Review: The Priority of Preaching

Christopher Ash, the Priority of Preaching, PT Media & Christian Focus 2009.

This book arises from addresses given the the 2008 EMA in London and is by the Director of the Cornhill Course.

Its a book for those in pastoral ministry or aspiring to be. The topic is preaching, but it is not a story of preachers or a series of 'how to' tips.

Rather it is a carefully argued encouragement for pastors to keep preaching as a central priority in ministry, to make their preaching expository and to preach in consecutive book-length series. The encouragement rests on evangelical assumptions about Scripture as God's living word and on a consideration of the form in which God has revealed himself. He revealed himself in books, so let us preach books!

There's an interesting discussion re the place of small groups verses preaching. Ash argues that being spoken to by someone (preaching) is a culturally universal and equalising experience, whereas small groups are a sub-cultural and possibly divisive experience with their assumptions about literacy, cognitive adeptness and verbal fluency. He also argues that the small group should complement preaching (and thus follow the sermon) by focusing on personal applications and accountability of Scripture and thus avoid the problem of shared ignorance driven by a amateurish efforts at interpretation. This is interesting indeed in the light of present trends to elevate small groups and diminish preaching.

As befits a book building on high assumptions about Scripture, the book is essentially a series of expositions from Deuteronomy. Christopher Ash thus puts his own assumptions and lessons into his words.

This is not a long or difficult book. It could be a great Saturday night read for the discouraged preacher who needs encouragement before the great task of the next day. I read it on a weekend when I preached three sermons in two hemispheres and was moved to bound from plane to pulpit.