An Emerging Dictionary for the Gospel and Culture

Description: What? Another dictionary? Or really an anthology, organized alphabetically by virtue of a particular conversation. The idea for this project emerged from a free-for-all conversation around breakfast one morning. We had invoked any number of authors living and dead, and had spanned spirituality, leadership, education, philosophy, ecclesiology, and even cosmology. We heard from Augustine and Barth, Jim Wallis and Dallas Willard, referencing chaos and culture. Someone had even shared an ancient koan! Why . . . that's it. Why not a roving, eclectic dictionary that is both ridiculously current and particular, and at the same time broadly inclusive, reaching back to Augustine and St. Benedict. Why not write the ABCs of the emerging and missional conversation: this is Wishful Thinking (Buechner) meets A for Abductive (McLaren and Sweet) meets Soul Survivor (Yancey). And maybe there is just a touch of Brian McLaren in A Generous Orthodoxy. The rules are simple: no more than five words per letter; names and personalities can occur on either side, attached to a definition or as referencing a word or concept, and while the overall interest is theological, the focus is life and mission, not theory. Leave your luggage behind, climb aboard and join a journey of exploration that will enrich, challenge, and bring a smile to your face. Endorsements: ""There is a growing need for a guide that can help Christians find our way through the new frontiers of the post-evangelical landscape. The rate of theological, cultural, and church developments is breath-taking. Even the best read among us are finding it hard to keep up. An Emerging Dictionary for Gospel and Culture meets this need. Creatively, with much skill and breadth of knowledge, Leonard Hjalmarson has provided a tool to help us manage the complexity of the many new conversations surrounding what God is doing in these exciting days. I highly recommend it.""_ --David Fitch author of The Great Giveaway ""Len Hjalmarson is one smart cookie: he somehow manages to gather, interpret, and file many of the key ideas that are impacting church and culture in our time. Here he articulates them, and we get the benefit of his encyclopedic mind. A blessing!"" --Alan Hirsch author of Untamed: Reactivating a Missional Form of Discipleship ""If our Forge team needs information about a missional topic, we just ask Len. He is a walking encyclopedia about what is going on in the missional or emerging church movements and about most of what has been written. Len is also a great writer. He communicates succinctly and with clarity what others struggle to articulate. Perhaps the major criticism I have of this book is that it is not entitled Volume 1. I am sure there is more to come. This is a helpful resource. --Cam Roxburgh National Director, Forge Missional Training Network ""Hjalmarson has done what many have wanted to do but couldn't-made sense of the multiple threads of discussion that have been taking place around the missional church. Using the idea of a dictionary is brilliant. He takes the varied conversations and with gentle and perceptive skill draws them together into a coherent whole. Thoughtfulness and care is on every page. He takes the varied themes and draws them into a passionate dialogue on what it means to engage the culture with a relevant and transformational gospel. This was a needed tool that provides content and a frame to the conversation. A must for everyone who seeks to be part of the conversation and a follower of Jesus in this time."" --Gary V. Nelson author of Borderland Churches: A Congregation's Introduction to Missional Living