The Archer and the Arrow: Preaching the Very Words of God

I like Jensen's work and most of his points make theological and ontological sense. His central thrust is that we need to ensure preaching is delivered with a keen eye and ear for how Bible writers piece together material and buildestablish points- verse by verse. Jensen is a little conservative though, and some of his points suggest that there is only one way to preach well. I'm not convinced by his points that this is necessarily the case. A good book to start with, though, if you've been approached by your church to preach. Happy sermon speaking!

How good is it that Phillip Jensen, who has been called """"a once in a lifetime preacher"""" should put together his thoughts on preaching so that others may benefit?\\r\\n\\r\\nIn this book, you get Phillip Jensen's ideas, skilfully organised by Paul Grimmond, one of Jensen's admirers and followers. Grimmond is well-placed to do this, because he has listened to Jensen speak for more than 20 years and has put his principles into practice in his own speaking ministry. \\r\\n\\r\\nTim Challies says that the image Jensen uses to depict preaching is too complicated and not one that people will be able to remember. He contrasts this with the simple, effective and memorable image of the trellis and the vine in Colin Marshall and Tony Payne's earlier companion volume to this one. He expects that image will be used by many to depict the administrative work in Christian ministry (trellis work) versus the task of drawing God's people into his kingdom through evangelism (vine work). However in this book, the straightforward image used of an archer (the preacher) and his arrow (the sermon) is made more complex by Jensen's depiction of the arrow's head, shaft and feathers as illustrations of the elements of a sermon as message, exegesis and theology. \\r\\n\\r\\nBut is it as hard to grasp as Challies makes out? I think that it is unpacked fairly clearly, and is a useful device for reminding us of all that is needed to create a successful message which challenges listeners to action.…