Thinking After

  • “Can These Bones Live?”: The Question Before the Church

    I hope to return in the very near future to posting audio from my book launch celebration, as well as to pick up where I left off in my series on Lesslie Newbigin’s “marks of the missional church.”  In the meantime, here is a penetrating assessment of the challenge placed before the contemporary church in North America by the “Catholic Baptist” theologian Barry Harvey: (more…)

  • Book Launch Celebration Recap and Audio

    Thanks to all of the people who made the trek to Scarborough last week to celebrate the launch of my new book, For the Life of the World: Jesus Christ and the Church in the Theologies of Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Stanley Hauerwas.  It was a great encouragement to see so many people whose lives have intersected with mine in so many different contexts.  A special thank you to the congregation of Good Shepherd Community Church for their generous hospitality in hosting the event and to Pastor Steve Tu for so ably moderating the event. (more…)

  • Calvin on “The Wonderful Exchange”

    I’m hoping to return to my series on Lesslie Newbigin’s marks of the missional church in the near future, but in the meantime I thought I’d share an excerpt from John Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion that I came across this morning.  In the soaring quote that follows we see resonances with the theme of the “blessed” or “happy exchange” which Martin Luther developed in his famous tract, “The Freedom of a Christian.”  In addition, there is also a distinct echoing of the famous Patristic saying affirmed by Irenaeus, Athanasius, Gregory Nazianzus and Gregory of Nyssa, among others, that “God became man in order that man might become God.”  The apparent presence of the theme of theosis or deification in this passage lends credence to the recent attempt by Rowan Williams’ to read John Calvin as “The Last of the Greek Fathers.” (more…)

  • Endorsements for “For the Life of the World”

    Since we are now a week away from the Book Launch Celebration for my new book For the Life of the World: Jesus Christ and the Church in the Theologies of Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Stanley Hauerwas, I thought I’d whet the appetites of those who are coming (and perhaps encourage those who are still on the fence) by sharing a couple of gracious endorsements the book has received: (more…)

  • “What Would Bonhoeffer Do?”: Metaxas’s Misappropriation

    When people discover that I have written a book on the theology of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, they often ask me what I think of the popular biography written by Eric Metaxas.  My standard answer runs something like this:  “Well, Metaxas is certainly an engaging writer.  However, he does seem to be in over his head when it comes to understanding the politics of the Church Struggle in Germany and the finer points of Bonhoeffer’s theology.  That being said, he has done a great service for the church in helping to make Dietrich Bonhoeffer more widely known.”  Usually, this is all the person is looking for.  However, if I were to go into more depth I would comment, among other things, upon Metaxas’s failure to understand the centrality of Bonhoeffer’s peace ethic to his theology, his lack of engagement with Bonhoeffer’s prison letters, and his tendency to portray Bonhoeffer in the terms of right-wing American evangelicalism.  Some recent public comments by Eric Metaxas have led me to believe that I have perhaps been far too generous in my assessment of Metaxas’s reading of Bonhoeffer up to this point. (more…)

  • “For the Life of the World” Now in Print

    My book, For the Life of the World: Jesus Christ and the Church in the Theologies of Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Stanley Hauerwas, has recently been published.  In celebration of its appearance there is going to be a book launch event at Good Shepherd Community Church in Scarborough on Wednesday, July 6.  More information about the event can be found here.  Print and electronic copies can be purchased through the Wipf and Stock website, Amazon, or ordered through your local bookstore. There will also be a limited number of copies available for purchase at the book launch. To whet your appetite, here’s the blurb from the back cover: (more…)

  • Series: Newbigin on “The Call to the Church” – 3. A Declericalized Theology

    [This post is the fourth in a series of posts on what could be called “Newbigin’s marks of the missional church” as outlined in his book Foolishness to the Greeks.  The previous posts can be found here:  introduction, mark #1, mark #2.]

    “The missionary encounter with our culture for which I am pleading,” Newbigin writes, “will require the energetic fostering of a declericalized, lay theology.”[1. Lesslie Newbigin, Foolishness to the Greeks: The Gospel and Western Culture (W.B. Eerdmans: Grand Rapids, 142.]  Upon returning to England after years of missionary service in India, Newbigin observed that theology in the modern West had become largely isolated from the lives and concerns of average Christian men and women. (more…)

  • Series: Newbigin on “The Call to the Church” – 2. A Christian Doctrine of Freedom

    Having considered in the previous post Newbigin’s insistence that the church must recover its eschatological imagination, we now turn to the second of what could be called his seven marks of the missional church — a true Christian doctrine of freedom.  Two sets of concerns fall under this heading for Newbigin.  The first set deals with matters that pertain to the relationship between church and state, while the second touches upon issues related to anthropology.[1. Lesslie Newbigin, Foolishness to the Greeks: The Gospel and Western Culture (Grand Rapids: W.B. Eerdmans, 1986), 137-141.] (more…)

  • Series: Newbigin on “The Call to the Church” – 1. Eschatology

    The previous post set the stage for a series of posts on Lesslie Newbigin’s understanding, as presented in Foolishness to the Greeks, of the seven essential conditions that must be recovered if there is to be a genuine missionary encounter between the church and the modern West.  The first of these essential conditions, Newbigin asserts, “must be the recovery and firm grasp of a true doctrine of the last things, of eschatology.”[1. Lesslie Newbigin, Foolishness to the Greeks: The Gospel and Western Culture (Grand Rapids: W.B. Eerdmans, 1986), 134.]  (more…)

  • Series: Newbigin on “The Call to the Church” – Introduction

    This past week marked the start of a course I am teaching at Tyndale Seminary called “Integrative Seminar II.”  Don’t let the nondescript title fool you; this course may very well be the most enthralling course that I’ve had the privilege to be involved with at Tyndale.  There’s a variety of reasons for this, including the fact that the course occurs near the end of the MDiv In-Ministry program and provides an opportunity for the students to bring together what they have learned and the skills they have developed over the course of the entire program.  Probably the biggest factor, though, is the compelling character of the subject matter itself.  “Integrative Seminar II” is shaped around exploring the life and thought of six twentieth century Christian pastor-leader-theologians: Lesslie Newbigin, John Perkins, Vinay Samuel, Dorothy Day, Desmond Tutu, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer. (more…)