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Review: What is Jesus Doing?

In What is Jesus Doing? (IVP Academic, 2020), Edwin Chr. Van Driel seeks to understand how the ongoing ministry of Jesus informs the ministry of the church in an anxious age. Sourcing his premise in the doctrine of the ascension, van Driel brings together a powerhouse group of research-practitioners to discuss Christ’s work in the church today. With contributors in the areas of systematic theology, missional theology, pastoral theology and pastoral care, and liturgics and homiletics, each of the contributors feeds into a rich yet incomplete answer to the question, “What is Jesus doing in the church?”

This terrific book shows how practical theology is an interdisciplinary task, one that refuses to be siloed by a particular mode of theology. The contributors are leading experts in their discipline and approach this subject with the background of their tradition, education, and experience. While these chapters are seriously academic, they are written by practitioners with a heart for the church; therefore, each chapter moves toward the implications for understanding the embodiment of theology in everyday life and ministry. This would be a helpful book for pastoral leaders as well as seminarians and persons who are interested in the relationship and reconciliation between the academy and church.

(A complimentary review copy was given in exchange for an honest review.)

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