For most of history, argues John Dillenberger, the visual arts were, for better or worse, part of the very fabric of the life and thought of the church. But with the Reformation and the Counter-Reformation a major change took place. Protestant rejection of the visual was matched in Roman Catholicism by the reduction of its formative power. While the visual arts dropped out of the lives of Protestant churches, they became a memory rather than a source of ennoblement or power in the Roman Catholic Church. Thus, in different but allied ways, Protestants and Catholics lost the power of the visual.Part art history, part historical theology, and part theological reflection, this book is both an argument and a program for the recovery of the visual arts in the life of the church, for reclaiming seeing as part of religious perception. It offers a theological understanding of the visual and provides a basis upon which the visual arts may again be incorporated into Protestantism and reinvigorated in Roman Catholicism. The first part is devoted to historical reconstruction, exploring those moments in Western history in which the relation between religion and the arts was in ferment. Part 2 is given to contemporary delineation and analysis: of spiritual perceptions in modern American painting and sculpture, of modern church art and architecture, and of the changing views of contemporary theologians toward the visual arts. Citing David Tracy, Karl Rahner, Langdon Gilkey, and others as examples, Dillenberger argues that contemporary theology is moving away from the modern rationalistic understanding of theological analogy to one far closer to the arts. Part 3 is constructive, developing a theological perspective that demands and includes the visual arts, and suggesting ways in which this can be accomplished in pastoral and theological education.The world of art, says Professor Dillenberger, is more aware of the role of religion in the arts than the world of religion is of art. Thus it is time for the church to resume its historic association with the visual arts, albeit in analogous rather than repristinating ways.
In fifteen thorough chapters David Ewert surveys the whole range of New Testament authors to discover what they have to say on the Holy Spirit and what this means for the life of the believer and for the church.To add another book on the Holy Spirit to the great number available is a daunting undertaking, the author admits. One can only hope that by ordering the biblical materials in a new way, familiar truths will shine with new luster. Perhaps by bringing the relevant biblical passages to bear on the life of the church in our day old truths can be seen in a new light.The material is organizzed in three parts: (1) The Promise of the Spirit, considering all the passages of the Gospels that speak of the Holy Spirit; (2) The Coming of the Spirit, dealing with the Pentecostal outpouring of the Spirit in the book of Acts and the continual overflow of the Spirit in the expansion of the church; and (3) The Spirit in the Life of the Believer, studying what the apostles have to say about the Holy Spirit in the epistles.Many have instinctively sensed that the teaching of the New Testament on the Holy Spirit is a key that unlocks many doors, the author notes. Jesus likened the Spirit to the wind, with its mysterious and numinous character. Just as we can hear and feel the blowing of the wind, by God''s grace we can experience the presence and the power of the Spirit, if we are willing to get in the path of God''s wind.
For over a hundred years, Anglican church buildings in every part of the world were dominated by a single idea of what churches should look like and how they should be arranged inside. Only since Vatican II has the dominance of this idea been finally overthrown. Thousands of churches still reflect the architectural dogmas of the Cambridge Camden Society. Millions of worshippers still imbibe the theology so effectively promoted by this group through its powerful influence on the arrangement of church interiors and the style of such buildings. And many of these architectural images of what is the nature of the Church itself have proved to be the most stubborn resisters of Vatican II reforms.The Cambridge Camden Society was so successful in changing the outward aspects of Anglican worship because it had specific ideas as to how churches should be arranged. The Society''s infatuation with a certain period of gothic architecture and with the whole medieval ''cultus'' brought about drastic changes in worship according to the ''Book of Common Prayer'' without changing a single letter of the prayer book itself. The members of the Society led the way not only in the revival of medieval architecture but also of vestments and ceremonial.Though much of the Cambridge Camden theology reflects that of the Oxford Movement, Dr. White shows both parallels and contrasts between the aims of Oxford tractarians and Cambridge ecclesiologists. Architecture proved to be every bit as effective a form of propaganda as tracts, and a good deal more permanent. The public, at first hostile, eventually became receptive to the ideals of the Cambridge Movement. The measure of the Movement''s success is seen in almost all Anglican (and many Protestant) churches built or remodelled between 1840 and the 1960s. This is a valuable contribution to nineteenth-century studies, especially to the visual history of the period.
Noting that Christians in the 20th century have not been able to make up their minds whether God and our corporate lives have anything to do with each other, Dyrness explores the century''s theological trends. Citing the impact of contemporary hermeneutics, Dyrness shows how the Bible still functions as a master narrative wherein Christians can find themselves. Dyrness addresses various aspects of contemporary culture, constructing a theology of embodiment that connects culture and worship in concrete ways.For all those concerned with issues of religion and culture, particularly of the raging Culture Wars, ''The Earth is God''s'' offers an informed Evangelical view that is at once balanced and hopeful.
What is the secret of a vital, growing church? The answer Dr. Ortlund suggests in this book is deceptively simple - and life-changing. In thirty years of working with churches big and small, he has come to believe that the church comes closest to being what God intended when it structures itself around three priorities:Priority One: ChristPriority Two: The Body of ChristPriority Three: The WorldAnd he draws on wide reading, extensive Bible Study, and years of personal experience to show ''how'' rediscovering and using these three priorities can make a tangible difference in the life of any church. ''Three Priorities for a Strong and Local Church'' is a must reading for ministers, but also for church staffers, vestry, elders, counselors, teachers, small-group leaders - anyone who cares deeply about the church of Jesus Christ and what it can be.
Responding to the need for quality material for personal and group Bible study, Ronald S. Wallace has taken care to write this exposition of 1 Kings in such a way that modern readers can learn from this part of the Old Testament, and pastors and teachers can use it in their work.Designed to benefit classroom settings and weekly study groups, this book is divided into sixteen sections that help bring about a clear understanding of the message of 1 Kings. An introduction to each section describes the main historical facts to be noted as the passage is read, and each section concludes with a list of questions and notes that prompt further discussion and study.
This is a book about youth ministry - a ministry with youth based in the local congregation. Seven theological themes utilizing a lectionary/ seasons-of-the-year framework, provide this book''s core. Here is a resource to help youth and youth leaders struggle with a reconstruction of the role of the congregation in transformative ministry with youth.
''Election: Love Before Time'' is a book that talks about some of the greatest words in the Bible; election, foreknowledge, and predestination. It places them into a context of God''s sovereignty and love. It endeavors to treat them honestly and cogently without diluting their meaning through human rationalization. These words are significant to our faith and spiritual health. Man shall not live by bread alone, Jesus said, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. We will live better with these words than without them.
Only in the gospel of Jesus Christ does your weakness provide the platform for God''s glory and grace. Jesus uses your weaknesses of sin and of circumstance to gloriously display the truth that his grace is sufficient for you and that his power is made perfect in weakness. When You Are Weak guides the reader to explore the practical theology of 2 Corinthians 12 and to usher you unto the green pastures of God''s transformative grace. God uses the "thorns of the flesh" experienced in this life to bring you by his sovereign, never-letting-go love into greater communion and fellowship with him so that he might become your greatest joy and treasure. When you are weak, boasting in Jesus makes you strong!
Making the Word of God Fully Known is a collection of essays on church, culture, and mission relevant for the Australian church in honor of the sixty-fifth birthday of Archbishop Philip Freier, archbishop of Melbourne. The essays cover aspects of mission strategy, ministry of women, ministry to Australian indigenous people, responding to past history of child sexual abuse, and issues of liturgy and ecclesiology. The target is Australian ministers and laypeople. The essays largely come from Melbourne, a richly diverse Anglican diocese and reflect the priorities and strategies of Archbishop Freier''s thirteen years as archbishop.
In response to readers'' comments, this revised edition provides helpful clarifications, charts, and expanded notes and references.Kraus, in a theological description of Jesus Christ, offers answers to questions of Jesus'' identity and the nature of the revelation-salvation which came through him. This anticipates his volume, ''God Our Savior'', dealing with implications of Christ''s revelation for other data of theology, such as God, humankind, the Holy Spirit, church, and eschatology.For many years the idea of vicarious suffering to atone for the sins of humanity has not been self-evident in Western culture, to say nothing of the cultures of Asia. Western theologians have presupposed Roman categories of guilt and legal penalty as the framework for their explanations.However, this has been unsatisfactory in cultures where social tradition and shame are primary moral sanctions. Observing that the biblical cultural context was more oriented to shame than to a legal concept of guilt, Kraus has reinterpreted the meaning and efficacy of the cross as the means of God''s salvation.Such a reinterpretation requires that one also reevaluate the theological definition of Jesus'' person. How one understands what he did for us is closely related to how one understands who he was. His identity and role mutually impact each other. Thus one must ask, Who was this one who reconciled us to God by suffering the shame of our sin?In answer, Kraus finds concepts of self-identity and self-revelation most helpful. Jesus, the self-revelation of God to us, is God-giving-himself-to-us. That self-revelation comes as a self-giving, and only in the form of a genuinely personal, historical, and human relationship.In all of this the author intends to present an authentically biblical picture of Jesus, but in the context of modern language and thought forms.
Psychological insight, theological understanding, and biblical metaphor combine here to offer solid help for a little-understood aspect of the minister''s task. What is the minister to do when confronted with opposition from his or her own congregation, when met with frustration in his or her ministry? With empathy for both the minister''s plight and the congregation''s pain, James Dittes shows how these very frustrations can be the beginning of real and healing ministry. When the people abandon the intimacy and openness of the church with appeals for agenda and rigidity, when projects begun with enthusiasm collapse in apathy, when the people demand that the minister conform to their image of him or her: all these bespeak a need, even an unspoken pain, underlying the surface conflict. At the very point the minister most feels the desire to pack up and move on his people may most need him to stay. ''When the People Say No'' will help every minister recognize this enigmatic call and meet it with a creative and healing response.
In this book the author argues for a rigorous scientific theology under the double constraint of the reality of God and the reality of the world of space and time. Careful attention is given to the common commitment of theological and natural science to objective knowledge, and the deeply natural relation between knowledge of God the Creator and knowledge of the world he has made. Stress is laid upon the stratified structure of theology and the need for a radical simplification and unification of Christian doctrine.Is theology the ""science of God"", and is it concerned with objective knowledge like natural science? Is there a natural theology and how is it related to knowledge of God through divine relation? How is the community of faith within which dogmatic theology arises related to the social coefficient of scientific inquiry? What is the place of mysticism and of art in theology? Does theology have a special notion of truth, and does it have its own inner logic and structure? These are some of the main questions which this book seeks to answer.
The women who spoke or wrote in the margins of the Middle Ages--women who were oppressed and diminished by social and religious institutions--often were not literate. Or, if they could read, they did not know how to write. Transforming or subverting Western and patristic traditions associated with the clergy, they also turned to Eastern and North African traditions and to popular oral theater, and focused in their choice of genre on lyric, romance, and confessional autobiography. These essays analyze their texts and reconstruct a medieval feminine aesthetic that begins a rewriting of cultural and literary history.
'Faith At State' offers excellent, encouraging guidance on understanding and relating to professors, performing in the classroom, and being a Christian presence non-Christians can respect.
The thesis of this book is straightforward: Tilley argues that theodicy as a discourse practice creates evils while theodicists ignore or distort classic texts in the Christian tradition, unwittingly efface genuine evils in their attempts to justify God, and silence the voice of the suffering and the oppressed by writing them out of the theological picture. The result is often a theological legitimation of intolerable social evils.
Philippine Duchesne has a message for today''s world in which the rich seem to be growing richer and the poor to be growing poorer. It is a message of justice and love for all people. It was for this conviction that Philippine, a Religious of the Sacred Heart missionary, became the fourth United States saint in 1988.This book is a bold historical biography of a remarkable woman who struggled her entire life to enflesh God''s love and care in human situations. It opens with a critical discussion and forthright examination of how class, gender, and race have been influential factors in the selection of saints, and then details Philippine''s life with its many failures and many achievements. It shows how this wealthy woman who belonged to a politically prominent French family decided to dedicate her life and gifts to the poor. It examines her difficulties as Sacred Heart''s first missionary in the new world and it tells how this courageous pioneer woman provided free education for those who had long been denied the privilege--young women, the poor, and native Americans.This eminently readable biography provides a clear and scholarly assessment of Duchesne''s religious and social world that is ideal for students and professors of U.S. church history. It raises important questions about women, the poor, and marginalized groups in Duchesne''s time that are still pertinent to ask today.
As the dean of Luke-Acts studies in America, Henry J. Cadbury also wrote ground-breaking treatments of Jesus and early Christianity. In ''The Peril of Modernizing Jesus'', Cadbury helps us consider the Jesus of his day rather than the Jesus of our making. Subjects covered in this book include the following:- anachronism in thinking about Jesus- the cause and cure of modernism- the Jewishness of the Gospels- Jesus and the mentality of our age- limitations of Jesus''s social teachings- purpose, aim, and motive in Jesus- the religion of Jesus
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