first time. He does not interpret a biblical text as much as he inhabits it, speaking from the inside in a way that makes those who are still on the outside wonder whether it is safe to enter. It never is, when he is your guide. You can hear it in the urgency of his voice, turning the volume up high. You can see it in the energy of his body, plowing the air with his hands as he bends over the pulpit so far that his reading glasses seem sure to fly off his face. His listeners often remark that being in his presence is as close as they will ever come to being in the presence of Hosea or Jeremiah, though he is clearly a prophet ignited by both testaments of the Bible. If your heart beats faster when you listen to him, it is because his heart beat faster first. The dangerousness of his preaching comes straight from his firsthand experience of a dangerous gospel, with power to wake a sleep-walking world.

Although you cannot see any of this in a book, you can still hear it. The volume you are holding in your hands is the third in a series of Walter Brueggemanns collected sermons. This might lead you to believe that it contains the husks left over from previous volumes, but you would be wrong. It contains his most recent work, some of it less than a year old at the time of this writing. So what can you learn from a third volume that you might not have learned from the first two?

First, you can get a sense of what indefatigable really means. Now in his ninth decade, Brueggemann continues to preach at churches both large and small across the nation. Sometimes the occasion is as grand as the annual Festival of Homiletics, where he speaks to more than a thousand preachers who wish they had half his pop and sizzle. At other times the gathering is as intimate as a memorial service for an old friend. Whatever the setting, a Brueggemann sermon never stays put in its own time zone. Because he is able to inhabit a text rooted in the ancient world while keeping the world of his listeners fully in view, he can articulate the ways in which these are not two worlds, but one. The God who spoke is the God who speaks, to humans who are not as far away from Eden as we may think.