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Overview
This well-rounded collection of volumes on various theological topics blends systematic theology with theological exegesis and pastoral theology to create a valuable, multifaceted resource for theological investigation. Life Together in the Way of Jesus Christ presents a unique approach to systematics in this general introduction to theology. In Jesus and the Demise of Death, Matthew Levering takes up facets of Christology and eschatology by considering the eschatological life secured for believers through the work of Jesus who has led the way as the first to experience that glorified reality. Amos Yong, in Spirit of Love continues in the vein of systematics with a presentation of a Trinitarian theology of grace. The Betrayal of Charity presents a theology of love and considers the ways in which our fallen natures mitigate love. Carl Vaught, in The Sermon on the Mount, weds theology and exegesis by presenting a theological reading of the most famous sermon in history.
The last three volumes of the collection direct intellectual theological investigation outward to others and guide readers through ways to bring theological truths to bear in pastoral care. In Caring Cultures, Susan Dunlap investigates how cultural context affects pastoral care. Kristen Swenson, in Living through Pain, opens up the Psalms as an ancient source of pastoral care and shows that it continues to provide guidance through grief and pain today. Finally, Phil Zylla, in The Roots of Sorrow, provides many real-life examples of suffering and how to navigate those difficult circumstances.
The Logos Bible Software edition of this collection is designed to encourage and stimulate your study and understanding of theology and its practical goal in pastoral care. Scripture passages link directly to your English translations and original language texts, and important theological concepts link to dictionaries, encyclopedias, and a wealth of other resources in your digital library. In addition, you can perform powerful searches by topic and find what other authors, scholars, and theologians have to say about the resurrection, suffering, or any of the other topics addressed in these helpful volumes.
Key Features
- Well-rounded theological collection blending systematic and pastoral theology
- Recent volumes on important topics in theology
Individual Titles
- Life Together in the Way of Jesus Christ: An Introduction to Christian Theology by Dan R. Stiver
- Jesus and the Demise of Death: Resurrection, Afterlife, and the Fate of the Christian by Matthew Levering
- Spirit of Love: A Trinitarian Theology of Grace by Amos Yong
- The Betrayal of Charity: The Sins That Sabotage Divine Love by Matthew Levering
- The Sermon on the Mount: A Theological Investigation, Revised Edition, by Carl G. Vaught
- Caring Cultures: How Congregations Respond to the Sick by Susan J. Dunlap
- Living through Pain: Psalms and the Search for Wholeness by Kristin M. Swenson
- The Roots of Sorrow: A Pastoral Theology of Suffering by Phil C. Zylla
Dan Stiver has crafted an engaging one-volume introduction to Christian beliefs, based on his experience teaching introductory theology courses. While describing how traditional theology came to be, he explains for both undergraduates and graduate students how theology is already a part of their life of faith.
As he examines traditional theological issues and such current topics as globalization and ecology, Stiver treats theology as a living, dynamic activity. Employing useful case studies, his groundbreaking approach helps students understand what theology is—and shows them that they are participants in creating an ongoing, vigorous theology that will remain at the center of their faith for the rest of their lives.
Stiver’s overarching image of theology as a journey is provocative and insightful.
—Beth Newman, professor of theology and ethics, Baptist Theological Seminary, Richmond, VA
Stiver’s work is worthy to weigh down the bookshelves, backpacks, and hard drives of the emerging generation of theological students.
—Charles J. Scalise, professor of church history, Fuller Theological Seminary
This is an up-to-date introduction to theology, fully aware of recent developments in hermeneutics and postmodernity . . . Stiver not only provides a survey of the tradition but responds to present concerns, striking a good balance between communicating the heart of the classic tradition and addressing contemporary problems.
—Kevin Vanhoozer, research professor of systematic theology, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School
Dan R. Stiver received his PhD from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and is the Cook-Derrick Professor of Theology at Logsdon School of Theology, Hardin-Simmons University.
What happened to Jesus after death and what happens to those who follow him? Jesus and the Demise of Death offers a constructive theology that seeks to answer that very question, carefully considering both Jesus’ descent into hell and eventual resurrection as integral parts of a robust vision of the Christian bodily resurrection. Taking on the claims of N.T. Wright and Richard B. Hays, Matthew Levering draws strongly upon the work of Thomas Aquinas to propose a radical reconstruction of Christian eschatological theology—one that considers a beatific vision enriched by Platonic thought as a central part of Christianity and emphasizes the role of the church community in the passage from life to death.
In an investigation that hides its great learning, Levering argues for a realist understanding of the biblical account of the resurrection of Jesus. Levering has all along been constituting himself a Catholic biblical theologian of rare talent; here, one can’t help thinking of Benedict XVI as a model. It is impossible not to be struck by a similarity of style: irenic yet confident, definite but luminously and persuasively modest.
—Cyril O’Regan, Huisking Professor of Theology, University of Notre Dame
Jesus and the Demise of Death is a powerful exploration of the Christian faith’s answers to one of the most fundamental human questions: ‘What happens after I die?’ Following the guidance of Thomas Aquinas and others, Matthew Levering shows that there is deep wisdom in the church’s traditional answers, and that this wisdom is both biblically sound and consistent with scientific discoveries about the human person.
—C. Stephen Evans, professor of philosophy and humanities, Baylor University
Levering brings the best of current biblical scholarship into a creative interface with theological reflection informed by one of the church’s greatest minds, Thomas Aquinas. In Jesus and the Demise of Death the core tenets of classical Christian eschatology, recently jettisoned by many theologians as allegedly outdated, make a surprising comeback. Levering adds an important and timely Catholic contribution to the lively contemporary theological debate about Christian eschatology.
—Reinhard Huetter, professor of Christian theology, Duke University Divinity School
Faced with the finally unavoidable question of death, many in the contemporary Western world have no better answers to share than agnosticism, professed indifference, or despair. In this iconic book, Matthew Levering maps the road to a recovery of the hope that the historic Christian faith was able to offer and maintain through the story of Jesus and the personally engaged God present therein. The passage of Christ through life, death, and resurrection has opened the way for countless believers over the centuries, and the divine invitation to a shared and enjoyed eternity still beckons.
—Geoffrey Wainwright, Cushman Professor of Christian Theology, Duke Divinity School
Matthew Levering is professor of theology at the University of Dayton, a distinguished fellow of the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology, and director of the Center for Scriptural Exegesis, Philosophy, and Doctrine. He is also the author of the Ezra and Nehemiah volume in the Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible and Holy People, Holy Land: A Theological Introduction to the Bible
Pentecostal theologian Amos Yong points readers toward an increased theological emphasis on God as love. In Spirit of Love, the first pneumatology of the spiritual gift of love, Yong constructs ecumenical and interdisciplinary theology of the Holy Spirit for the church universal. A distinctive contribution toward greater theological reflection on the Triune God, Spirit of Love seeks to move readers toward a more complete understanding of God as the source of divine love.
Yong renders his tradition an invaluable service. This is a key book in the emergence of a mature Pentecostal theology.
—Gary Badcock, Peache Professor of Divinity, Huron University College, University of Western Ontario
This is classic Amos Yong. Once again he has sensitively harmonized different voices to create an original contribution to scholarship.
—Mark J. Cartledge, director, Centre for Pentecostal and Charismatic Studies, University of Birmingham, UK
Yong’s work is groundbreaking in developing a robust Pentecostal theology.
—Richard J. Mouw, president and professor of Christian philosophy, Fuller Theological Seminary
Amos Yong is J. Rodman Williams Professor of Theology at Regent University School of Divinity in Virginia Beach, Virginia.
Love was at one time a powerfully unifying force among Christians. In his letters, Paul consistently evokes charity as the avenue to both human and divine communion. If the magnitude of charity was of the utmost importance to early Christians, so were those sins that aimed to distract Christians from acting based on love. Taking seriously the efforts of Paul, and later Thomas Aquinas, to expose and root out the sins against charity, Matthew Levering reclaims the centrality of love for moral, and in fact all, theology.
Levering argues that the practice of charity leads to inner joy and peace as well as outward mercy, good will, and unity with God and neighbor. The sins against charity—hatred, sloth, envy, discord and contention, schism, war and strife, and sedition and scandal—threaten love’s concrete effects by rebelling against dependence on God and undermining interdependence on others. The Betrayal of Charity seriously considers the consequences of each of the sins against love, compelling individuals and communities to recognize their own loss of charity. In doing so, Levering fosters a spirit of restoration and reminds readers that love—not the sins against it—will have the last word.
Levering is by now at the forefront of the younger generation of Catholic theologians in America. The Betrayal of Charity provides a profound treatment of particular patterns of sin together with a proper placement of those patterns within the grammar of love. A lovely and intellectually stimulating book.
—Paul J. Griffiths, Warren Chair of Catholic Theology, Duke Divinity School
The Betrayal of Charity is spirited and engaging. Levering addresses very worthy interlocutors—including Hays and Schwartz—and gives them a good run for their money.
—Gary Anderson, professor of Old Testament, University of Notre Dame
Levering’s account of love brings Aquinas’ moral theology alive for contemporary readers. The Betrayal of Charity sets up a rich dialogue with the biblical texts, as well as Jewish, Protestant, and secular accounts of the virtues and the vices that contradict them.
—Brian Brock, lecturer in moral practical theology, University of Aberdeen
Levering demonstrates that ‘contemplating charity in light of its opposites’ will deepen our understanding of the primary theological virtue. This work of moral theology takes Scripture and Thomas Aquinas as chief sources for insightful reflections on hatred, sloth, envy, discord, schism, violence, and scandal. Levering’s brilliance lies in clearing away the sins that sabotage divine love through critical readings of Christianity’s critics.
—The Christian Century
Matthew Levering is professor of theology at the University of Dayton, a distinguished fellow of the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology, and director of the Center for Scriptural Exegesis, Philosophy, and Doctrine. He is also the author of the Ezra and Nehemiah volume in the Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible and Holy People, Holy Land: A Theological Introduction to the Bible
This revised edition of Vaught’s theological investigation of the Sermon on the Mount begins with the assumption that the text cannot be understood apart from a transformation of the human spirit. The stages of this transformation are outlined in the Beatitudes. Against this background, the book comes to focus on the perfection that Jesus demands from his followers.
Vaught’s study is a theological attempt to explore some of the ways in which perfection can be achieved. The text moves from Matthew’s Beatitudes, through simple illustrations of salt and light, to indications about the way in which Jesus fulfills and transcends the religious tradition from which he comes. In The Sermon on the Mount, we also find suggestions about how to deal with the practical problems of murder and anger, adultery and divorce, the problem of retaliation, and the problem of responding to our enemies.
. . . a gracious invitation to rediscover the Sermon on the Mount . . . it reflects years of discipline in reading texts closely while also paying full attention to their contexts. The lucid, lively prose makes the solid, substantial content all the more attractive and accessible.
—Merold Westphal, distinguished professor of philosophy at Fordham University
Carl G. Vaught was distinguished professor of philosophy at Baylor University. He received his BA from Baylor in 1961, where he graduated summa cum laude and received the Alpha Chi Scholarship Award as the valedictorian of his class. He attended Yale University as a Woodrow Wilson and a Danforth Graduate Fellow and received his PhD in philosophy from Yale in 1966. Before he came to Baylor, he taught in the Philosophy Department at Penn State for 31 years where he directed the dissertations of 29 graduate students and served as head of the Department of Philosophy from 1982 to 1992. He became a fellow of the Society of Philosophy in America in 1987, was affiliated with Oriel College in Oxford in 1990–1991, and was a distinguished alumnus at Baylor in 1993. His principal philosophical interests are metaphysics, the philosophy of religion, and the history of philosophy.
Skilled pastoral caregiving, Susan Dunlap argues, requires an understanding of the culture of the local congregation where it is practiced. An engaging example par excellence, Caring Cultures looks closely at three very different congregations’ responses to the body in times of illness: an African American congregation in the Apostolic Holiness tradition; a Euro-American mainstream Protestant church; and the Latino members in a Roman Catholic parish.
With vivid examples drawn from the author’s interviews and observations, this beautifully written book shows how each congregation has developed divergent ways of thinking about the body, habits of responding to it, and understandings of God’s response to the body’s pain or peril. The author offers unusually rich descriptions of caregiving as it is displayed in these three congregations, integrating both well-explained theory and moving personal stories.
The depth and attentiveness of Dunlap’s research and the compassion and beauty of her writing make this book important reading.
—Dorothy C. Bass, director, Valparaiso Project on the Education and Formation of People in Faith
A challenging, hopeful book. Dunlap’s insights may very well help us set right much that is wrong with today’s care.
—Will Willimon, bishop, the North Alabama Conference of the United Methodist Church
Weaving theological, sociological, psychological, and pastoral perspectives together articulately and sensitively in her analysis of the insights gained of the ways these churches dealt with illness, Dunlap has modeled very well the ways in which congregational studies can yield fruit, not just for pastors and congregations, but for researchers across the disciplines.
—Pneuma
Susan J. Dunlap received her PhD from Princeton Theological Seminary and is adjunct assistant professor of pastoral theology at Duke Divinity School.
Pain disintegrates a person, fracturing self and relationships. In Living through Pain, Kristin M. Swenson charts the multifaceted personal and social problems caused by chronic pain and surveys professional efforts to mitigate and manage it. Because the experience of pain involves all aspects of a person—body, mind, spirit, and community—Swenson consults the book of Psalms for wisdom, perspective, and insight. Her close reading of selected psalms from the Hebrew Bible demonstrates that the challenge of living through pain is timeless. Swenson shows how these ancient texts offer a vocabulary and grammar for understanding and expressing the contemporary experience of pain. The psalms tell of suffering and healing. They decry pain’s propensity to fracture even as they demonstrate a person’s ability to mend. Pain is a universal experience, and this book invites readers to consider more fully what is involved in the process of healing.
Swenson shows how the psalms can help people to renew meaning in their lives, without ever imposing that meaning.
—Arthur W. Frank, professor, Department of Sociology, University of Calgary
This is an up-to-date and multi-faceted exploration of pain as a ‘whole-self event’ demanding response—personally, contextually, medically, theologically, and spiritually. Living through Pain is must reading for those who want to understand how shrieks and groans and desperate sighs both fracture and bring unexpected healing to the human spirit. This book is not for the faint-hearted or for those who seek easy answers. And that is good news!
—Joan E. Hemenway, board-certified chaplain and clinical pastoral educator
The interface between the psalms and the reality of human suffering is a long established conversation. In this book, Swenson brings new life and freshness to that interface. She does so by exacting engagement with contemporary literature on the reality of pain and medical research. The outcome is a rich dialogue whereby ‘pain theory’ illuminates the psalms and the psalms, in turn, offer a suggestive dimension to pain theory. The book is ‘down and dirty’ in its engagement with real life. It will be an important study for men and women of faith who live with pain and for those in the helping professions who live with the pain of others. Swenson shows how the psalms, when read and heard, are indeed instruments for the existential, concrete processing of pain in healing ways.
—Walter Brueggemann, professor emeritus, Columbia Theological Seminary
Kristin M. Swenson received her PhD from Boston University and is assistant professor of religious studies at the School of World Studies, Virginia Commonwealth University.
What are humans to do—and how should caregivers respond—when faced with the reality of anguish? The Roots of Sorrow addresses the sometimes painful questions that surround human suffering. By integrating concrete examples with personal stories of adversity and sorrow, Phil Zylla constructs a pastoral theology that situates itself within the very core of suffering. Resisting the natural tendency to flee from the pain of sorrow, Zylla empowers professionals to help others face suffering directly and honestly.
Phil Zylla shows a unique ability to create a tapestry that weaves together a theology of suffering with a substantive approach to pastoral care and an understanding of the actual experience of pain.
—Rod Wilson, president, Regent College
The Roots of Sorrow is as competent theologically as it is courageous pastorally. Zylla exposes the roots of sorrow with unflinching honesty, compassion, and hope. A rare book of profound and practical wisdom.
—Margaret Whipp, lecturer in pastoral theology, Ripon College Cuddesdon, Oxford
A beautifully conceived and thoughtfully written book. Zylla’s theological reflections emerge from a deep personal wrestling with the devastating realities of human suffering.
—Donald Capps, professor emeritus of pastoral theology, Princeton Theological Seminary
This is one of those rare volumes that is deeply grounded in the lived reality of human beings and, at the same time, offers vibrant examples of rigorous theological reflection and hope. All will learn more of the patient presence required for those who are called to minister to the afflicted.
—David Hogue, professor of pastoral theology and counseling, Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary
Phil C. Zylla is academic dean and associate professor of pastoral theology at McMaster Divinity College in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, where he teaches on pastoral care and the theology of suffering. He has also served several churches as a senior pastor.
Product Details
- Title: Baylor Theology Collection
- Publisher: Baylor University Press
- Volumes: 8
- Pages: 2,213