Free Downloads
The Church In Exile: Living In Hope After Christendom

The people of God throughout history have been a people of exile and diaspora. Whether under the Assyrians, Babylonians, Greeks or Romans, the people chosen by God have had to learn how to be a holy people in alien lands and under foreign rule. For much of its history, however, the Christian church lived with the sense of being at home in the world, with considerable influence and power. That age of Christendom is now over, and as Lee Beach demonstrates, this is something for which the church should be grateful. The "peace" of Christendom was a false one, and there is no comfortable normalcy to which we can or should return. Drawing on a close engagement with Old Testament and New Testament texts, The Church in Exile offers a biblical and practical theology for the church in a post-Christian age. Beach helps the people of God today to develop a hopeful and prophetic imagination, a theology responsive to its context, and an exilic identity marked by faithfulness to God's mission in the world.

Paperback: 240 pages

Publisher: IVP Academic (February 5, 2015)

Language: English

ISBN-10: 0830840664

ISBN-13: 978-0830840663

Product Dimensions: 6 x 0.6 x 9 inches

Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)

Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)

Best Sellers Rank: #77,830 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #24 in Books > Christian Books & Bibles > Churches & Church Leadership > Ecclesiology #109 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Religious Studies > Sociology #332 in Books > History > World > Religious > Christianity

The image of the church in exile is taken up by Lee Beach, an assistant professor of Christian Ministry at McMaster Divinity College in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, as an image of hope for the church. Even as God was with the exiles in the biblical story, God is with us as well as we enter this new post-Christendom era. While Beach uses the image of exile to stir our prophetic imagination, Walter Brueggemann points out that the texts he chooses actually emerge out of the Diaspora. The difference between exile and Diaspora, is that with exile there is an expectation of a return to normalcy. With the Diaspora, there is a new normalcy of living and practicing one’s faith far from home. Brueggemann writes that “’Exile’ might be a hope of ‘recovery’ for the way the church used to be, whereas ‘Diaspora’ is a recognition that there will not be any return home and there will not be a recovery of any old normalcy” (p. 12). Thus, while the term exile is used here, there is clearly a sense in this book that we will never return to the former “normalcy.”With Brueggemann’s helpful caveat in mind we are ushered into Beach’s provocative exploration of the biblical story of exile and diasporas, old and new, which is divided into two parts. The first part focuses on the development of a theology of exile, with special attention given to Esther, Daniel, Jonah, the ministry of Jesus, and the wisdom of 1 Peter. One of the key points in expositing the idea of exile is that God is to be seen as present on foreign soil. The earlier symbols of divine presence – the land, the Davidic monarchy, and the Temple were gone. These markers of their identity as a people had been stripped away from them.

The Church in Exile: Living in Hope After Christendom Remarriage after Divorce in Today's Church: 3 Views (Counterpoints: Church Life) De Negerslaven in De Kolonie Suriname En De Uitbreiding Van Het Christendom Onder De Heidensche Bevolking (Dutch Edition) Islam At The Gates: How Christendom Defeated the Ottoman Turks Liberty, Fraternity, Exile: Haiti and Jamaica after Emancipation Living Off The Grid And Loving It: 40 Creative Ways To Living A Stress Free And Self-Sustaining Lifestyle (Simple Living, Off Grid Living, Off The Grid Homes, DIY Survival Guide, Prepping & Survival) Living Without the One You Cannot Live Without: Hope and Healing after Loss After Effects for Flash / Flash for After Effects: Dynamic Animation and Video with Adobe After Effects CS4 and Adobe Flash CS4 Professional DYING TO REALLY LIVE: Finally, an After Death Survivor returns from deeply into life after death (NDEs - Life After Death? Series Book 1) The Multi-Site Church Revolution: Being One Church in Many Locations (Leadership Network Innovation Series) Vertical Church: What Every Heart Longs for. What Every Church Can Be. What Would Jesus Deconstruct?: The Good News of Postmodernism for the Church (The Church and Postmodern Culture) CHURCH and SOCIETY IN TRINIDAD Part I & II:THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN TRINIDAD 1498-1863 The Catholic Church in Micronesia: Historical Essays on the Catholic Church in the Caroline-Marshall Islands The Records of Holy Trinity (Old Swedes) Church, Wilmington, Del., From 1697 to 1773, With an Abstract of the English Records From 1773 to 1810 and Catalogue and Errata of the Records of Holy Trinity (Old Swedes) Church The Early Church (The Penguin History of the Church) (v. 1) Church STILL Ain't A Showplace for Saints (Church Saints Book 2) Western Society and the Church in the Middle Ages (The Penguin History of the Church) (v. 2) Hope Against Hope: A Memoir Christmas in Good Hope (A Good Hope Novel Book 1)