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In this book, Stan Chu Ilo offers an integral theology of development and a critical social analysis of different development theories and practices in the world, especially in Africa. Ilo offers a comprehensive biblical, anthropological, and theological foundation of the principles and praxis of Catholic social ethics from the Second Vatican Council to Pope Francis. Drawing from the social encyclical Charity in Truth, Ilo shows how Catholic social teaching responds to some of the challenging questions and concerns of our times in relation to human rights, ecology, globalization, international cooperation, development and aid, human and cultural development, business ethics, social justice, and the challenges of poverty eradication. He creatively applies these principles to the social context of Africa, and lays a groundwork for sustainable Christian humanitarian and social justice initiatives in Africa.

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The evolution of Christianity as it is known today began in Antioch, but as Becoming Christian reveals, it had once been quite different. While most histories gloss over the earliest period of Christianity to begin with the Christian establishment, this book uncovers the little-known history within the «gap» between 31 and 70 CE, when the Jesus Movement was headquartered in Jerusalem under the authority of James bar Joseph, the brother of Jesus, and the apostles served as missionaries carrying the teachings of Jesus throughout Judea, Galilee, and Samaria. By the year 66 CE, James and most of the apostles had died, along with much of their teaching. Paul's spiritual Jesus had gained a foothold among Gentiles in Antioch and throughout the West, including Rome, where it finally blossomed into a powerful political hierarchy. No longer was Jesus' humanity important to the church. With the death of James, the original movement fell into disarray and split into factions, each developing its own doctrines. Thus, there arose numerous Christianities during the first two centuries, many of which had become heretical. The Jesus Movement had now become irrelevant to the church, and as Becoming Christian reveals, by the third century it would be publicly eradicated for all time.

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Guiding Gideon chronicles the encounters between Gideon, a young man in his thirties in the midst of crisis, and his spiritual guide, Julian. With Julian accompanying him to attend prayerfully to the life directly before him, Gideon traverses the troubled landscape of his interior life, where he encounters grace, his deepest wounds become «sacred,» and he is invited into fuller participation in the kingdom of God. Julian reflects prayerfully on each session, conscious that he is a privileged witness to the restorative movements of the Spirit within Gideon's life and that the same Spirit is forming him in the way of Jesus. Guiding Gideon is for all who desire to become more attentive to their formation in the likeness of Christ. It is also for spiritual guides who want their mentoring, counseling, pastoral care, or spiritual directing to reflect and embody the way of Jesus. Written as a narrative, Guiding Gideon offers prayerful reflection within the context of guiding a fictional pilgrim and also invites readers to witness the formation of a fictional guide. Reflective of the contemplative vision of New Monasticism, Guiding Gideon models a prayer-action praxis inspired by Jesus' Sermon on the Mount.

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This book and the essays contained within are dedicated to Dr. Chuck Sackett in recognition of his thirty-two years of teaching at Lincoln Christian University. He currently serves as Professor at Large but has held a variety of roles and titles during his thirty-two years there.
These essays are written by current colleagues and former students who have had the privilege of studying hermeneutics, homiletics, and ministry with Dr. Sackett. Each essay covers a topic of scholarly or contemporary interest in the fields of hermeneutics or homiletics.
Hermeneutics and homiletics remain topics of discussion in the academy and the church. These essays continue that discussion. The essays overlap the two fields. Some essays focus heavily on hermeneutical issues with an eye towards proclamation, while others start with homiletics and hermeneutical issues are echoed in the background.
The essays found in this book offer unique perspectives and approaches to interpretation and preaching. Though homiletics and hermeneutics are the fields of the study, the church remains the arena where the fruit of each discipline is observed most clearly, as Dr. Sackett instructed his students throughout his years of teaching.

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This book endeavors to examine and critically assess the theological anthropology of Jonathan Edwards with a view to considering how this anthropology coheres with his apologetic methodology. Specifically, the question has been raised whether Edwards' doctrine of man is consistent with the picture painted of Jonathan Edwards by John Gerstner that he was the epitome of the classical apologist. It is argued that Edwards practiced an eclectic apologetic sans apologetic self-awareness. In other words, Edwards was a child of his training and time.

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How can faith speak directly to people's real lives? How can conversation around Scripture make «all the difference» in the arenas of one's daily world? People who have heard the Bible many times–or for the first time–want to know in the terms and images of their life situation. «When my world seems to be shaking all around me, why doesn't it help to hear 'You are forgiven'?» And further, «What can I say to someone who feels totally alienated from God?»
Seventy Images of Grace in the Epistles will help people make connections and empower them for their ministries in daily life. The book presents an interplay of stories of people's actual lives and Epistle images of grace. Readers will begin to recognize the depth of the human predicament and the power of the gospel, thereby becoming equipped for Christian discipleship and vocation, not from duty or guilt, but from freedom. «Guides for Engagement» will help readers turn the book into a learning event.

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In this volume, Jason Radcliff examines T. F. Torrance's reading of the church fathers. Radcliff explores how Torrance reconstructs the patristic tradition, producing a Reformed, evangelical, and ecumenical version of the Consensus Patrum («Consensus of the Fathers»). This book investigates how Torrance uniquely understands the Fathers and the Reformers to be mutually informing and how, as such, his approach involves significant changes to both standard readings of the Fathers and Torrance's own Reformed evangelical tradition. Torrance's approach is distinctive in its Christocentric rootedness in the primary theme of the Nicene homoousion («of one essence [with the Father]») and its champion Athanasius of Alexandria. The book explores Torrance's inherently broad ecclesiology and constructive achievements, both of which contribute to his ongoing ecumenical relevance.

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What is the significance of the body? What might phenomenology contribute to a theological account of the body? And what is gained by prolonging the overlooked dialogue between St. John Paul II and Emmanuel Levinas? Nigel Zimmermann answers these questions through the agreements and the tensions between two of the most important thinkers of the twentieth century. John Paul II, the Polish pope, philosopher, and theologian, and Emmanuel Levinas, the French-Jewish philosopher of Lithuanian heritage, were provocative thinkers who courageously faced and challenged the assumptions of their age. Both held the human person in high regard and did their thinking with constant reference to God and to theological language. Zimmermann does not shirk from the challenges of each thinker and does not hide their differences. However, he shows how they bequeath a legacy regarding the body that we would overlook at significant ethical peril. We are called, Zimmermann argues, to face the other. In this moment God refuses a banal marginalization and our call to responsibility for the other person is issued in their disarming vulnerability. In the body, philosophy, theology, and ethics converge to call us to glory, even in the paradox of lowly suffering.

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It has been some time since Catholic and liberal Protestant theologians stopped writing seriously on bibliology. Meanwhile, conservative evangelical theologians guard against the introduction of new ideas. In an effort to make headway through this gridlock, Carlos Bovell has commissioned a roundtable discussion on the prospect of whether the inspiration of Scripture might extend beyond authors and texts, and if so, what this might entail for the authority of Scripture. Taken together, the essays in this volume make an invaluable contribution to contemporary literature on the inspiration and authority of the Bible.

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This book examines the doctrines of election and atonement in Karl Barth's Church Dogmatics, taking up Barth's own challenge to his reader to surpass his argument and offer a better typological interpretation of the cultic texts. Barth's radical re-working of Calvin's doctrine of election is one of the most important developments in twentieth-century theology. Christ synthesizes for Barth a particular dialectic: the binary structure of God's Yes of election and God's No of rejection. The book's central question–how can Jesus simultaneously be both the elected and the rejected (CD II/2), acting as both the judge and the judged (CD IV/1)?–is followed by an exploration of the roles of the Holy Spirit and human freedom in God's electing and saving action. Commentators both acknowledge Barth's innovation in this area and identify problems with his approach, but few have offered what David Ford has called a correction «from within» Barth, using Barth's own method. Using the concept of Existenzstellvertretung, this critique of Barth's exegetical justification for the doctrines offers an alternative exegesis that not only provides this much-needed correction, but also immerses the reader in a fresh engagement with Scripture itself.

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