Holy Love: A Wesleyan Systematic Theology
Francis Asbury Press announced this week the publication of a major new work of systematic theology for the Wesleyan-Methodist tradition. Titled Holy Love: A Wesleyan Systematic Theology, the five-volume series is the culmination of more than two decades of work on the part of multiple Wesleyan-Methodist scholars. Our tradition has been in need of an up-to-date work of systematic theology for some time, and the publication of this work fills a significant gap in Wesleyan scholarship. The lead editor on the series is John Oswalt with Christianne Albertson and Matthew Ayars serving as contributing editors.
Great Timing
The timeliness of this publication is worth noting. While this multi-volume work is written for the broad Wesleyan-Methodist tradition, it could be particularly useful for the newly-formed Global Methodist Church. We Global Methodists are in a season of identity formation in which we're thinking through issues of theology and polity. A group of us gathered recently to consider what the theological foundations of the Global Methodist Church at the Reconstructing Methodism Conference. My hope is that GMC clergy and laity would make use of Holy Love: A Wesleyan Systematic Theology as we continue to build this new denomination.
Volumes and Authors
Here are the titles of each volume and their authors:
Christology as Theology by M. William Ury (Get it on Amazon)
Theology by Allan Coppedge
Cosmology, Bibliology, Pneumatology, and Anthropology by John N. Oswalt, Gareth Lee Cockerill, Matt Ayars, and Dennis F. Kinlaw
Hamartiology, Soteriology, and Predestination by John N. Oswalt, Allan Coppedge, and Thomas H. McCall
Ecclesiology and Eschatology by Steve Blakemore and Christopher T. Bounds
The first volume is available now, and the others will be released over the next several months. Francis Asbury Press is running a discount when you order the whole bundle now. You'll get the first one now and the others will be shipped when published. I hope this resource is used widely.
Dr. Matt O’Reilly (Ph.D., Gloucestershire) is Lead Pastor of Christ Church in Birmingham, Alabama, Director of Research at Wesley Biblical Seminary, and a fellow of the Center for Pastor Theologians. A two-time recipient of the John Stott Award for Pastoral Engagement, he is the author of Paul and the Resurrected Body: Social Identity and Ethical Practice, The Letters to the Thessalonians, and Bless the Nations: A Devotional for Short-Term Missions. Connect at theologyproject.online and follow @mporeilly.
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Excellent!
I remember years back reading a silly debate in the WTJ about whether or not writing systematic theology textbooks were "un-Wesleyan" or not. [Demonstrative proof that Wesleyanism is so broadly and ill defined in contemporary times!] We Methodist have a long history of producing systematic theology textbooks, beginning with Richard Watson's Arminian Antidote "Theological Institutes" and culminating with (but not ending with) William Burt Pope's "A Compendium of Christian Theology."
Hopefully, this systematic theology volume set will be a sound and conservative alternative to what the Church of the Nazarene has been producing these past few decades. Furthermore, I hope that when these books engage church history and tradition, they do not ignore their own Wesleyan-Arminian tradition like Dr.…