Foundations 86 (Summer 2024)

Issue 86 of Foundations: An International Journal of Evangelical Theology, published by Affinity, is now available from here (now requiring an email address for a link to a downloadable pdf) which includes the below essays.

Donald John MacLean

Editorial

Jonathan Bayes

Review Article: Neo-Calvinism: A Theological Introduction

Steve Bishop

Abraham Kuyper: Inspiration, Revelation, and Scripture

This paper examines Kuyper’s view of the Scriptures. It stresses Kuyper’s organic and pneumocentric view of the Scriptures. These emphases serve to show that Scripture is both of divine and human origin.

Lee Gatiss

John Owen and Relating to God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit

This article presents the foundational importance of the Trinity for the Christian life. Considering the teaching of John Owen, and his context in the seventeenth century, helps us see that the great blessing of the Christian life is that we have fellowship with the one true and living God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. And, in particular, that we have distinct communion with him as Father, as Son, and as Holy Spirit.

Roger Fay

John Wesley and Aldersgate

This article considers the significance of John Wesley’s experience on 24 May 1738 when his heart was “strangely warmed”. It argues against attempts to dilute the evangelical significance of this experience.

Ian Shaw

Slavery, the Slave Trade and Christians’ Theology – Part 1

In this article I explore the different positions taken by Christians in America and Britain, through the 17th to 19th Centuries, regarding slavery and the slave trade. In a second article I will reflect on the theological themes that framed how they thought, spoke and acted.

Thorsten Prill

Missionary – What’s in a Word? A Critical Discussion of a Disputed Term

This article discusses the meaning of the word “missionary” and its use in today’s church. It looks at the biblical, historical and contemporary understandings of a phrase which triggers a variety of responses even among Christians. Some insist that “missionary” has become a discredited term and others hold that it no longer reflects their broader understanding of mission. However, those who still use it find support both in the Scriptures and mission history. Given the similarity of the phrase “missionary” and the biblical term “apostle” one can argue that missionaries are followers of Christ who are sent to continue with the apostolic task without claiming the same authority as the Twelve or the Apostle Paul. Therefore, the preaching of the gospel, the planting of churches and the training of church leaders lie at the heart of their mission. This work might be accompanied by other activities, such as social, educational or medical programmes, but, as demonstrated by the early representatives of the Protestant mission movement, it should always be carried out with sensitivity, respect and humility.

Book Reviews

Themelios 49, 1 (April 2024)

The latest Themelios is online here (and available here as a single pdf), containing the below articles.

Editorial

Brian J. Tabb and Benjamin L. Gladd

Announcing the Carson Center for Theological Renewal

Strange Times

Daniel Strange

Baggy Trousers: Approaching Theological Study

Dave Brunn

Gender in Bible Translation: A Crucial Issue Still Mired in Misunderstanding

This article argues that much of the controversy surrounding gender in Bible translation is unnecessary. One reason is that many of the discussions about this issue have focused almost exclusively on the way nonliteral versions translate gender, giving insufficient attention to the way gender is handled in versions that identify as literal. A careful, objective examination of both kinds of versions together will show that the two sides of this discussion are not as far apart as some have supposed. While there are differences between the various versions, this article will demonstrate that the most significant distinction between the way literal and nonliteral versions handle gender in translation lies in the frequency rather than the nature of the adjustments.

Melvin L. Otey

The Ancient Pedigree of Homosexuality as the Sin of Sodom

Scholars disagree about the precise nature of the sin that provokes God’s wrath in Genesis 19. In fact, multiple transgressions are involved, including fornication, rape, and inhospitality. Christian exegetes traditionally emphasize the apparently homoerotic aspects of the Sodomites’ demand to “know” the angels inside Lot’s home. However, some modern scholars isolate the aggressors’ inhospitality to the exclusion of any potential sexual deviance and allege that the emphasis on fornication, especially homosexual intercourse, is a historically recent phenomenon. This article critiques this assertion by demonstrating that a tradition within Second Temple Judaism and the primitive church attributes sexual sins, including homosexuality, to Sodom and its neighbors.

Dan Martin

Pedagogy and Biblical Theology: Tracing the Intertextuality of the Book of Proverbs

This paper articulates a provisional thesis, namely, that we need a pedagogical category within our biblical theological frameworks, on the basis that such a category was in the New Testament authors’ minds. I begin by outlining the challenges of integrating the book of Proverbs into biblical theology to date, before highlighting the value of intertextuality as the primary inductive method for constructing biblical theology. I then demonstrate through a ‘worked example’ the mutually interpretive canonical relationship of a Proverbs text with the New Testament, providing a tentative basis for a pedagogical biblical theological category. I conclude by outlining how this thesis can be tested and developed through further research.

Adam Friend

Filial Revelation and Filial Responsibility: (Dis)obedient Sonship and The Religious Leaders in Matthew 11–16

Sonship appears in every section, at every turning point, and on the lips of every character in Matthew’s Gospel. In determining the motif’s function, the religious leaders have largely been neglected. This study analyzes Matthew’s development of the motif of sonship in Matthew 11:1–16:11, arguing that the religious leaders clarify the positive concept of sonship from their provision of its negative example. For Matthew, sonship must be actualized in obedience.

Garrett S. Craig

The Divine Identity in 1 Peter: The Father, Christ, and the Spirit in Relation

Traditionally the discipline of New Testament studies has not been welcoming to a Trinitarian understanding of God. In recent years, however, some scholars working in the discipline have argued for the positive exegetical benefits for what they have called a “Trinitarian hermeneutic.” While working within the historical-grammatical paradigm, a Trinitarian hermeneutic seeks to understand the text’s God-talk by attending to the relations between the Father, Christ, and the Spirit. By using this method, the article argues that the divine identity found in the letter of 1 Peter puts pressure on its readers to articulate an understanding of God that agrees with later Trinitarian confessions.

Christopher Osterbrock

The Spiritual Utility of Calvin’s Correspondence during the Strasbourg Years

Calvin’s letters are no mere collection of personal correspondence but served him in his lifelong spiritual formation. Of note are those letters collected during his time in Strasbourg (1538–1541). This study argues for and assesses the unique spiritual utility of Calvin’s correspondence during the Strasbourg years. The reformer is observed in these letters examining himself, seeking counsel and companionship, and recording the evolution of his philosophy of ministry, all this while shepherding his French refugee church under Martin Bucer’s mentorship. Calvin’s letters evidence a desire for theological implication through reciprocated dialogue, which pastors and laypersons alike ought to consider.

Nathan Sherman

A Change in Kind, Not Degree: Labels, Identity, and an Evaluation of “Baptistic Congregationalists”

How do we decide what to label people of centuries past when they had no clear labels for themselves? Should we describe seventeenth century Baptists as “Baptists” if that was not what they called themselves? Matthew Bingham has recently argued that instead of using the label “Particular Baptists” for the English Calvinistic Baptists of the 1640s and 50s, historians would more clearly describe their subjects as “baptistic congregationalists.” Is Bingham justified in his use of this neologism? While this article might be considered a book review – which several others have already contributed – it also contributes to the debates about wider religious labels of Early Modern England.

Obbie Tyler Todd

What Republicanism Is This? An Introduction to Christian Republicanism (1776–1865)

While the term “Christian republicanism” is known to most historians of the early republic, very few have attempted to explicate its unique theology or to identify its various religious, moral, and even racial permutations in the church. Christian republicanism was much more than just a set of political or social commitments. It was also a loose theological system. This article provides an introduction to Christian republicanism, tracing its beliefs, defining its boundaries, and chronicling its lifespan in the early United States when it flourished in the American mind.

Roger W. Fay

John Wesley and Faith at Aldersgate

The importance of justification by faith to the thinking of John Wesley (1703–1791) both during and after his Aldersgate Street experience in May 1738 has long been doubted by some Wesley scholars. This article demonstrates that the historical data surrounding Aldersgate is compelling and points to the validity of Wesley’s own interpretation of that occasion. A reprise of the historical data, coupled with an examination of some alternative interpretations by distinguished modern Wesley scholars, demonstrates the weak historical basis for interpretations that downplay justification by faith. John Wesley remains an important and instructive figure in the history of evangelical revivals.

Ryan Reed

The House Divided: An Assessment of the American Neo-Evangelicals’ Doctrine of Scripture

Carl F. H. Henry, Harold Lindsell, and Bernard Ramm represent three of the most formative voices within the neo-evangelical movement in America. Nevertheless, these three figures held to three different tones and methodologies on the doctrine of Scripture. Lindsell represents the evangelicals that saw inerrancy as a test for evangelical authenticity, as seen in his works, The Battle for the Bible and The Bible in the Balance. Though closer to the Lindsellian view, Henry saw inerrancy as a test for evangelical consistency rather than authenticity. Ramm represents evangelicals that affirmed a broad concept of inerrancy but did not see it as either the test of authenticity or consistency. This particular issue would cause early cracks in the unity of the new evangelical movement. By examining these three figures’ understanding of the doctrine of Scripture, this paper will show how the early neo-evangelical leaders struggled to decide how clearly they would identify with their fundamentalist roots.

Robert Golding

Swimming in a Sanctimonious Sea of Subjectivity: A Proposal for Christian Authenticity in a Made-Up World

There is a curious tendency in modern culture to simultaneously reject objective truth (e.g., “live your truth”) and to live as if it were real (e.g., “you must fight for the truth”). Objectivity has worked its way back into the subjectivity of postmodernism. This is not pure postmodernism, nor a return to the modernism that preceded it. This is a new phase, which I call metamodernism (a term coined elsewhere). This paper first explains metamodernism (sections 1–2). Then, it offers some suggestions for Christians to rebut metamodernism (section 3). Finally, it concludes with an anecdote to better explain the recommendation of the third section (section 4).

Luke Johnson

“Salvation Without Spin”: How the Gospel of Christ Subversively Fulfills the Prayer Wheels of Tibetan Buddhism

With present calls for inter-religious dialogue, Christianity must relate to major world religions in specific ways to distinguish its uniqueness in belief and practice. This article uses one of the five “magnetic points” of J. H. Bavinck, “I and salvation,” to demonstrate how Christianity carries out Hendrik Kraemer’s notion of “subversive fulfillment,” specifically with the prayer wheels of Tibetan Buddhism. The article first shows how Christianity confronts a trust in religious objects for salvation. Second, Christianity challenges a belief in mere mantras for spiritual help. Third, Christianity teaches that humans cannot gain merit through religious works. Instead, Christianity offers true deliverance through faith in the person and work of Jesus Christ.

Book Reviews

Didache 21, 2 (2022)

The latest issue of Didache (sponsored by the International Board of Education of the Church of the Nazarene) is now online. The summaries are adapated from Dean Blevins’ Introduction. It, and the individual essays, are available from here.

Dean G. Blevins

Introduction

Francisca Ireland

Wesley’s Aesthetic Practical Theology

Francisca Ireland offers a new vision for theological aesthetics, arguing that John Wesley’s practical theology provides an ‘engaged aesthetics’ of body and imagination, allowing practitioners to reflect theologically on one’s own and others’ experiences.

C.P. Troutman

John Wesley, Ethnodoxologist: Engaging Missionally with the Ethnodoxology Conversation

Troutman argues that Wesley provides a theology that motivates an embrace of various cultural forms of music and celebration, commensurate with Wesley’s own vision.

Vinicius Couto

Synod of Dordrecht: An Iconographic Analysis

Vinicius Couto utilises an aesthetic methodology and historic artwork to explicate the theological issues underlying the Synod of Dort and the division around Arminian and Calvinist discourse.

Jorge Alberto Baños Peña

What is Biblical Preaching? Its Importance and Purpose for the Church’s Work

Jorge Alberto Baños Peña offers a rationale for biblical preaching, providing a grounded presentation demonstrating the interplay between artistic expression, Scripture, and theological reflection.

Joseph Bankard

Forgiveness as Process and Virtue: How to Overcome Feelings of Anger and Resentment

Joseph Bankard revisits the multifaceted practice, and virtue, of forgiveness. Bankard notes that this is interpersonal and intrapersonal, with the process entailing three elements: omissions, actions, and emotions.

Sarah Legreid

Death and Life: Reading 2 Corinthians 4:7–12

Sarah Legreid introduces a trauma hermeneutic into a detailed study of Paul’s theology through his Corinthian correspondence, arguing that 2 Corinthians reveals a nuanced and balanced trauma dynamic within Paul’s life of suffering and resilience.

Hannah Jones-Nelson

Perichoresis and Missional Theology: Humanity’s Invitation into the Mission of God

Hannah Jones-Nelson’s treatise addresses the theological concept of perichoresis as the intimate relationship, or dance, of the Trinity – a relationship that allows humanity to both extend and fulfill the missio dei.

Jesus, Thy Blood and Righteousness

For this year’s Good Friday.

The words are a translation by John Wesley (1703-91) of a hymn written by Nicolaus Ludwig Graf von Zinzendorf (1700-60).

Jesus, thy blood and righteousness

my beauty are, my glorious dress;

’midst flaming worlds, in these arrayed,

with joy shall I lift up my head.

Bold shall I stand in thy great day;

for who aught to my charge shall lay?

Fully absolved through these I am

from sin and fear, from guilt and shame.

When from the dust of death I rise

to claim my mansion in the skies,

e’en then this shall be all my plea,

Jesus hath lived, hath died, for me.

Jesus, be endless praise to thee,

whose boundless mercy hath for me,

for me a full atonement made,

an everlasting ransom paid.

O let the dead now hear thy voice;

now bid thy banished ones rejoice;

their beauty this, their glorious dress,

Jesus, thy blood and righteousness.

Asbury Journal 73, 1 (2018)

The latest issue of Asbury Journal, containing the below main articles, mostly drawn from a colloquium on ‘Wesleyan Theology from Biblical and Missiological Perspectives’.

Laurence W. Wood

John Wesley’s Mission of Spreading Scriptural Holiness: A Case Study in World Mission and Evangelism

A manual of discipline, called The Large Minutes, was given to all Methodist preachers when they joined John Wesley’s annual conference, containing this explanation: “God’s design in raising up the people called ‘Methodists’” was “to spread scriptural holiness over the land.” This paper will trace a narrow slice of the larger developing story of how John Wesley arrived at his distinction between justifying faith and full sanctifying grace. It will also serve as a case study to show that the call to justification by faith and a subsequent experience of sanctification by faith became the theme of his evangelistic preaching. This paper will conclude with some observations about the importance of Wesley’s holiness message for the founding of Asbury Theological Seminary and the E. Stanley Jones School of World Mission and Evangelism.

Susangeline Y. Patrick

Seeing Lakota Christian Mission History Through the Eyes of John Wesley’s Image of God

This paper engages John Wesley’s understanding of the Imago Dei (the image of God) and examines the history of Christian mission among the Native American tribes, particularly Lakota on Rosebud Reservation and Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota. Wesley’s view of the image of God in creation, partial loss of the image of God, and restoration of the image of God in Jesus Christ provides a framework to describe both the successes and failures in Lakota mission history. Wesley’s understanding of the Imago Dei challenges current mission theology and praxis to see God’s creation and peoples as worthy of honor and love, redeemable and restorable in the new creation.

Timothy J. Christian

The Problem with Wesley’s Postmillennialism: An Exegetical Case for Historic Premillennialism in 21st Century Wesleyan Theology and Missions

This article presents an exegesis of Revelation 20:1-10 followed by a critical assessment of Wesley’s interpretation of Revelation 20:1-10. Overall, Wesley’s postmillennial interpretation of Revelation 20:1-10 is not supported by an exegetical reading of Revelation 20:1-10 (Scripture); it is not rooted in the early church (tradition); and it is based largely upon the optimism of the 18th century which was shattered by the 20th century (experience). Historic premillennialism, however, does exegetical justice to Revelation 20:1-10 (Scripture), takes seriously the early church’s view (tradition), and accords with our reason and experience in the 21st century (reason and experience). As such, Wesleyans should abandon postmillennialism and instead embrace historic premillennialism for the sake of having a biblically based theology and approach to missions and evangelism in the 21st century.

Wilmer Estrada-Carrasquillo

The Relational Character of Wesley’s Theology and its Implications for an Ecclesiology for the Other: A Latino Pentecostal Testimony

This article assesses the impact of John Welsey’s theology on relationship, both between human beings and God and between human beings within community. This theology of relationality is then used as a framework for reading the Christological hymn in Philippians. Finally the implications of our understanding of a theology of relationality are explored in the light of missiological and ecclesiological lenses. All of this is done through the added lens of the author’s experience as a Latino Pentecostal.

Ryan Kristopher Giffin

The Good Work of Justification, Sanctification, and Glorification: John Wesley’s Soteriological Explanation of Philippians 1:6

Numerous scholars have described John Wesley’s use of scripture as soteriological in orientation. This article discusses how this soteriological hermeneutic is present in Wesley’s explanatory note on Phil 1:6, a well-known Pauline text. The article highlights how Wesley’s brief note on this beloved text can provide readers with an entry point into a discussion of three theological themes Wesley held dear, the themes of justification, sanctification, and glorification. In this way, Wesley’s explanation of Phil 1:6 presents Wesleyans with a convenient way of reflecting on both Wesleyan hermeneutics and Wesleyan theology.

Howard A. Snyder

John Wesley, Irenaeus, and Christian Mission: Rethinking Western Christian Theology

John Wesley (1703-1791) was a theologian and practitioner of mission. The theological sophistication of his missiology has never been fully appreciated for three reasons: 1) Wesley seldom used the language of “mission,” 2) he intentionally masked the depth of his learning in the interest of “plain, sound English,” and 3) interpreters assumed that as an evangelist, Wesley could not be taken seriously as theologian. Quite to the contrary, this article shows the depth and sophistication of Wesley’s doctrinal and missiological thinking. Reviewing Western Christian theology from the first century to our day, this article examines the close use of Irenaeus by Wesley, which carries high potency for Christian fidelity, discipleship, theological integrity, authentic mission, and Spirit-powered transformation in persons and culture.

Marcus W. Dean

A Wesleyan Missiological Perspective On Holiness Across Cultures

Missiology has focused on various aspects of contextualization and the importance of salvation, but has not dealt extensively with the biblical concept of holiness. From a Wesleyan perspective this paper looks at holiness from the lens of contextualization. A biblical support of contextualization is presented. Then the cultural factors of values – the dynamics of shame, guilt, and fear are explored – and purity are examined as starting points to contextualize the holiness message. While holiness is ultimately about ethical life and relationships, the message must be built upon culturally understandable concepts.

Mark R. Elliott

Methodism in an Orthodox Context: History, Theology, and (Sadly) Politics

The history of Methodism and Eastern Orthodoxy goes back to the early days of Wesley and his interest in the teachings of the Greek Church Fathers. The relationship between Methodists and the Orthodox Church has gone through positive and negative periods, but the growth of the Soviet Union and the challenge of Communism placed new challenges on both groups. The emergence of the Russian Orthodox Church and its reaction to growing Protestant missions has led to new problems, although the ongoing hope is that commonalities in our theology will overcome some of the challenges of current political realities. This paper was originally presented at the United Methodist Church Eurasia-Central Asia “In Mission Together” Consultation, held in Fulton, Maryland on May 6, 2017.

Features

From the Archives: Frances Havergal’s Letter to Hannah Whitall Smith about her Sanctification Experience

Book Reviews

The entire issue is available as a pdf here.

The Asbury Journal 72, 1 (2017)

The latest issue of Asbury Journal, containing the below main articles, with the one on Lesslie Newbigin particularly catching my eye.

Nathan Crawford

Improvising with the Quadrilateral: An Augustinian Approach to Recovering the Use of the Wesleyan Quadrilateral in the Theology of Preaching

This article explores the improvisational nature of preaching through a closer examination of Augustine’s view of the theology of preaching in De Doctrina Christiana, and an exploration of the Wesleyan framework, known as the Wesleyan Quadrilateral as an additional, but key supplement to developing a theology of preaching which maintains the centrality of scripture, but permits the important addition of improvisation to meet the needs of changing times and congregations.

Samuel K. Law

Waltzing with Wesley: Wesleyan Theology as a Renewing Framework for Chinese Christian Spirituality and Global Identity

This paper argues that Wesleyan theology, understanding that God’s prevenient grace is working toward the restoration of all Creation, serves as a means of grace for global Christians to incarnate Christianity with their indigenous cultural identity. Using the Chinese context, this paper explores how a Wesleyan perspective, being itself a pragmatic and integrative theology, provides a pathway for the Chinese church, suffering from a hobbled spirituality as consequence of an over-identification with Confucian philosophy, to achieve a synergistic spirituality that balances both biblical and Chinese cultural components. A brief review of Chinese spirituality is first provided.

David J. Fuller

The Theme of Creation in Old Testament Theology from the Twentieth Century Onwards: Assessing the State of Play

One particularly disputed topic within the field of Old Testament theology is the subject of creation, specifically the theological and ethical import of the creation materials. The present study conducts a survey of positions on the theme of creation in significant works of Old Testament Theology (excluding works that utilize a narrative or book-based approach) from the seminal volumes of Eichrodt and Von Rad to the present day. It is the intention of the present study to identify the various zones of general agreement and disagreement within the subcategories present in different discussions of creation in Old Testament Theology, in order to clearly isolate the areas that require further research.

Kelly J. Godoy de Danielson and Robert Danielson

Pentecostal Music in the Public Square: The Christian Songs and Music of Juan Luis Guerra

This article explores the issue of contextualization of music in Latin America, particularly through the lens of Pentecostal singer-songwriter Juan Luis Guerra and his story of healing and conversion. Instead of leaving the pop music scene that had made him famous, he chose instead to stay in pop music and introduce Pentecostal Christian songs into his secular albums and concerts. This is a continuation of a long history of creative contextualization by Pentecostal musicians in sharp contrast to mainline Protestants who still primarily rely on translations of English hymns and music in a world where music is an integral part of the culture.

Kelly J. Godoy de Danielson and Robert Danielson

Música Pentecostal en la Plaza Pública: Las Canciones Cristianas y la Música de Juan Luis Guerra

Samuel Lee

An Eschatological Framework for Assessing the Effectiveness of Business as Mission Companies

This paper attempts to address the following question: “What metric or indicator is most useful for assessing the effectiveness of BAM (Business as Mission) companies?” Several books have provided evaluative tools for assessing ministry viability and business effectiveness, but there are currently none that explicitly deal with a BAM measuring stick for holistic BAM effectiveness. This study thus will seek to offer several possible outlets for the emergence of a relational metric that can be used by BAM practitioners in a variety of different contexts. Specific avenues that will be explored include the business world, economic theory, the Christian canon, as well as church history.

Shawn P. Behan

A Hermeneutical Congregation: A New Reading of Lesslie Newbigin’s Missional Ecclesiology through the “Congregation as Hermeneutic of the Gospel” Principle

Within the Missional Church Movement, the work of Lesslie Newbigin in developing a missional ecclesiology has been foundational. Yet often his ideas are not fully followed, rather just his language or overarching principles. Thus, a new reading of Newbigin’s central idea for missional ecclesiology, the congregation as hermeneutic of the Gospel, is necessary. Looking at his initial work on this concept, expanded with the work of others, along with examples from churches, forms the content of this article. Ultimately, it provides a new way of reading Newbigin’s missional ecclesiology for application in local churches.

From the Archives: E. Stanley Jones and Nellie Logan

The entire issue is available as a pdf here.

Holiness 2, 3 (2016) on Holiness and Contemporary Culture

The latest issue of Holiness, the journal of Wesley House Cambridge is now available online, this one devoted to ‘Holiness and Contemporary Culture’.

The editor, Andrew Stobart, imagines explaining to John Wesley that ‘by “contemporary culture” we are simply referring – albeit with greater sophistication than we normally muster – to “the world in which we live”, the world within which we attempt to speak to and of and for God’. At once, he notes, ‘Wesley is no longer standing on the sidelines of our topic, but fully immersed in it, offering us an example of how “holiness” and “contemporary culture” are to be related in thought and practice’.

He goes on: ‘Holiness is always a lived entity, generated within the community of Christ, but also informed by and worked out within the cultural structures that provide definition to our daily lives.’

The entire journal, containing the below collection of peer-reviewed essays, lecture, and short articles, is available as a pdf here.

Hilary Brand

Whatever happened to sin? An examination of the word and concept in contemporary popular culture

The concept of ‘sin’ is rarely expressed in today’s popular culture. When the word does appear it is frequently in ironic quotation marks and often used in terms of ‘naughty but nice’, minor misdemeanours, something disapproved of, an outmoded Catholic shame culture, Islamic oppression or fundamentalist extremism. Rarely is it used in the way the Church understands it. By analysing the use of the word in recent news reports and examining its use and absence across the range of twenty-first-century media, this study draws some conclusions about how UK secular society understands the word. It then goes on to explore how some twentieth-century cultural changes have impacted on its understanding, and concludes with some observations on how twenty-first-century Western culture still senses the underlying problem and yearns for a way to express it.

Rebekah Callow

‘Lifting the shell’: expressions of emotion and cross-cultural struggle in international students

Research has shown that while humans around the world hold various emotions in common with one another – sadness, happiness, fear and anger – the expression of these emotions can look different depending on the culture. This article explores the different expressions of ‘struggle’ that arise when a person experiences ‘culture shock’ or ‘culture stress’ due to life in a cross- cultural context. The article argues that in the increasingly international context of higher education, urgent attention needs to be given to these different cultural expressions of struggle, in order to better understand students’ experiences and provide effective coping strategies. Richard Lewis’s cultural model is developed for use in this context. 

Pete Phillips

Wesley’s parish and the digital age?

The following article was delivered as the annual lecture of the Methodist Sacramental Fellowship at the 2016 Methodist Conference in London. Beginning with the original context of John Wesley’s well-known phrase, ‘the world as my parish’, this article explores the digital aspects of our global parish today. Putting the digital age on the agenda of the Church’s mission is seen as a similar response to Wesley’s decision to become ‘more vile’ and enter the world of field preaching. The lecture concludes by offering a fresh approach to Methodist identity magnified by aspects of digital culture, calling for the creation of digital Arminianism, digital field preaching, digital creativity and, ultimately, a digital parish. The article proposes that Methodism embrace a digital social holiness to spread scriptural holiness throughout the geographic and digital landscape.

Anna Robbins

‘It’s always right now’: framing the struggle for meaning in contemporary culture

Late contemporary culture has seen a previously dominant existentialism give way to naturalistic determinism, and yielded a nihilism that is not conducive to human flourishing, as individuals or society. I will seek to frame a discussion whereby the fact of meaning may be posited and discussed in contemporary culture, concluding that Christianity offers a context for exploring meaning in a way that is preferable to other views because it provides a coherent approach to understanding the nature of the human being, and the problems that give rise to a crisis of meaning. The article will also offer several suggestions for further study whereby the work of meaning may be pursued.

Gordon Leah

A reluctant Samaritan: reflections from Carlo Levi’s Christ Stopped at Eboli

Carlo Levi, doctor, organist, painter and political activist, was exiled in 1935 by Mussolini to Lucania, a remote corner of southern Italy. I consider the enormous impact his skills made on the primitive life of the area, and how, when the peasants believed that ‘Christ stopped at Eboli’, the town north of their region, and no Christians or outsiders were interested in them, Levi gradually, through his immersion in their life with practical, undemonstrative service, gave them new hope. Finally I consider the vital importance of practical service as a true reflection of Christ’s active love for a world and for suffering people without other hope.

Richard Clutterbuck

A holiness movement, shaped by mission: encountering God in Oceania

Reflecting on the author’s experience of Christianity in Oceania, this article draws attention to a classic nineteenth-century Methodist text written in the founding years of the Christian mission in Oceania. Letters on Entire Sanctification was written by John Hunt, a remarkable young missionary, published after his early death in Fiji, and can claim to be the first substantial work of Christian theology written in Oceania. Understanding Hunt’s writings in their context helps to define the relationship between holiness and mission, and refocus the Methodist movement as a ‘holiness movement, shaped by mission’.

Rosemary Power

Pilgrims in a barren land: pioneer ministry in rural Ireland

This article considers a pioneer ministry in rural and small-town west of Ireland, at a time of social change and financial crash. It considers what was expected, what actually happened, how the parent de nomination responded, and what on reflection may feed into the wider discussion of new ways of spreading the Christian gospel. This article is a companion to the author’s article ‘Modern pilgrimage in the west of Ireland’, published in this journal (Volume 2, Issue 1, pp. 115–126).

Tom Osborne

‘Pretty amazing grace’: using contemporary popular music in church worship

This article reflects upon the use within corporate worship of music created outside of the church environment. Using the practical experience of producing a Passiontide liturgy that incorporated secular popular music, and the shape of the resulting worship, the article explores the appropriateness of such use and, assuming such use is deemed appropriate, best practice in doing so. Engaging with a range of academic and popular sources, the article sees music as a key component of both church and contemporary cultures and attempts to offer a way of bridging the gap that seems to exist between them.

Tim Macquiban

What have the sermons of John Wesley ever done for us? The Wesleyan legacy in issues of wealth and poverty: reflections on Wesley’s sermon, ‘The Use of Money’

Wesley’s sermon, ‘The Use of Money’, still resonates with our contemporary economic context. After a synopsis of the sermon, this article seeks to set it in its original context, understanding the key marks of Wesley’s approach to poverty: the importance of personal contact with the poor, the importance of thrift, and the importance of indiscrimination, grounded in spiritual egalitarianism. The legacy of Wesley’s advice, both within the early Methodist movement, and as a starting point for critical reflection today, is then considered.