Hanging Out With Dead People
I enjoy hanging out with dead people. Specifically, I appreciate the opportunity to learn from the wisdom of our ancestors in the faith. This means cracking open old books.
And yet, we live in the digital age, in which everything is fast, new, and cutting edge. New books are printed seemingly every day, on a dizzying array of topics. Pastors can feel like they’re on a treadmill, trying desperately to keep up with all the latest ministry ideas produced in podcasts, blogs, and (yes) books. “Have you read the latest?” is a question that can dominate us. If we’re not careful, we can become jaundiced towards the past, trafficking in what C. S. Lewis termed “chronological snobbery.” By that measure, only what is new is worth pursuing.
However, as a pastor, I learned that I did not need to reinvent the wheel. The past is in the past, but it can still help me in the present. In an effort to “Break Bread with the Dead,” I’ve learned to go retro, seeking out the wisdom of church history. For me, this means I hang out with dead guys via their books. Sometimes, these are out of print and difficult to find. Others are classics, always available on Amazon. I have found answers to many of my cutting-edge ministry questions in these dusty old books.
In this blog, I want to share four of those books with you. Perhaps you will be motivated to pick up one of these volumes. Or perhaps you will be inspired to spend your life in the company of the dead.
The Book of Pastoral Rule, by Gregory the Great
Written in the sixth century, this book (authored by a man that John Calvin called the last good Pope) reminds us of the importance of diligent preparation for ministry (seminary students, take note). Gregory said, “No one presumes to teach an art that he has not first mastered through study. How foolish it is therefore for the inexperienced to assume pastoral authority when the care of souls is the art of arts.”
According to Gregory, those who care for souls must diligently prepare themselves and safeguard their spirituality. He notes that leaders can inflict spiritual damage through their own hypocrisy: “No one does more harm in the Church that he who has the title or rank of holiness and acts perversely.”
In an era of scandal-ridden churches, we need Gregory’s counsel. Pastors (and those aspiring to the pastorate) would do well to soberly read this ancient volume and attend to their own spiritual formation.
The Good Shepherd: Meditations on Christian Ministry in Today’s World, by Lesslie Newbigin
Lesslie Newbigin was one of the brightest Christian thinkers of the twentieth century. After spending nearly four decades as a missionary in India, he used his retirement to foster a fresh missionary encounter between the gospel and western culture.
Newbigin is famous for books like The Gospel in a Pluralist Society and The Open Secret. But I believe that The Good Shepherd is an under-appreciated resource in pastoral theology. These essays on pastoral ministry were originally delivered as talks at a monthly clergy breakfast in Madras.
His insightful essays cover a variety of topics like preaching (“We have to preach Christ. That is really our only business in the pulpit.”), visitation (“The pastor visits every member of his congregation, however poor and insignificant not because he is useful for the programme of the parish, or because he is influential or helpful, but simply because he is one of God’s children to be loved and respected as he is.”), and evangelism (“Our evangelism will be futile if it is mere words not authenticated by deeds. But our deeds will be futile if they do not eventually find their full meaning in the message of the Gospel which has to be proclaimed by words.”).
Newbigin helpfully offered concrete suggestions for the intellectual life of pastors, urging them to read strategically and systematically. The conclusion to his first essay poignantly notes, “That is the secret of the true pastor – that the life of the Good Shepherd is being lived in him.”
The Preacher’s Task and the Stone of Stumbling, by D. T. Niles
“As the world changes at a breakneck pace, it’s time to go retro. It’s time to crack open an old book.”
D. T. Niles was a twentieth century Sri Lankan evangelist. In 1957, he delivered the annual Lyman Beecher Lectures on preaching at Yale University. In preparation for this lectureship, Niles wrote three letters: one each to a Muslim, Hindu, and Buddhist friend. He asked each of his friends to write back and express why they could not believe in Jesus. Taking their responses into account (he quoted their letters in full), he presented a series of lectures on missional preaching (long before the word missional had been coined). He spoke movingly about preaching the Incarnate God (to our Hindu neighbors), the Crucified Christ (to our Muslim neighbors), and the Risen Lord (to our Buddhist neighbors).
Niles’ challenge echoes from the storied halls of Yale to the secular, pluralistic cities of our late-Modern age: “God has acted and men must believe. That is the ground of the preacher’s task. But men find in this action of God something they stumble over. That is the heart of the preacher’s problem.”
The Church Between the Temple and Mosque, J. H. Bavinck
J. H. Bavinck was a professor of missiology at the Free University of Amsterdam from 1939-1965. When he taught missions, he did so not simply as a theorist, but as a veteran. He drew upon his decades of experience as a missionary in Indonesia, where he presented the gospel in a context marked by Islam and Eastern mysticism.
As America becomes increasingly pluralistic, pastors must train their church members to evangelistically engage their neighbors who might identify with another faith (or no faith at all). Bavinck insightfully recognizes five points of contact between the Christian gospel and the religions of the world (For a retrieval of Bavinck and application of his ideas to secular settings, see the work of Dan Strange). These points of contact are anchored in a biblical understanding of religion: it “is never a soliloquy, a dialogue of a man with himself …. Religion is by its very nature a communion, in which man answers and reacts to God’s revelation.”
These are some old books in the realm of pastoral theology that have impacted my approach to the pastorate, to preaching, and to mission. What dusty old volumes will you pick up? Which ancestors of our faith will you choose to learn from? As the world changes at a breakneck pace, it’s time to go retro. It’s time to crack open an old book. It’s time to hang out with the dead.
