Beeson Podcast, Episode #590 Dr. Michael Knowles March 1, 2022 >>Announcer: Welcome to the Beeson podcast, coming to you from Beeson Divinity School on the campus of Samford University. Now your hosts, Doug Sweeney and Kristen Padilla. >>Doug Sweeney: Welcome to the Beeson Podcast. I’m your host, Doug Sweeney, here with my co-host, Kristen Padilla. We are glad to welcome you back into our studio. Spring is just around the corner and our halls here are buzzing with fellowship and learning. If you’re never been to our campus you really ought to visit. We would love to show you around. In the meantime we’d love for you to visit us online. You can join us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and on our website for all kinds of live events and recordings. Check us out at www.BeesonDivinity.com. Today’s guest is on campus giving our William E. Conger Junior Lectures in Biblical Preaching. So, who is this person, Kristen? And what are we going to talk about today? >>Kristen Padilla: Hi Doug. Hello, Podcast Listeners. We have the Reverend Dr. Michael Knowles with us in the studio, I’m glad to say. He is Professor of Preaching in the Hurlburt Chair of Preaching at McMaster Divinity College in Canada. He is ordained in the Anglican Church of Canada and is the author of seven books. So, welcome, Dr. Knowles to the Beeson Podcast. >>Dr. Knowles: Thank you so much, it’s so lovely to be with you, and thank you for your consistently warm hospitality during my visit. >>Kristen Padilla: Well, it’s been such a joy to get to meet you and to have fellowship with you over a meal last night. I’m excited to introduce you to our podcast listeners. I wonder if you can tell us more about who you are? Your background and your journey to faith in Jesus Christ? >>Dr. Knowles: So, I’m the child of English immigrants, post war immigrants. Born in Calgary, Alberta. Grew up, went to university in Victoria B.C. While I was there I was in the English Department at U Vic. I was doing my undergraduate degree. There were a number of Christians in the department. I know they prayed mightily for this very lost young man. My conversion is actually quite an unusual one, because having built some bookcases to accommodate my university books I dug out an old Gideon’s Bible that I had received in grade five – and reading the back about accepting Jesus as your Lord and Savior ... I actually signed in the back of a Gideon’s New Testament and was profoundly converted, much to my surprise. So, my background is Anglican. I’m ordained in the Anglican Church of Canada. That’s simply my background. I’ve never thought of going elsewhere in terms of my own affiliation but I have had lots of fellowship and experience with lots of folks across a wide range of denominational expressions and experiences. >>Doug Sweeney: I bet a few of our listeners know a little bit about the Anglican Church of Canada. But most of them don’t know much. Would you tell us a little bit about your denomination and how you became an ordained minister? >>Dr. Knowles: Oh, sure, that’s actually quite simple. It’s the Church of England. It’s like Episcopalian but the Canadian version. Historically aligned with the powers of state, which has been kind of interesting, even though now Canada is a very secular country. After I finished my English degree I did an honors degree and I studied John Bunyan, a Puritan proto Baptist. I very much felt the call to study theology. And during the first two years of my MDiv degree I spent literally hundreds of hours on my knees praying that the Lord would show me the way. One day he did. I had this quite remarkable experience in which he didn’t show me anything outside of myself. He showed me in fact that I had a pastor’s heart. And I was livid, because it turned out that all along I’d been resisting his call. He was actually calling me into ministry and I didn’t want ministry. I wanted to be an academic. So, we weren’t on speaking terms for a little while after that. But I eventually (laughs) came to my senses. So, I’m ordained in the Anglican Church simply because that’s where the Lord has called me. Not because of the excellence of or the qualities of a particular denomination, but because that’s where the Lord has chosen to have me work. I’m honored to do that. >>Kristen Padilla: You mentioned also your desire and call to be an academic. And you are one. You are a professor of preaching, as I’ve already said, and you’ve already told me this story, but I think it will interest our listeners – how you got into teaching, preaching, and teaching others about the discipline of preaching? >>Dr. Knowles: So, when I finished my doctoral degree I was first off given a position of assistant director of an institute of evangelism at our Anglican College. I know that for some folks Episcopalian or Anglican and evangelism tend to not occur in the same paragraph, let alone the same sentence, but we had an institute of evangelism. When in effect funding for that came to an end my doctoral supervisor, Richard Longnecker, was teaching at McMaster. And he wanted me to come and help him teach New Testament courses at McMaster. So, invited me out to dinner with the principal of the day. I discovered to my dismay that as I really thought about it I didn’t want to teach New Testament, though I’ve published in New Testament, though it fascinates me in a way, it’s kind of like with a computer. I’m a computer user, not a computer programmer. Often, the way New Testament ... Well, sometimes the way New Testament is taught is it’s very technical, it’s like learning C++ for religion. Not my thing. So, after a long and very awkward dinner in which I managed not either to offend my hosts, nor to say “yes” to this proposal, Dr. Brackney, the principal of the day said, “Well, what else do you do, Dr. Knowles?” And I said, “Well,” very grateful for a change of topic, “I’m preaching Sunday evenings at an Anglican Church. I’m preaching through the Book of Acts.” And he said, “Well, then we may just have a position for you.” So, this came as a complete surprise to me, but I found it to be a point of conversion and convergence. Conversion in the sense that it was a new call to me. Convergence in the sense that it brought together spirituality, scholarship, church leadership, ordination, service in pastoral ministry. And I thought, “Oh, I think I could enjoy that. I might be able to do that.” So, completely by accident, quite frankly, I’m still a bit surprised by it after 25 years. It’s the only, as far as I know, the only funded and named chair in preaching in Canada. I’m not quite sure why I have it, except by the grace of God. >>Doug Sweeney: You’ve already mentioned that you’re on our campus this week, giving our Conger Lectures in Preaching, a storied annual lecture series here at Beeson. What are you telling the students this week? You’ve given a lecture on preaching crucifixion, we’re looking forward to a lecture on preaching resurrection. What can our listeners know about what you’re sharing with the students? >>Dr. Knowles: In one sense, it’s quite simple. There is no word for discipleship in the New Testament. In place of Paul talking about an abstract principle of discipleship he says instead that Christian identity consists of being in Christ, in Christ Jesus, in Christ the Lord. There’s some variations, but 164 times he says that to be a follower of Jesus is to be mystically made one with him. Well, these lectures are really the exposition of that idea that to be joined to the life of Jesus means that we enter first into his death and then into his resurrection. And so we’re really talking about whether in the life of discipleship or the life of preaching, what does it mean to be governed in practical terms by always coming to a point of yieldedness. What the German Pietists would call “[foreign language 00:08:36],” to give, to yield yourself up. What does it mean to come to a point of utter dependence upon the author of life so that he can give life to you as a person, to your ministry, to your preaching? So, we’re really talking about living the pattern of the life of Jesus in the world today. >>Kristen Padilla: I mentioned that you have written seven books and I know that you are working on a new project that is entitled, “The Throne, The Lamb, and The Song: Worshipping With the Apocalypse of John.” I’d love to know about this project and specifically what the Book of Revelation has to say about a theology of worship? >>Dr. Knowles: Well, if I can, I want to start somewhere slightly different to answer that question. An unusual place. The Tower of Babel. We think of it as they’re trying to storm Heaven. I don’t think so. I think what happens is this is a Mesopotamian [ziggurat 00:09:28] where what they’ve done is they’ve built a temple, or at least a step pyramid with a temple at the bottom and a temple at the top, because by so doing they have harnessed ingenuity, human ability to set the terms and times and conditions for worship. I think we replicate that heresy over and over again. We say, “If you are to worship, you must worship using this language and not that. This music, not that. In my denominational pattern, not the other one.” We set the table for the Lord and then say, “Okay, Lord, we’re ready for you now. You can come.” Well, worship in the Book of Revelation is the very opposite of that. It’s worship impelled by the vision of God. Where worship begins ... This book expounds, I think, seven different worship scenes. And each one of them is because John has been invited into the presence of the living God, the glory of the Heavenly Father. And it’s the sight of God that impels worship. And I have to say, I’m personally impelled by that. That allows us to hang loose a little bit to all of the constraints by which we seek to set limits on how we should worship and where God is permitted to show up. I would like to start at the other end of things. To have this vision of God out of which we cannot but worship as God reveals himself we simply respond by declaring, “Glory and worship and honor and praise is Yours.” >>Kristen Padilla: And when does that book come out? >>Dr. Knowles: Well, I have absolutely no idea. Because I haven’t yet found a publisher. So, yeah, we’ll see. (laughs) >>Doug Sweeney: Well, publishers, take note. There’s a good book in the works here. Dr. Knowles, Kristen and I know that you’re an old friend of Dr. Mike Pasquarello, who is one of our faculty members here at Beeson. And a lot of our listeners know that one of the hats Mike Pasquarello wears here at Beeson is that he serves as the Director of our Preaching Institute. And a lot of our listeners will know, too, that one of the most popular lecture series offered through the Preaching Institute here at Beeson is called, “Text to Sermon,” where Dr. Pasquarello brings preachers of various sorts in every year to explain to students and pastors from the area who come and attend the lectures as well how it is they prepare to preach. How they move from study and prayer over text to scripture to the delivery of a sermon from the pulpit. Kristen and I thought it would be helpful to ask you the same question so our listeners can benefit from your experience as well. So, how do you go about preparing the sermons that you preach? >>Dr. Knowles: Well, thanks for that wonderful question. So, let me tell another story that rather somewhat earlier in my preaching career I got very discouraged with my preaching, because I found that I was telling my hearers, good evangelical Anglicans, believe it or not there are such things ... good evangelical Anglicans to be more faithful, to believe more, to be better followers of Jesus – and I found that all of my trying to exhort was only depressing them and depressing me. It wasn’t actually getting anywhere. And so of necessity I had to change the way I read the text. So, when I read a text I look for who God is and what God is doing. Not even what I should say first. And I do have to say a little story on myself, I hope it’s not totally neurotic, but I often start ... In the Anglican liturgical context, liturgical sacramental polity, the text of the week is given. And often I come to those texts, there will be several, without a clue what to speak on. And I have to pray. I have to say, “Lord, you’ve got to show me something or I have nothing.” But I begin to listen and pray and look in the text, not for what I ought to do as a result, nor can I reduce it to a single proposition, sorry, but can I catch a glimpse of the living powerful Word of God at work, not propositionally, but in the person of Jesus? What is he doing? How is Paul or Luke or the Book of Revelation, or Hebrews, what are they saying about who Jesus is and what he does? And I try to talk about that. So, then the one who carries the sermon is not my brilliant exposition. But the fact that Jesus is the one who does these things. And it invites the hearers then to look to him. To check it out ... it’s not true because I said it, it’s true because he does it. And that’s how I would move into a sermon. >>Kristen Padilla: We have a lot of pastors and preachers who listen to the podcast and I’ve heard you talk about this week and I know you’ve written on this topic. About how to preach and proclaim the gospel in a post Christendom era. And I wonder if you can just unpack that for a bit for our listeners? What would you say about preaching the gospel in the post Christendom era? >>Dr. Knowles: Yes, fabulous, because Canada as some of your listeners may know is a much more secular country than the US is, in almost any of its regions. So, post Christendom and postmodernism go together. And vastly oversimplifying, post Christendom is about the loss of power on the part of the Church. Post modernism is about lack of confidence in anybody making universal truth claims. It’s a vast oversimplification, but if we can just take those two things. I think that, it turns out I’m teaching a course right now on postmodern post Christendom preaching, so thankful for the question. With respect to power, I think that preaching today is non coercive. We can’t compel people to believe. We can’t say, “You must believe or the powers of Hell will overtake you.” That’s just never going to fly. And we’re not in a position of power to insist on anything. So, instead, we yield and we bear witness to the thing that does not depend on us alone. So, my orientation with other people like Tom Long is to talk about preaching as testimony. Bearing witness to a thing that’s larger than ourselves and our responsibility is simply to bear witness to a greater thing than ourselves. And that verges over directly into postmodernism. The thing is not ... postmodernism is inherently suspicious of universal truth claims. So, we’re not, I’m not preaching that you ought to believe a universal because it’s somehow abstractly true, it becomes true in the embodied truth who is Jesus himself. Really, quick note here – truth in Hebrew scripture and in Hebrew is not only abstract propositional truth, but it is the truthfulness of the one who his himself true. So, in a biblical perspective, the truth of scripture is the fact that God is faithful to the things he says. So, we’re de-propositionalizing in a certain sense by drawing attention to the character and the reality and the agency of God. >>Doug Sweeney: That’s good. Kristen and I have a tradition in these podcast interviews. We ask all of our guests what the Lord is doing in their lives these days, what the Lord is teaching them these days. We’ve learned already, after just a couple of days with you that you do walk with the Lord and you’re full of biblical wisdom. What’s God teaching you now? Anything that you could say to our listeners by way of edifying them in conclusion about what you’re learning from the Lord these days? >>Dr. Knowles: You know? I don’t think the lesson in principle is ever different, it’s always just deeper. He keeps calling me to trust him. I’m headed for retirement at some point. I have no idea what that will look like. But I know he calls me to trust him. And the thing that’s interesting is that I’ve had to learn over the years it’s not trusting the things that he gives, “Lord, I asked you for this and I’m trusting you ...” He’s actually not asking me to trust the gift, he’s asking me to trust the giver. Because often even when he doesn’t give us the thing we asked for he always give us himself. He is always himself the answer to any of our prayers. And that’s what he’s teaching me. And the lesson always goes deeper and I don’t think it will ever end until I see him face to face. >>Doug Sweeney: A wonderful word and a wonderful way to end this interview. You have been listening to the Reverend Dr. Michael Knowles. He is Professor of Preaching and the George F. Hurlburt Chair of Preaching at McMaster Divinity College in Hamilton, Ontario. He’s an ordained minister in the Anglican Church of Canada. He’s a prolific author and he’s becoming a dear friend of all of us here at Beeson Divinity School. So, thank you, Dr. Knowles, for being with us today and this week. Thank you, listeners, for tuning in again. We love you. We’re praying for you. And we say “goodbye” for now. >>Kristen Padilla: You’ve been listening to the Beeson podcast. Our theme music is written and performed by Advent Birmingham of the Cathedral Church of the Advent in Birmingham, Alabama. Our engineer is Rob Willis. Our announcer is Mike Pasquarello. Our co-hosts are Doug Sweeney and, myself, Kristen Padilla. Please subscribe to the Beeson podcast at www.BeesonDivinity.com/podcast or on iTunes.