I had the privilege of studying preaching under the guidance of Dr. J. Ellsworth Kalas. Though a textbook could be written about his method, his was not a “textbook” method. He taught us would be preachers to approach preaching as a sacred art, a craft of weaving the biblical story into and out of the souls of men and women. Though he didn’t scorn books on preaching, he seemed more intent that we read classic literature. In fact, he assigned it. I still have the list. As I read Derek Vreeland’s fine post on reading fiction it reminded me of that list. I thought our Seedbed community might enjoy seeing the recommended reading list of one of the great preachers of the 20th and now 21st century.
Essays
G.K. Chesterton
All I Survey, a book of essays
All is Grist, a book of essays
As I was saying
T.S. Eliot, Christianity and Culture
Madeleine L’Engle, The Irrational Season
Poetry
T.S. Eliot, The Complete Poems and Plays
Robert Frost, In the Clearing
Letters
James Agee, Letters of James Agee to Father Flye
Novels
Louis Auchincloss, The Rector of Justin
Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Crime and Punishment
Graham Greene, The Heart of the Matter
Thomas Hardy, Far from the Madding Crowd
Sinclair Lewis, Dodsworth
John P. Marquand, The Late George Apley
Alan Paton, Too Late the Phalarope
Robert Penn Warren, All the King’s Men
Charles Williams, All Hallow’s Eve
Thomas Wolfe, The Web and the Rock
If you want to sample the preaching works of Ellsworth Kalas, Seedbed has collected some his greatest hits and made them available here.