2019 Bast Preaching Festival
Featuring Rev. Timothy Blackmon, Wheaton College Chaplain
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November 4, 2019
The Ostrich and the Dominee: Homiletics in an Anxious Age
Have you ever stayed up all night, wondering what to say, how to say it, and when to say it?
Has your recycling bin overflowed with piles of crumpled notes, unfit for use?
Have you ever felt your heart pound in your chest as you rose to speak? As if something was stuck in your throat as your microphone went live?
If you answered ‘yes’ to any of these questions, you are probably a preacher.
Whether it is easy or not, and whether you like it or not, you are called to speak in public. You preach through election seasons and national tragedies. You lead the prayers of the people in the aftermath of terrorist attacks and in the middle of high-octane controversies. Perhaps you face the weekly pressures of “Why don’t you say something?” or, “Why did you say that?”
If you’ve ever wonder what it means to be faithful to your calling in an anxious age, we invite you to the 2019 Bast Preaching Festival featuring Rev. Timothy Blackmon, Wheaton College Chaplain.
Tim’s lectures entitled The Ostrich and the Dominee: Homiletics in an Anxious Age will take a close look at the power and the pitfalls of a preacher’s public speech. We will explore what it means to speak for God, with conviction, clarity and creativity during troubled times.
Rev. Timothy Blackmon is the chaplain of Wheaton College. He grew up in The Netherlands, earned a Bible and Theology degree at the European Bible Institute in Lamorlaye, France, and graduated from Calvin Theological Seminary with an M.Div. Rev. Blackmon has served church plants in California as well as The American Protestant Church of The Hague in The Netherlands prior to becoming the sixth chaplain of Wheaton in 2015.
Schedule
8:00am – Registration
8:30-9:45 – Session 1 – Plenary with Rev. Tim Blackmon (chapel)
9:45-9:55- short break
9:55-10:15 – Chapel (Rev. Tim Blackmon preaching)
10:15-10:45 – Community time
10:45-11:45 – Workshops/Breakout
– Karen Campbell (in the chapel)
– Isaac Anderson (in 019)
– Joel Schoon-Tanis (in 105)
11:45-1:00 – Lunch- boxed lunches provided
1:00-2:00 – Workshops (same as earlier)
2:00-2:15 – coffee break
2:15-3:30 – Session 2 – Plenary with Rev. Tim Blackmon (chapel)
3:30-4:00 – Closing
Workshops
Playfulness in Preaching
Through Show and Tell and a bit of doodling, artist Joel Schoon-Tanis will explore core ideas around the creative process (and how to nurture it) as well as give examples of how to use art and art making in worship and in preaching. After this groundwork is laid, Joel will invite participants into some hands on exercises. No obvious art skills necessary!
For nearly 30 years Joel Schoon-Tanis has been a working artist in Holland, Michigan. He has written and illustrated a handful of books (recently “40: the Biblical story”, “At Psalm’s School” and “At God’s Table”), painted murals around the world (including Kenya, Zambia, the Separation Wall in Palestine and exotic northern Wisconsin), and painted nearly a gazillion paintings in his career. His work is in churches, children’s hospitals, schools, restaurants, businesses and many private collections. In 2016 one of his images was presented to the Pope. In 2017 he joined international artists in Leipzig, Germany to create art around themes of social justice in conjunction with a gathering for the 500thanniversary of the Reformation.
Music and Metaphor
When we consider the disciplines of music and preaching, what is the balance between creating and discovering? Between conducting and accompaniment? This session with Rev. Karen Campbell will explore some metaphors from music that might serve to enable deeper faithfulness and creativity in preaching.
Karen Campbell was originally ordained within the Presbyterian Church in Ireland but transferred to the CRC denomination just over a year ago to take up her role as co-pastor in Church of the Servant Grand Rapids. In addition to preaching and pastoring, Karen is a keen musician and enjoys music making in a variety of settings.
Crafting the Counterspell
The poet Marie Howe describes a poem as a counterspell to the prevailing narratives of modern life. This session with writer Isaac Anderson will consider the sermon as counterspell and the preaching act as an invitation to be reawakened or unsettled again by biblical texts. Attention will be given to creative process, the stewardship of language, constructing tapestries and transitions, and reckoning with “the underneath.” There will also be time for Q/A.
Isaac Anderson is a writer and former teaching pastor at Jacob’s Well Church in Kansas City. His writing has appeared in Image, The Los Angeles Review of Books, TheAtlantic.com, Portland Magazine, The Christian Century, Fourth Genre, and elsewhere, and has received honorable mention in Best American Essays. He has taught writing at Ohio State University, Lenoir-Rhyne University, Western Theological Seminary, Seattle Pacific University, and the Kansas City Art Institute. He currently works as a Communications Officer at World Vision in Washington, D.C.
