A Theology of the Christian Life: Imitating and Participating in God

Description

In this book, theologian Christopher Holmes encourages readers to be more deeply captivated by the Bible’s witness to God. He gets at the heart of the Christian life by considering some of the great truths of God’s existence.

Holmes engages with the church fathers along with Augustine and Aquinas to offer a rich, accessible account of the triune God and the divine perfections. He unfolds a program of spiritual renewal founded on the essential attributes of God, showing how we share in the life of God through imitation and participation and how the doctrines of the triune God and the divine attributes shape our understanding of the Christian life. Throughout, Holmes demonstrates the importance of theology for Christian faith and practice.

A Theology of the Christian Life will appeal to professors and students of Christian theology as well as pastors and church leaders.

Contents

Introduction
Part One
1. The Existence of God and the Christian Life
I AM
How Do We Know That God Exists?
Spiritual Sight
2. The Manner of God’s Existence and the Christian Life
Sense Perception?
Virtue
Moses’s Example
Familiarity with God
The Soul’s Elevation in Prayer
Ascetical Existence
“The Moral Race Course” of the Baptized
3. Perfection and the Christian Life
The Likeness of God
Is Christ Perfect?
Rewards
The Father’s Invisibility
A Light Yoke
4. Infinity and the Christian Life
Angelic Existence
The Bodiless God
The Trinitarian Dimension
God as Ever Greater
The Love of God
Devotion and the Doctrine of God
The Perennial Relevance of 1 Corinthians 15:28
5. Immutability and the Christian Life
Choice
The Way of Life
True Worship
The Unchanging God
On Not Diverging from God
Charity
Friendship with God
Part Two
6. The Hypostatic Union and the Christian Life
Believing Agency and Being
The Great Difference
Superiority to the Demonic
7. Virtue and the Christian Life
Virtue
Theological Existence
The Holy Spirit
God’s Renown
Prayer
8. Church and the Christian Life
The One Foundation
A Fruitful Death
The Grace of Prayer
Conclusion
Indexes