Renewing the Center: Evangelical Theology in a Post-Theological Era

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From the Back Cover "Certainly Renewing the Center marks a milestone in Grenz's work and may, if found plausible, constitute a landmark in evangelical reflection."--Theology Today "This account of where evangelical theology has been and where it is going bears all the virtues that one expects from a book by Stanley Grenz: clarity, fair-mindedness, thoughtfulness, comprehension, and faithfulness."--Gary Dorrien, Union Theological Seminary "Perhaps Renewing the Center wasn't the best title for this book. Perhaps this book reaches toward a new center, a new vantage point, a new floor that must be discovered (or constructed) for the first time, so that words beginning with "re-" don't apply. Perhaps the ultimate center--Jesus--is actually a moving center, moving and always on the move, so that our faith centers less in an old position we claim and defend and more in a set of fresh footprints we track and follow. But then again, recalling the best sense of evangelical, the newest thing is also the oldest thing: the ever-new good news is also the original story of Jesus, continuing through history and stretching through today into a vast future that is full of danger, yet even more full of hope."--Brian McLaren (from the foreword) "Stanley Grenz presses the question of whether evangelicalism can embrace a doctrine of the church that is believably universal and comprehensive. Evangelicals, Catholics, and other Christians have a very big stake in how that question is answered in the years ahead."--Richard John Neuhaus, editor in chief, First Things "Stanley Grenz urges a re-forming of evangelical theology in a coherent apologetic, churchly, missional, forward-looking world so as to interface effectively with the intellectual thoughts of postmodern and postchristian culture. His exposition is a tour de force that commands our attention, and merits our gratitude."--J. I. Packer, Regent College About the Author Stanley J. Grenz (DTheol, University of Munich) was the Pioneer McDonald Professor of Theology and Ethics at Carey Theological College in Vancouver, British Columbia. A leading voice on the North American theological scene, he wrote or cowrote over twenty-five books, including A Primer on Postmodernism, Created for Community, and Revisioning Evangelical Theology. Foreword (Brian McLaren) / 7 Preface / 15 Introduction: Evangelicalism in a Time of Transition / 19 1. The Gospel and Awakening Evangelicalism / 33 2. Scripture and the Genesis of the New Evangelicalism / 61 3. The Shaping of Neo-Evangelical Apologetic Theology / 93 4. The Expansion of Neo-Evangelical Theology / 125 5. Evangelical Theology in Transition / 159 6. Evangelical Theological Method after the Demise of Foundationalism / 192 7. Theology and Science after the Demise of Realism / 226 8. Evangelical Theology and the Religions / 257 9. Evangelical Theology and the Ecclesiological Center / 295 10. Renewing the Evangelical "Center" / 333 Afterword: An Agenda for the Future of Evangelical Theology (John R. Franke) / 361 Scripture Index / 371 Author Index / 373 Subject Index / 379