Great Evangelical Preachers of Yesterday, James McGraw, Abingdon Press, New York, 159 pages, $2.75.
James McGraw is professor of preaching and pastoral ministry at Nazarene Theological Seminary, Kansas City, Missouri. He is also an experienced pastor. In his book the author has covered 24 preaching giants from Wycliffe's time to G. Campbell Morgan of the early twentieth century. His chapters are brief but they crowd in the inspirational and practical preparation of the preaching ministry in its various facets.
The pithy, pointed statements of many biographers are well summarized, so that the book itself becomes a simple analysis of the genius behind these successful preachers. Preaching is elevated into an artful skill, with a strong emphasis on both doctrinal and expository preaching. Here is basic knowledge of ministerial methods that have not become antiquated in present-day soul winning. Many of the men mentioned above moved large audiences for Christ in their day, and their power stimulates every evangelistic-minded pulpiteer today.
Great Evangelical Preachers of Yesterday provides a most useful bibliography. Another value is the frequent technique of effective sermon building, all in down-to-earth style. The simplicity of sermon technique is frequently stressed by means of examples.
To denominational workers who have in recent years basked in our local lectureships, this book will provide continuing inspiration. We recommend it also to college Bible teachers for their classwork.
Louise C. Kleuser
Assignment: Overseas, by John Rosengrant and others, Thomas V. Crowell Co., New York, 1960, $1.95.
Americans or other nationals planning to go overseas and desiring to be helpful, effective residents or visitors in other lands, will find Assignment: Overseas of tremendous help. It is especially applicable to American missionaries and Christian tourists toward whom the book is beamed and who recognize that their religious faith must be the basis for their way of life.
This book will not solve all the problems but it can certainly assist every reader in becoming sensitive to the way of life in other cultures and societies. Assignment: Overseas contains facts, ideas, suggestions, and the considered opinions of a variety of experts, which should substantially help those who are going overseas and wish to be properly oriented.
The book had its origin in lectures given at the Institute on Overseas Churchmanship and was designed especially for people planning to embark on overseas assignments for government, business, technical assistance organizations, and service organizations. It directs the thinking of such people into areas such as—
1. The tensions, problems, and dilemmas with which the individual will be confronted as an American and as a Christian in his relationships with other people abroad.
2. Our belief as Christians about the worth and dignity of man wherever he may be found.
3. The uniqueness of the Christian faith.
4. The making of an intelligent Christian witness in everyday relationships and personal associations overseas.
Assignment: Overseas gives evidence of careful and sensitive editing. It merits a wide reading by ministers and all concerned with our worldwide movement.
E. W. Dunbar
The Making of a Minister (the autobiography of Clarence E. Macartney). J. Clyde Henry, Channel Press, Inc., Great Neck, New York, 1961, 224 pages, $3.00.
J. Clyde Henry introduces the autobiographer to his readers. The life, talents, pulpit strength, and pastoral appeal of this minister are referred to as a part of the great American heritage. Its flavor is different from some other national backgrounds. It shows the spiritual and civic development of a man who made a success of large city pastoring in America. One of the book's contributions is a firsthand evaluation of the Harry Emerson Fosdick issues—the controversy between the modernists and liberals. In this Clarence E. Macartney and J. Gresham Machen hold up the fundamentalist standards.
Louise C. Kleuser
