In The Incarnation as God's First Intention, Edwin Chr. van Driel advocates a transformative perspective on the incarnation, proposing that God's decision to become incarnate was not a response to human sin but was instead God's first and foundational intention. Engaging the historical and theological roots of this supralapsarian (before the fall) Christology, Van Driel, a leading scholar on the topic, invites readers to reconsider long-held views on God's engagement with creation...

In this book, Edwin van Driel analyzes contemporary Pauline exegesis and its implications for Protestant theology. Over the last several decades, scholars have offered fresh interpretations of the apostle, including the New Perspective on and the apocalyptic reading of Paul. Van Driel juxtaposes these proposals with traditional Protestant understandings of Paul and argues that the crucial difference between these two readings lies not in how one understands isolated Pauline notions but in ...

Jesus is present here and now, Christians have always affirmed. But how are we to understand his present activity in a challenging, post-Christian context? In what ways is he at work in our congregational worship, pastoral care, preaching—and even our board meetings?At a time when many feel uncertain about the future of the church, What Is Jesus Doing? brings together leading thinkers in pastoral theology, homiletics, liturgical theology, and missiology in...

Offering not only state-of-the-art introductions from Biblical, historical, and constructive theologians, this volume also fosters an inter-disciplinary and cross-confessional conversation, reclaiming the idea of election as a central notion for any retelling of the biblical narrative.Several essays explore the variety of ways in which election is spoken about in the Scripture, drawing on research from the last twenty years that offers a more sophisticated framework than the tradit...