Digital Logos Edition
The Reading and Preaching of the Scriptures in the Worship of the Christian Church (7 Vols.) is a multi–volume study by Hughes Oliphant Old that explores the history of preaching from the words of Moses at Mount Sinai through modern times. He examines the connections between Scripture, reading, preaching, and ministry in the work of preachers over the centuries. In over 4,400 pages, Old provides a compelling account of preaching and worship in the Church. Focusing on individual preachers and homilectical movements throughout history, this collection is essential for understanding the partnership between preaching and worship in a holistic way.
Ideal for pastors, seminary students, and laity wishing to learn more about the legacy of historic preaching, The Reading and Preaching of the Scriptures in the Worship of the Christian Church (7 Vols.) is comprehensive in scope, thorough in research, and readable in tone. With the Logos Bible Software edition, studying the history of preaching is easier than ever before! You can search by topic, preacher, or Scripture passage with the click of a mouse, saving yourself from turning pages, cross-referencing citations, and unnecessarily complex research projects.
Studying these volumes is like walking around a great cathedral [. . . ] every section, however distinctive, unites in a grand design whose aim is to restore preaching to its rightful place. This multivolume work is easily the best history of preaching ever written, one that will serve generations of those whose faith comes by hearing.
—William Edgar, Westminster Theological Seminary
Old has bequeathed to the church of the twenty–first century the definitive history of preaching, a spiritual feast for scholars and preachers alike for years and years to come.
—James F. Kay, Princeton Theological Seminary
I consider this series by Old to be most timely. The current unfortunate trend to dumb down worship with less Scripture and with popular topical sermons needs the corrective offered in this comprehensive and readable work.
—Robert Webber, Northern Baptist Theological Seminary
You can save when you purchase this product as part of a collection.
In this volume, Hughes Oliphant Old begins his survey of the history of preaching by discussing the roots of the Christian ministry of the Word in the worship of Israel. He then examines the preaching of Christ, the Apostles, and early church leaders.
Hughes Oliphant Old surveys the history of preaching in the Greek schools of Alexandria and Antioch, in the Syriac church, and throughout the Christian Empire, concluding with the preaching of Leo the Great, Peter Chrysologos, and Gregory I.
The third volume in Hughes Oliphant Old’s multivolume history of the reading and preaching of Scripture focuses on the Middle Ages. Surveying the development of preaching over the span of a thousand years, Old explores the preachers of sixth-century Byzantium, the church’s mission to the barbarians, the preaching of the gospel during Charlemagne’s Holy Roman Empire, the era of the great monastic orders, and the prophetic preachers of Renaissance Italy. Giving special attention to preaching greats like Bernard of Clairvaux and Bonaventure, Old also provides extensive analyses of several sermons from the period in order to show how the church presented the gospel in this little-known era.
In Volume 4, The Age of the Reformation, Old focuses on changes in preaching due to the Protestant Reformation and the Catholic Counter-Reformation. This is the pivotal volume in Old's project, covering as it does not only what the Reformers and Counter-Reformers preached but also their reform of preaching itself. Old traces the main events and people involved in the development of preaching at this time— Luther, Calvin, Thomas of Villanova, Francis Xavier, William Perkins, John Donne, Johann Gerhard, Jacques Bossuet, and many more—while also giving due attention to how preaching was itself an act of worship.
In Volume 5, Moderatism, Pietism, and Awakening, Old brings the story of preaching up through the eighteenth century, showing how, after the tumultuous age of the Reformation, preaching in the eighteenth century was driven in several very different directions. The book’s first chapter considers moderatism, an inevitable reaction against the high tensions of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation. In the second chapter Old discusses pietism, examining the contributions of Philipp Jakob Spener, Theodorus Jacobus Frelinghuysen, John Wesley, George Whitefield, Samuel Davies, and other preachers. The remaining seven chapters delve into a variety of national or denominational schools of preaching.
This sixth volume, The Modern Age, tells the story from the French Revolution to the fall of the Berlin Wall (1789–1989). During this time preaching continued to support its historic faith while the church undertook to resist secularization, come to grips with biblical criticism, and initiate bold overseas missions.
Opening with the revived Catholic Order of Preachers, Abraham Kuyper, and Friedrich Schleiermacher, Old moves on to consider John Henry Newman and Charles Haddon Spurgeon. He then carefully examines the evangelical Calvinism of New England, as well as the beginnings of black preaching and the great American school of Charles Finney, Dwight L. Moody, and Harry Emerson Fosdick. In the twentieth century Old’s focus falls on the crises of the two world wars, especially the courageous ministries of German, Dutch, and Hungarian preachers during the Third Reich.
This magisterial volume is the seventh and last of Hughes Oliphant Old’s history of preaching. Here Old takes up the story with the sixties and the Second Vatican Council and follows it all the way through to the house churches of China and the preaching of the Archbishop of Uganda, known as the “Billy Graham of Africa.” Along the way he looks at the engaging preaching found in Latin America, the rise of the modern megachurch, the role of Joan Alexandru’s preaching in bringing down the house of Ceausescu, and other historically significant moments in preaching. Full of surprising details and inspiring stories of ministry, this book is a fitting work to round out Old’s monumental, comprehensive series written by a preacher for preachers on the history of preaching in the Christian church.
Hughes Oliphant Old is John H. Leith Professor of Reformed Theology and Dean of the Institute for Reformed Worship, Erskine Theological Seminary, Columbia, South Carolina.
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Glenn Crouch
1/2/2018
Ralph A. Abernethy III
9/7/2017