1. Northern Illinois Synod Professional Leaders Conference Celebrating Reformation 500 Through Preaching, Singing, and Engaging
Rev. Karoline M. Lewis, Ph.D.
The Marbury E. Anderson Chair in Biblical Preaching
Luther Seminary, St. Paul

2. Preaching John: Engaging and Embodying an Incarnational Homiletic
Proclaiming the good news of the Fourth Gospel continues to be a challenge for today's preachers. Its supplementary role in the RCL as well as its perceived high Christology perpetuates its marginalized status. The use of the Gospel of John in exclusionary Christian claims also makes it off-putting, difficult, and challenging for the weekly preacher. These sessions will provide the theological framework essential for getting at how to preach John as well as explore how the Fourth Gospel itself offers its own homiletic. We will also imagine how John’s unique voice can contribute to the theological imagination of our ever-reforming church. 

3. First Session: The Challenges of Preaching John/ The Prologue
First Session: The Challenges of Preaching John/ The Prologue
Second Session: Outline/Summary of John’s Unique Stories/Lectionary Considerations
Third Session: John’s Homiletic as a Reformation Homiletic

4. The Challenges of Preaching John/The Prologue
First Session
The Challenges of Preaching John/The Prologue

5. Challenges of Preaching the Fourth Gospel
The Spiritual Gospel
(less historical)
High Christology
(later dating)
Perceived Anti-Semitism
Perception of Jesus
(barely human)
Lectionary (supplemental)
“Big” texts (no comparison)

6. Embrace the particulars; preach the details
How to Preach John
The Prologue
Theological themes
3D interpretation, not linear (whole to interpret the part; mutual interpretive possibilities)
Embrace the particulars; preach the details

7. John 20:30-31
30Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. 31But these are written so that you may come to believe/continue to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

8. John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God,
and the Word was God.
Origin
Relationship
Identity

9. a summary of John’s gospel
Where does Jesus come from? This is also where he is going.
Full circle: incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension
What is his relationship with God like? This is the believer’s relationship, too.
Every claim about the relationship between God and Jesus is a claim about the relationship between the believer and God/Jesus
Who is Jesus?
The “I AM”

10. 2 He was in the beginning with God.
3 All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being
4 in him was life, and the life was the light of all people.
5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.

11. John, the Witness
6 There was a man sent from God, whose name was John.
7 He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him.
8 He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light.

12. John (not the Baptist)

13. John 1:9-13
The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. 11 He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. 12 But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.

14. John 1:14
And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father's only son, full of grace and truth.

15. John 1:16
From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.

16. John 1:18
No one has ever seen God (Ex 33:11-23; Judg 6:22-23). It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father's heart, who has made him known.

17. who is the Word made flesh?
ESVJohn 1:18 No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father's side, he has made him known. NKJJohn 1:18 No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him. NABJohn 1:18 No one has ever seen God. The only Son, God, who is at the Father's side, has revealed him. NIVJohn 1:18 No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father's side, has made him known.

18. where is the Word made flesh?
ESVJohn 1:18 No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father's side, he has made him known. NKJJohn 1:18 No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him. NABJohn 1:18 No one has ever seen God. The only Son, God, who is at the Father's side, has revealed him. NIVJohn 1:18 No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father's side, has made him known.

20. what does the Word made flesh do?
ESVJohn 1:18 No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father's side, he has made him known. NKJJohn 1:18 No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him. NABJohn 1:18 No one has ever seen God. The only Son, God, who is at the Father's side, has revealed him. NIVJohn 1:18 No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father's side, has made him known.

21. But there are also many other things that Jesus did; if every one of them were written down, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written. Grace upon grace…