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Pioneer missionary Timothy Richard served forty-five years in China and became a household name among educated Chinese. Largely forgotten for decades, his amazing life is reintroduced in this most welcome volume.
In 1880, Richard first articulated a vision for modern higher education as the basis for overall progress in China. His influence grew, along with high official honors, after 1891 when he became general secretary of the Christian Literature Society and continued as a leader in the Educational Association of China. By the mid-1890s, many Chinese scholars and officials began to embrace his expanding vision and approach to reform.
After the 1900 Boxer Uprising, Richard was invited by the Chinese government to represent Protestant missions, advising and mediating the settlement for the losses of life and property, especially heavy in Shanxi. Following his recommendation, which received Imperial approval by June 1901, the province paid a fine, but it was used to found a college of Western learning in its capital city. The Imperial University of Shansi (now Shanxi University), with Chinese and Western Learning Departments, and overseen by Richard and the provincial governor as joint chancellors, was to serve as the model institution in a national system of modern higher education.

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For both Maximus the Confessor (c. 580-662) and Jurgen Moltmann (b. 1926), understanding what it means to be human springs from a contemplative vision of God. This comparative study explores surprising parallels between the theological anthropology of the seventh-century Byzantine monk and the contemporary German Protestant. Bingaman argues that Maximus and Moltmann root their understanding of the human calling in their Trinitarian and christological reflection, in contrast to many modern theologies that tend to devise an account of human being first, and then try to find ways in which Christ and the Trinity are somehow relevant to this human being. In this constructive work, Bingaman demonstrates the intrinsic connection between Maximus' and Moltmann's views of human being, Christ and the Trinity, the church, and the human calling in creation. Illustrating the richness of these ancient and postmodern theologies in conversation, All Things New lays out future trajectories in theological anthropology, patristic ressourcement, ecologically attuned theology and spirituality, and Orthodox-Protestant dialogue.

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The last sixty years have witnessed a virtual explosion of interest in how modern science and traditional Christianity intersect. This new rapprochement with science has irrevocably altered how we think of God. It constitutes a foundation from which we cannot retreat, but from which we also cannot move forward until we examine the presumptions on which it is based. For the first time, Richard Coleman interprets in a clear and meaningful way the themes and practitioners that make this rapprochement different, and what it has achieved. But this book is more than description–it is an inquiry into whether Christian theology has lost its authentic voice by its singular focus on accommodating modern science.

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In Soft Shepherd or Almighty Pastor? contributors seek to go beyond the taboo on «power» within pastoral contexts. They not only discuss fundamental theological and philosophical questions about power but also develop ways to prevent power abuse in pastoral context. Power is considered as omnipresent and is analyzed in its positive and negative aspects. Not only the classical associations of «power over» or «domination» are discussed in relation to ecclesial and pastoral situations, but also forms of power linked to «service» and «care.» A sacrificial spirituality might also be dangerous. Soft Shepherd or Almighty Pastor? gathers ten contributions, all of which reflect on the complexity of power issues, also in relation to sexual abuse. The authors argue that dealing adequately with power requires renewed forms of theological thinking, especially about ministry.

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Jong Hun Joo offers a model of how both solid biblical understanding and effective practice of worship can be realized in churches today by exploring the theology and practice of Matthew Henry (1662-1714). Matthew Henry is one of the most famous biblical commentators in the English-speaking world. However, Henry was also a pastor who was liturgical in negotiating the political and religious landmines of his day. This all but overlooked aspect of Henry's biography and writings is both a window into his life and times and an insightful view into the pastoral dimensions of Christian rituals and practices in the home and church. Joo discerns how Henry understood and practiced English Presbyterian worship as an example of Reformed worship in his context and, further, based on the principles found in Henry's writings and practices, Joo suggests how contemporary churches can appropriately develop and articulate their own worship in their own contexts. In so doing he makes a case for worship renewal.

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It has become standard in modern interpretation to say that Jesus performed miracles, and even mainline scholarly interpreters classify Jesus's healings and exorcisms as miracles. Some highly regarded scholars have argued, more provocatively, that the healings and exorcisms were magic, and that Jesus was a magician.
As Richard Horsley points out, if we make a critical comparison between modern interpretation of Jesus's healing and exorcism, on the one hand, and the Gospel stories and other ancient texts, on the other hand, it becomes clear that the miracle and magic are modern concepts, products of Enlightenment thinking.
Jesus and Magic asserts that Gospel stories do not have the concepts of miracle and magic. What scholars constructed as magic turns out to have been ritual practices such as songs (incantations), medicines (potions), and appeals to higher powers for protection.
Horsley offers a critical reading of the healing and exorcism episodes in the Gospel stories. This reading reveals a dynamic relationship between Jesus the healer, the trust of those coming for healing, and their support networks in local communities. Horsley's reading of the Gospel stories gives little or no indication of divine intervention. Rather, the healing and exorcism stories portray healings and exorcisms.

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If You Call Yourself a Jew reads Romans as a dialogue between Paul and a Gentile proselyte to Judaism. This fresh reading brings Romans into focus as Paul's exposition of the revelation of God's righteousness–his faithfulness to his covenant promises to Abraham, which climaxed in the announcement that «in you all the tribes of the earth will be blessed» (Gen 12:3). Paul insists that the righteousness of God is revealed, «for the Jew first as well as for the Greek,» not through Torah but through the faith(fullness) of Jesus. Torah and the prophets provide corroborating witness for God's righteousness, but Gentiles who bend their necks to Torah's yoke miss the actual mechanism for finding peace with God. Paul found in the story of Jesus the image of complete faith in/faithfulness to God; in Jesus' resurrection he found the image of God's complete faithfulness, «for the Jew first as well as for the Greek.» Whereas Torah resulted in curse and death, it also anticipated the unconditional faithfulness of God for both Jew and Gentile. For Paul, the gospel of Jesus Christ is the account of the outworking of God's faithfulness: the end of Torah's curses and the fulfillment of its blessings.

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Encountering ETI weaves together scientific knowledge and spiritual faith in a cosmic context. It explores consequences of Contact between terrestrial intelligent life (TI) and extraterrestrial intelligent life (ETI). Humans will face cosmic displacement if there are other complex, technologically advanced intelligent beings in the universe; our economic structures and religious beliefs might need substantial revision. On Earth or in space, humans could encounter benevolent ETI (solicitous of our striving for maturity as a species) or malevolent ETI (seeking our land and goods to benefit themselves, claiming that their «superior civilization» gives them the right)–or meet both types of species. Earth Encounters of the Third Kind described by credible witnesses (including American Indian elders) suggest that both have arrived already: some shut down U.S. and U.S.S.R. ICBM missiles to promote peace; others mutilated cattle or abducted people, perhaps to acquire physiological data on biota for scientific study or for other, unknown purposes. Sci-fi movies such as Avatar and novels like The Martian Chronicles describe humans as malevolent ETI aliens: we do to others what we fear others will do to us. A shared and evolving spiritual materiality could enable humanity to overcome cosmic displacement, and guide TI and ETI in a common quest for meaning and wellbeing on cosmic common ground.

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Religion is commonly viewed through the lens of the world's religious traditions, stressing the differences, and often the conflicts, among them. The author of this book instead presents religion as a common and universal human phenomenon, based deeply in a human nature shared by all. In this view, the underlining and unifying principle of religion is a particular affirmative attitude toward life, which he presents as the Ultimate Value, and as such the key cultural constituent and defining factor of all religion. This Ultimate Value finds its expressions in various civilizations, and results in a variety of forms; these are what we know as the world's religious traditions. By analyzing the roles of both culture and civilization in their attitudes toward life, the author places religion beyond religious traditions, and shows how the latter, regardless of whether they are theistic or atheistic, draw their principles from the former, mainly by promoting the Golden Rule in its applications.

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