Joining Creation's Praise: A Theological Ethic of Creatureliness

"In the beginning, God created . . ." Thus begins the Bible's story of a long conversation between God and creatures, one in which humans are often the least edifying contributors. They need to learn what it means to confess themselves creatures if they are to begin to understand what it means to be human and how to live. Joining Creation's Praise, a major statement by a leading Christian ethicist, shows how confessing that we are creatures deeply reshapes every aspect of Christian thinking and living. Human beings are made to embody Christ's image in the world--not as dominators but as conduits of divine life. In this comprehensive yet clear volume of theological ethics, Brian Brock follows the first few chapters of Genesis in order to discover the things that the sages of Israel took to be crucial for the ethical life of human beings among other creatures in God's world. Informed by theological rigor and careful exegesis, the many ethical reflections in this volume allow an ancient wisdom to shed fresh light on very postmodern ethical questions about conversion, life with God, knowledge and wisdom, dominion, Sabbath, vocation, economics, human dignity, our relationship with the rest of creation, sexuality, marriage, family, sin, death, and politics.