The Image of God in an Image Driven Age: Explorations in Theological Anthropology

by Beth Felker Jones (Editor), Jeffrey W. Barbeau (Editor)

Overview

Whether on the printed page, the television screen or the digital app, we live in a world saturated with images.Some images help shape our understanding of ourselves and the world around us in positive ways, while others lead us astray and distort our relationships. Christians confess that human beings have been created in the image of God, yet we chose to rebel against that God and so became unfaithful bearers of God's image. The good news of the gospel is that Jesus, who is the image of God, restores the divine image in us, partially now and fully in the day to come.The essays collected in The Image of God in an Image Driven Age explore the intersection of theology and culture. With topics ranging across biblical exegesis, the art gallery, Cormac McCarthy, racism, sexuality and theosis, the contributors to this volume offer a unified vision—ecumenical in nature and catholic in spirit—of what it means to be truly human and created in the divine image in the world today.This collection from the 2015 Wheaton Theology Conference includes contributions by Daniela C. Augustine, Craig L. Blomberg, William A. Dyrness, Timothy R. Gaines and Shawna Songer Gaines, Phillip Jenkins, Beth Felker Jones, Christina Bieber Lake, Catherine McDowell, Ian A. McFarland, Matthew J. Milliner, Soong-Chan Rah and Janet Soskice, as well as original poems by Jill Peláez Baumgaertner and Brett Foster.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780830899609
Publisher:	IVP Academic
Publication date:	04/18/2016
Series:	Wheaton Theology Conference Series
Sold by:	Bookwire
Format:	eBook
Pages:	272
File size:	6 MB

About the Author

Jeffrey W. Barbeau (PhD, Marquette University) is associate professor of theology in the Graduate School at Wheaton College. He holds graduate degrees in English literature, theology and religious studies, all of which shape his interest in the intersection of theology, literature and history. Barbeau writes and researches on British Romanticism, theology and literature, the nineteenth century, Methodist history and Wesleyan theology. He is the author or editor of multiple books on the English writer S. T. Coleridge and his family. He has coedited or contributed to books such as Spirit of God: Christian Renewal in the Community of Faith, Theology Questions Everyone Asks, The Evangelical Dictionary of Theologyand The Encyclopedia of Christian Literature. He has written articles or contributed book reviews to journals such as Books and Culture, Christian Scholar's Review and the International Journal of Systematic Theology. Barbeau is an active member and Sunday school teacher at Grace United Methodist Church in Naperville, Illinois, and lives with his wife Aimee and their children.

Beth Felker Jones (PhD, Duke University) is associate professor of theology at Wheaton College and former assistant professor of Bible and Religion at Huntington University. She is the author of The Marks of His Wounds: Gender Politics and Bodily Resurrection and Practicing Christian Doctrine: An Introduction to Thinking and Living Theologically. Jones is a columnist for the Christian Century and has written articles for publications such as Duke Divinity School's Faith and Leadership and Christianity Today's Her.meneutics blog. She lives in Wheaton, Illinois, with her husband Brian, a United Methodist pastor, and their four children.

Beth Felker Jones (PhD, Duke University) is associate professor of theology at Wheaton College. She is the author of The Marks of His Wounds: Gender Politics and Bodily Resurrection and Practicing Christian Doctrine: An Introduction to Thinking and Living Theologically.

Jeffrey W. Barbeau (PhD, Marquette University) is professor of theology at Wheaton College. A theologian, literary critic, and historian, he is the author of numerous monographs, anthologies, and edited books, including The Cambridge Companion to British Romanticism and Religion, The Spirit of Methodism: From the Wesleys to a Global Communion, and Religion in Romantic England: An Anthology of Primary Sources.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction
Beth Felker Jones and Jeffrey W. Barbeau
Zola, Imago Dei, on Her First Birthday
Jill Peláez Baumgaertner
Whiteout
Brett Foster
Part I: Canon
1. 'In the Image of God He Created Them': How Genesis 1:26-27 Defines the Divine-Human Relationship and Why It Matters
Catherine McDowell
2. Poised Between Life and Death: The Imago Dei After Eden
William A. Dyrness
3. 'True Righteousness and Holiness': The Image of God in the New Testament
Craig L. Blomberg
Part II: Culture
4. Uncovering Christ: Sexuality in the Image of the Invisible God
Timothy R. Gaines and Shawna Songer Gaines
5. Culture Breaking: In Praise of Iconoclasm
Matthew J. Milliner
6. Carrying the Fire, Bearing the Image: Theological Reflections on Cormac McCarthy's The Road
Christina Bieber Lake
Part III: Vision
7. What Does It Mean to See Someone? Icons and Identity
Ian A. McFarland
8. Image, Spirit and Theosis: Imaging God in an Image-Distorting World
Daniela C. Augustine
9. The God of Creative Address: Creation, Christology and Ethics
Janet Soskice
Part IV: Witness
10. The Sin of Racism: Racialization of the Image of God
Soong-Chan Rah
11. Witnessing in Freedom: Resisting Commodification of the Image
Beth Felker Jones
12. The Storm of Images: The Image of God in Global Faith
Philip Jenkins
Epilogue
Jeffrey W. Barbeau and Beth Felker Jones
List of Contributors
Name and Subject Index
Scripture Index

What People are Saying About This

Timothy George

"Bringing together art, literature and theology, these essays are a prism of Christian reflection on what is perhaps the most urgent question of our time: What does it mean to be a human being created in the image of God?"

Jana M. Bennett

"Poetry, literature, visual art and deep theological thinking collide here! What better way to think about what it means to be made in God's image, and what it means to bear God's image, to a world beset with so many false images? Students, pastors and theologians alike will find here a meaty conversation and, better yet, an invitation to bear God's image well."

Oliver D. Crisp

"This is a fecund collection of essays on theological anthropology. In it one can find treatments of the image of God from biblical, systematic and constructive theology, but one can also find essays that reflect on the imaging of God in the arts: in poetry and in literary criticism. Here too there is reflection on our witness to the divine image in a culture of commodification and a world where the color of one's skin has displaced the divine image in which we are all created. These explorations of the doctrine of the image of God offer readers a rich and satisfying smorgasbord of essays and art that repays careful reading and reflection."

Editorial Reviews

"The essays collected in this volume explore the intersection of theology and culture. With topics ranging across biblical exegesis, the art gallery, Cormac McCarthy, racism, sexuality, and theosis, the contributors offer a unified vision of what it means to be truly human and created in the divine image in the world today."

70(4) Interpretation

"This is a fecund collection of essays on theological anthropology. In it one can find treatments of the image of God from biblical, systematic and constructive theology, but one can also find essays that reflect on the imaging of God in the arts: in poetry and in literary criticism. Here too there is reflection on our witness to the divine image in a culture of commodification and a world where the color of one's skin has displaced the divine image in which we are all created. These explorations of the doctrine of the image of God offer readers a rich and satisfying smorgasbord of essays and art that repays careful reading and reflection."

Oliver D. Crisp

"Poetry, literature, visual art and deep theological thinking collide here! What better way to think about what it means to be made in God's image, and what it means to bear God's image, to a world beset with so many false images? Students, pastors and theologians alike will find here a meaty conversation and, better yet, an invitation to bear God's image well."

Jana M. Bennett

"Bringing together art, literature and theology, these essays are a prism of Christian reflection on what is perhaps the most urgent question of our time: What does it mean to be a human being created in the image of God?"

Timothy George

"The essays collected in this volume explore the intersection of theology and culture. With topics ranging across biblical exegesis, the art gallery, Cormac McCarthy, racism, sexuality, and theosis, the contributors offer a unified vision of what it means to be truly human and created in the divine image in the world today."

--Interpretation, 70(4), 2016

From the Publisher