Music as Prayer explores the spiritual and theological character of church music. Author Thomas H. Troeger-a theologian, preacher, poet and flutist-traces how making and listening to music can be an act of prayer, a way of sensing the irrepressible resilience of the divine vitalities, in down-to-earth language that everyone can enjoy. The book employs a wide range of perspectives: from scientific observations about the affect of music on the brain, to the insights of early church fathers about the place of music in worship, to the compositions of great composers and their reflections upon their art, to the Bible and theologians, to organists, choir directors and instrumentalists, to hymnists and poets. Listening to the wisdom of these varied tribes, Troeger finds them to be a cloud of witnesses, a choir giving testimony to how music puts the human heart in touch with the spirit in times of sorrow and seeking, in times of joy and gratitude. The book is addressed to listeners and performers alike, instrumentalists and singers, clergy and seminarians, worship committees and congregation members, scholars and teachers of liturgy and sacred music. It helps musicians and clergy to develop a mutual understanding of the theological and spiritual dimensions of their collaborative work. As a whole, the book celebrates the ministry of making music that awakens people to those gifts of the spirit that sustain hope, promote healing, and enliven a visionary faith in the possibility of a transformed world.

This book includes all the texts from Troeger's prior collaborations and other prayers and poems which he has written. There are 134 texts (poems, prayers, etc.) in all, grouped by images and patterns of association: Borrowed Light, Hidden Water, Wind and Flame, Melody Alone, A Spendthrift Lover, A Single Unmatched Stone, Fragmentary Prayers, and Disturbance of the Solid Ground. Endnotes and indices according to meter, theme and image, scripture, and first lines will aid clergy, church musicians, liturgists, and composers. An afterword provides further material for the creative process by exploring the literary and theological understandings that shape the texts.

An inspirational gathering of fifty-nine new hymn texts, anthems, and poems by the author of Borrowed Light (OUP, 1994) and co-author, with composer Carol Doran, of New Hymns for the Life of the Church (OUP, 1992), and New Hymns for the Lectionary (OUP, 1986). Thomas Troeger is one of the most important American figures in the liturgical renewal movement and is in great demand for workshops, lectureships, and special worship services. His poems and texts for music are widely used by composers, even more widely adapted to standard hymn-tunes by parish musicians, and used by individuals and groups for private devotion. This powerful new collection covers the entire church year along with a broad range of contemporary concerns and issues. The texts are conveniently indexed according to meter, theme and image, and Scripture.

A working pastor is always looking for fresh preaching perspectives. This hands-on resource from the author of a long-standing column in the journal Lectionary Homiletics covers the entire three-year lectionary cycle with brief reflections designed to generate fresh and timely sermon ideas.

Each reflection is limited to two pages and provides an interpretation of one or more lections for every month of the year. While some focus on a single lection, others draw forth a theological/pastoral theme that stretches across several lections, suggesting how to approach an entire month homiletically.

Considering the lack of resources that exists in the study of women's preaching, this book makes a very significant contribution to the development of homiletics because it joins together the history of women preachers with theological reflection. It is the author's hope that this book will provide a broader and deeper basis for the theology of preaching as well as practical ways in which preachers can improve their own preaching by looking at a woman's perspective. Kim gives a detailed account of women preachers from ancient times until the present--from women of the Western and Eastern churches to women of Asian and Latin American churches--showing the perspectives and insights that increase and enhance out understanding of who God is and what God is doing as well as the implications for preaching now and in the future. Women Preaching is a call to the church to accept women preachers as a matter of justice and a theological necessity.

In the parable that begins this book, a large chunk has fallen out of the roof of a historic church, exactly where an imposing mosaic of God enthroned in heaven used to reside. The members of the church, unable to agree on how to repair the roof or what image to put there, now worship under a God-shaped hole, trying to come to grips with the loss of old certitudes and the new challenges they face.

The church today faces exactly the same problem, argues Thomas Troeger. We live in a fragmented society, and the church reflects that fragmentation. We, too, sit under the "God-shaped hole," wondering how to proceed now that former ways of understanding who God is and what it means to be God's people are no longer universally or even widely held. How does one preach in this situation? The answer, says Troeger, is to reclaim the imaginative and visionary role of the preacher.

The preacher's job is to employ the creative elements of preaching to help God's people imagine the new thing God is doing in our time. Yet this kind of creative preaching is not just a matter of technique, of learning the right methods for how to preach with imagination. It is foremost a matter of formation; it comes when the preacher opens himself or herself, through the disciplines of prayer and study, to the inspiring presence of God's Spirit.

In Preaching While the Church Is Under Reconstruction, Troeger constructs a framework for how to preach in this time of transition and failing certainties. He demonstrates that, enlivened by the work of God's Spirit, it is possible to preach with vision and insight, and help God's people perceive their place in the world which God is creating anew.

Too often we evaluate worship as a matter of taste without examining the presuppositions that inform worship in a given congregation. The authors help church leaders see that worship is a public event, which must be continually renewed and revitalized. They identify sources of conflict in worship, provide creative approaches to resolving these conflicts, and examine five road maps for revitalized worship.

Troeger shares the secrets of capturing the imaginative spirit through exploration of the creative use of sight, sound, touch, and taste that leads to new visions for truth-telling and revelation in the sermon.

Here is the remedy for trite, boring sermons Thomas H. Troeger shows how to breathe fresh life into your sermons by harnessing your imaginative powers in a new way. In scores of dynamic workshops, Troeger has shown preachers and seminarians how to create powerful sermons by seizing moments when the heart and mind catch fire. Now, in Imagining a Sermon, Troeger shares the secrets of capturing the imaginative spirit within you.

You will discover how to observe daily events that can energize the preaching event. You will also discover how to fine-tune your visual and listening skills to fuse televised, scriptural, and remembered images into new truths for your congregation.

In Ten Strategies for Preaching in a Multi Media Culture, Thomas H. Troeger surveys how evolving forms of communications over the centuries have shaped presentation of the gospel. He then provides an in-depth analysis of ten strategies for creating sermons that effectively deliver the Word in an age of mass media and computerization. To illustrate each strategy, he offers gospel-based sermons which include creative techniques such as mime, drama, sound, simulation games, art-photography, and hymns.

A highly creative, entertaining, and thought-provoking way to examine contemporary preaching styles. In this contemporary parable--set in a homiletics classroom--ten preachers from a wide diversity of backgrounds preach, debate, and reflect on critical issues facing today's preacher.