How interactions of race and religion have influenced unity and division in the church At the center of the story of American Christianity lies an integral connection between race relations and Christian unity. Despite claims that Jesus Christ transcends all racial barriers, the most segregated hour in America is still Sunday mornings when Christians gather for worship. In Slavery's Long Shadow fourteen historians and other scholars examine how the sobering historical realities of race relations and Christianity have created both unity and division within American churches from the 1790s into the twenty-first century. The book's three sections offer readers three different entry points into the conversation: major historical periods, case studies, and ways forward. Historians as well as Christians interested in racial reconciliation will find in this book both help for understanding the problem and hope for building a better future.Contributors: Tanya Smith BriceJoel A. BrownLawrence A. Q. BurnleyJeff W. ChildersWes CrawfordJames L. GormanRichard T. HughesLoretta HunnicuttChristopher R. HutsonKathy PulleyEdward J. RobinsonKamilah Hall SharpJerry TaylorD. Newell Williams
"This volume is a commentary on Luke in the Two Horizons New Testament Commentary series. The author uses an approach that bridges the gap between biblical studies and systematic theology, offering section-by-section exegesis of the New Testament texts in close conversation with theological concerns"--
What are churches doing to form the faith of their young people? Many church denominations that practice infant baptism offer confirmation or an equivalent ministry when children reach adolescence and enter a new phase of spiritual growth--but all churches, regardless of tradition, wrestle with how to get young adults to actively join the church. What really works? In this book twelve authors draw on a three-year study of more than three thousand US congregations across five denominations--United Methodist Church, African Methodist Episcopal Church, Episcopal Church, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, and Presbyterian Church (USA)--to answer this pressing question. They tell stories of excellent and innovative confirmation programs that work and that show, above all, what good discipleship with young people looks like. Youth pastors, church leaders, and parents alike will benefit from the practices and new ways of teaching presented here that have proven helpful in forming and enhancing the faith of youth. Contributors: Joy L. Arroyo, Reginald Blount, Kenda Creasy Dean, Katherine M. Douglass, Terri Martinson Elton, Lisa Kimball, Gordon S. Mikoski, Kermit Moss, Richard R. Osmer, Kate Harmon Siberine, Jacob Sorenson, Kate O. Unruh.
Advent, says Fleming Rutledge, is not for the faint of heart. As the midnight of the Christian year, the season of Advent is rife with dark, gritty realities. In this book, with her trademark wit and wisdom, Rutledge explores Advent as a time of rich paradoxes, a season celebrating at once Christ's incarnation and his second coming, and she masterfully unfolds the ethical and future-oriented significance of Advent for the church.
"Kingdom Ethics is arguably the most significant and comprehensive Christian ethics textbook of our time." -- Michelle A. Clifton-Soderstrom, North Park Theological SeminaryChristian churches across the spectrum, and Christian ethics as an academic discipline, are often guilty of evading what Jesus actually said about moral life, focusing instead on other biblical texts or traditions. This evasion of Jesus has seriously malformed Christian moral witness--which Jesus said is tested by whether we put his words "into practice."David Gushee and Glen Stassen's Kingdom Ethics is the leading Christian introductory ethics textbook for the twenty-first century. Solidly rooted in Scripture--and uniquely focusing on Jesus's teachings in the Sermon on the Mount--the book has offered students, pastors, and other readers a comprehensive and challenging framework for Christian ethical thought. Writing to recenter Christian ethics in Jesus Christ, Gushee and Stassen focus on the meaning of the Kingdom of God, perennial themes of moral authority and moral norms, and all the issues raised by the Sermon on the Mount--such as life and death, sexual and gender ethics, love and justice, truth telling, and politics.This second edition of Kingdom Ethics is substantially revised by Gushee and features enhanced and updated treatments of all major contemporary ethical issues--including updated data and examples, a more global perspective, gender-inclusive language, a clearer focus on methodology, discussion questions for every chapter, and a detailed new glossary.Kingdom Ethics is for readers anywhere wanting a robust, comprehensive understanding of Christian ethics that is founded on the concrete teachings of Jesus and will equip them for further exploration into the field.
In this volume David Horrell focuses on themes of community, ethics, and ecology in Paul, moving from the concrete social circumstances in which the earliest Christian communities gathered to the appropriation of Paul's writings in relation to modern ethical challenges. Often questioning established consensus positions, Horrell opens up new perspectives and engages with ongoing debates both in Pauline studies and in contemporary ethics.After covering historical questions about the setting of the Paul-ine communities, The Making of Christian Morality analyzes Paul-ine ethics through a detailed study of particular passages. In the third and final section Horrell brings Pauline thought to bear on contemporary issues and challenges, using the environmental crisis as a case study to demonstrate how Paul's ethics can be appropriated fruitfully in a world so different from Paul's own.
This book features essays by biblical scholars and theologians offering broad reflections on key interpretive issues, rich readings of challenging biblical texts, and interaction with the Christian exegetical tradition from Melito of Sardis to Dietrich Bonhoeffer.The contributors to this volume are leading figures in the theological interpretation of Scripture. Mindful of the Bible's role in relation to God's purposes, people, and world, these essays together offer "acts of interpretation" that aim to advance the faithful and fruitful correlation of Scripture, theology, and culture.Contributors: Craig G. Bartholomew Hans Boersma S. A. Cummins Peter Enns Stephen E. Fowl Joel B. Green Edith M. Humphrey Charles Raith II Christopher R. Seitz Robert W. Wall Jens Zimmermann
Somewhere out there is the "good life," and we're all scrambling to get it. Glenn Pemberton maintains in this book that we find the so-called good life not in good things but in living well--and the biblical book of Proverbs teaches us how to live that life.Though based on solid biblical scholarship, A Life That Is Good is not a textbook, commentary, or comprehensive study. It is instead a readable, practical guide to the wisdom found in the ancient book of Proverbs--wisdom on everyday living, speech, relationships, justice, money, and much more. Pastors and church groups in particular will love and benefit from this relevant guide regarding the message of Proverbs for today's world.
After his church's community in Indianapolis lost nine young men to violence in a few short months, Mather came to see that the poor didn't need his help--he needed theirs. This is the story of how one church found abundance in a community of material poverty. Original.
When Anne Robertson asked a bunch of people on the street what came to mind when they heard the word Bible, she was met with a flood of mixed responses--words like wisdom, lies, faith, rules, ancient history, bigotry, poison, and many more.What she realized was that we all read the Bible through filtered lenses, according to our varied expectations of what the Bible is or should be. But, says Robertson, the Bible as a whole is primarily God's story--a story of relationship, community, and love.Robertson's New Vision for an Old Story gives readers the right lenses to see beyond the printed page to the God who encounters us in dynamic relationship and transforms our lives. The very nature and message of Scripture are rooted in incarnation. When we need to navigate community, truth, fear, and suffering, the Bible-- God's own story--can guide us through it all.
Eschatology and ethics are joined at the hip, says Michael Allen, and both need theocentric reorientation. In Grounded in Heaven Allen retrieves the traditional concept of the beatific vision and seeks to bring Christ back into the heart of our theology and our lives on earth.Responding to the earthly-mindedness of much recent theology, Allen places his focus on God and the heavenly future while also appreciating ways in which the Reformed tradition provides a unique angle on broadly catholic concerns. Reaching back to classical ethics as well as its reformation by Calvin and other Reformed theologians, Grounded in Heaven offers a distinctly Protestant account of the ascetical calling to be heavenly-minded and to deny one's self.
How can we make sense of violence in the Bible? Joshua commands the people of Israel to wipe out everyone in the promised land of Canaan, while Jesus commands God's people to love their enemies. How are we to interpret biblical passages on violence when it is sanctioned at one point and condemned at another?The Violence of the Biblical God by L. Daniel Hawk presents a new framework, solidly rooted in the authority of Scripture, for understanding the paradox of God's participation in violence. Hawk shows how the historical narrative of the Bible offers multiple canonical pictures for faithful Christian engagement with the violent systems of the world.
Caldecott Medalist Raschka breathes new life into the letters of Paul the Apostle, depicting Paul's sincerity and compassion, sadness and pain, giving readers a true sense of who Paul really was. Full color.
Children living in different parts of the world see very different things when they gaze out of their windows. But while their lives may seem different, there's something important that they all share. This beautiful book will spark readers' curiosity and imagination with its celebration of global diversity. Full color.
During the last two decades there has been a renaissance in the field of Christian philosophy. Unfortunately, most of this excellent work has not reached general readers. Reason for the Hope Within was produced specifically to make available the best of contemporary Christian philosophy in a clear, accessible--and highly relevant--manner. Fourteen of America''s rising Christian philosophers cover many of the traditional themes of Christian apologetics as well as topics of special relevance to today''s world: the problem of evilthe possibility of miraclesthe existence of heaven and hellEastern religionsReligion and scienceChristianity and ethics Reason for the Hope Within provides readers with the most up-to-date resources for thinking about and defending the Christian faith. Contributors: Douglas Blount Robin Collins J. A. Cover William C. Davis Scott A. Davison Daniel Howard-Snyder Frances Howard-Snyder Trenton Merricks Caleb Miller Michael J. Murray Timothy O''Connor John O''Leary-Hawthorn Thomas D. Senor W. Christopher Stewart
Founding not only a world religion but also an empire and a civilization, the prophet Muhammad was undoubtedly one of the most influential men in history. Amid the swirl of current judgments regarding Muslims and their religion, this book by Daniel Peterson offers a concise, objective, accessible biography of the first Muslim. Blending the texts of traditional sources into an engaging narrative, Peterson begins with the impoverished and orphaned childhood of Muhammad, highlighting his evident strength of will, character, and resourcefulness. Peterson then moves through the prophet''s life, detailing Muhammad''s visions and revelations and examining the beginning of a religion that continues to affect the entire world in dramatic ways. Respectful and readable, Muhammad, Prophet of God opens a clear window on the life and influence of the founder of Islam.
From the pen of award-winning author Cornelius Plantinga Jr. comes this book of flesh-and-blood Christian meditations with a theological spine.Building on the success of two earlier editions and now splendidly updated, Beyond Doubt unpacks the deep truths of the Christian faith by raising basic questions like these: What is God like?Why pray?Male and female -- how are we related?What is Jesus doing?What is the shape of the godly life?If the Lord is with us, why do we suffer?How do we face death? Plantinga addresses such questions through short, vivid meditations, each of which begins with a Bible verse and ends with a brief edifying prayer.Written in the graceful, polished prose that Plantinga is celebrated for, Beyond Doubt will help both new Christians and mature believers to grow in their faith.
Given all that has been written about the Gospel of John over the past twenty centuries, can anything more possibly be said about it? Yes, says Jerome Neyrey -- by reading this "maverick Gospel" in terms of ancient rhetoric and by viewing it in terms of cultural anthropology. / By interpreting the text in these two fresh ways, Neyrey distinctively illuminates the Gospel of John, casting new light on its theological message and on such topics as Jesus the revealer practicing secrecy, foot-washing as transformation ritual, and the Jewish background of Jesus'' equality with God, of Jesus being "greater than" Abraham. Neyrey''s scholarly study will certainly educate -- and at times provoke -- attentive readers.
At the beginning of the twenty-first century, Christianity faces one of its greatest opportunities, as well as one of its greatest challenges -- the formulation of a global theology. In Beyond Pentecostalism Wolfgang Vondey argues that Pentecostal thought and praxis represent an indispensable catalyst for the realization of this task. Accentuating Pentecostalism as a manifestation of what he calls the crisis of global Christianity, Vondey describes the elements of this crisis -- manifested chiefly in theology''s turn toward a performance-oriented enterprise -- and suggests that the task of overcoming the crisis demands an integration of Pentecostalism in the global theological agenda. This task will inevitably push Christianity beyond the boundaries of the classical Pentecostal tradition. In fact, Vondey suggests, Pentecostalism itself is in the process of going beyond its own historical, theological, socio-cultural, and institutional boundaries. His ultimate goal is not a "pentecostalization" of Christianity but rather a renewal of the theological landscape in light of the significance of Pentecostal voices, thoughts, and practices worldwide.
DESCRIPTION > The coming-of-age stories in Thin Ice relate a range of experiences both good and bad, including happy memories and heartwarming recollections but also personal traumas, intergenerational and racial conflicts, the strictures of religious belief and practice, the joys and sorrows of young romance, and more. Above and beyond the stories of the more notable personalities -- Jim Harrison, Roger Wilkins, John Hockenberry, President Gerald Ford, Betty Ford, Al Green, Paul Schrader, William Brashler -- the book as a whole is chock-full of crisp, humorous, irreverent, and moving writing. Reinder Van Til and Gordon Olson have excerpted half of the pieces from previous publications, while they directly solicited the other half from active writers specifically for this book. The earliest stories go back to the 1830s and 1850s, and the most recent are a cluster of contemporary pieces that describe coming of age in the Grand Rapids of the 1960s through the 1980s. Together they paint a multifaceted, impressionistic portrait of a century and a half in the fair city of Grand Rapids, Michigan. All in all, Thin Ice is a nostalgic treasure for any Grand Rapidian and literary treasure for e v e r y one. Contributors Albert Baxter Charles E. Belknap A. J. Muste Arnold Gingrich David Cornel DeJong Gerald R. Ford Betty Ford Edward V. Gillis John Thompson Roger Wilkins Jim Harrison Glen Peterson Max Apple John Otterbacher Reinder Van Til Al Green Paul Schrader Robert VanderMolen William Brashler Sheri Venema Hank Meijer Charles Honey Tom Rademacher Levi Rickert John Hockenberry Laura Kasischke Kaye Longberg Bich Minh Nguyen
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