Church, Worship, and Preaching from the Perspectives of Gunton and Webster

Church, Worship, and Preaching from the Perspectives of Gunton and Webster

Andres S. TANG

The aim of this paper is not to discuss what preaching is, nor to teach how to preach. Rather it is to re-think how to think theologically about preaching. We cannot understand preaching by abstracting it from the worship of the church community. Thus we need to grasp theologically what the church community is. Indeed the origin and telos of the church community have to be traced so as to grasp the theological nature or being of the church community in the economic activity of the triune God. In this way, we may understand that the worship of the church community is the proper place of the divine presence. Then the nature of preaching can be grasped in such a context as a theological event, that is, an event of God. Colin E. Gunton and John Webster, two contemporary English theologians, establish the base for us to re-think theologically the issue of preaching.