A Preaching Book Preachers Shouldn't Ignore
What Do They Hear? Bridging the Gap Between Pulpit & Pew by Mark Allan Powell (Abingdon, 2007) I read books about preaching and pastoring all the time. I should. I'm a preacher and a pastor, and I want to get better at being both. Every so often, I stumble upon a book that just makes sense, and speaks right into the heart of where I happen to be living at the moment. What Do They Hear? is one such book. Mark Allan Powell is a Literary Critic , who also happens to be a pastor and a preacher. In What Do They Hear? he utilizes the tools that a literary critic would use when evaluating a text to address the differences between what clergy and laity experience when they read Scripture. He does this for the purpose of educating clergy on ways that they might transform their preaching and more fully engage and inspire their hearers. Powell engaged in experiments where he had 50 clergy and 50 lay people read the same passage of Scripture, and th...