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Volume I is a compilation of 40 sermons preached by an Episcopal deacon who has been a physician for 48 years. The Rev. Seibert responds to her call as a deacon to "interpret to the Church the needs, concerns, and hopes of the world" as a narrative preacher. She is a storyteller sharing stories showing the relevance of the gospel to the world where she lives and works. She takes the listener through a gospel "midrash" or imagining the gospel as in an Ignatian spiritual exercise putting the listener inside the gospel. The sermons are based on the three-year Revised Common Sunday Lectionary in the Episcopal Church, Catholic and most Protestant Churches, usually interpreting the gospel. Volume II has sermons for special occasions, funerals, following disasters, ordinations, children sermons, weddings. Dr. Seibert takes seriously Frederick Buechner's advice to homilists and writers that the greatest importance is how well the preacher's words connect to the words inside the listener and how well the listener experiences the gospel during their brief time together. "(It) is not the preachers' eloquence but the lump in your throat or leap of your heart or the thorn in your flesh.."
About the author
The Rev. Joanna J. Seibert MD is a professor of pediatrics and radiology at Arkansas Children's Hospital and the University of Arkansas who has been an ordained deacon in the Episcopal Church for 14 years. Other books by this retreat leader are Taste and See, The Call of the Psalms for Busy People and for People in Recovery,and Healing Presence
