Preaching the Sermon on the Mount: The World It Imagines

This collection of essays and sermons challenges us to consider the Sermon on the Mount as Jesus' serious proposal for an alternative society, a speech of resistance to the forces and institutions that dominate the world. This two-part volume brings together the thoughts of biblical scholars and storytellers, theologians and historians, and evangelical and mainline scholars. Eighteen writers tackle Jesus' landmark sermon, as timely in today's discussions of empire, occupation, poverty, and wars as ever. They demonstrate that the Sermon on the Mount puts before us not an impossible ideal, but a vision of what God's people can be when they choose by God's grace to live in God's Kingdom. Contributors include: editors David Fleer and Dave Bland, Ronald J. Allen, Chris Altrock, Lee C. Camp, Charles Campbell, Warren Carter, Jeff Christian, Dennis Dewey, Stanley Hauerwas, Richard Hughes, Kenneth R. Greene, Lucy Lind Hogan, Charme Robarts, Rubel Shelly, John Siburt, Dean Smith, and Jerry Taylor.

David Fleer is professor of religion and communication and special assistant to the president of Lipscomb University in Nashville. . During the last calendar year he preached for churches in 30 different communities and he regularly presents at conferences, seminars, and lectureships in the Churches of Christ. Dave Bland is professor of preaching at Harding University Graduate School of Religion in Memphis, Tennessee where he has taught for sixteen years and where he directs the Doctor of Ministry program. Dave complements his teaching activity with preaching responsibilities at the Church of Christ at White Station in Memphis where he has served as one of the preaching ministers for the past twelve years.