James E. Beitler III: Seasoned Speech

Seasoned Speech
(IVP, 2019)

WHO: James E. Beitler III, associate professor of English at Wheaton College.

HE SAYS: “Christians can enhance the persuasiveness of our witness as individuals and create a hospitable community for wanderers and wayfarers by paying careful attention to both the rhetorical tradition and our own liturgical practices.”

THE BIG IDEA: The arc of the book’s argument moves from a discussion of individual postures of Christian witness to a discussion of communal ones. The author studies five communicators—C.S. Lewis, Dorothy L. Sayers, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Desmond Tutu and Marilynne Robinson—to inspire reflection, discussion and even imitation

THE PROGRESSION:
The chapters are arranged according to the times and seasons of the church year: Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Easter and Pentecost. After an introduction, the author dedicates one chapter to each Christian communicators mentioned above. Each case study chapter explores the rhetoric of that individual, focusing on their appeals to ethos or another closely related concept. The author concludes with a chapter that introduces readers to Mikhail Bakhtin’s concept of heteroglossia.

“Their words are grounded firmly in the truth but they have been seasoned with the salt of the saints who went before them.”

Order this book from Amazon.com »
Read an excerpt from this book »

Read more about Seasoned Speech in our interview with James Beitler III.

James E. Beitler III
James E. Beitler III

James E. Beitler III is associate professor of English at Wheaton College, where he is the director of first-year writing and also coordinates the Writing Fellows Program. He is the author of Remaking Transitional Justice in the United States and Seasoned Speech.

5 Keys for Sharing Your Faith

We do not need to be contentious and argumentative. We can be kind and grace-filled even when we disagree with others and offer them a whole new worldview.

Embrace Church: Real Transformation

The church’s success is a testament to divine grace working through flawed people, Pastor Adam Weber insists. Embrace’s goal-setting process, called “traction,” has also multiplied its congregation.

Collin Outerbridge: Building a Multicultural, Multigenerational Church

There's something about a unifying vision that is greater than our preferences, that is focused on serving our community, that I think has led to a strong sense of connectivity that's allowed our church to grow and to impact people right here where we live.