Learning about the Emergent Church Movement

I recently wrote a paper about the emerging church as part of my class work. One of the books I read that is a good primer for understanding the movement is Evangelicals Engaging Emergent edited by William D. Henard and Adam Greenway.


The book is a compilation of essays by some of the brightest evangelical scholars today. Some of my favorites are Danny Akin, Ed Stetzer, and Darrell Bock, but I also "met" some new scholars to read: Douglas Blount, R. Scott Smith, and John Hammett. They tackle issues ranging from explaining the movement, the postmodern view of Scripture, biblical interpretation, emergent's Christology, and their soteriology.

The strength of the book is that they touch on a broad range of topics. These essays can serve as jumping off points to exploring topics of interest in more depth by using their references to dig deeper. I especially enjoyed the theological section of the book, since appears that the next big battle in the church will deal with issues concerning the nature of Christ and salvation.

Though the book does have some practical chapters, this would be of more interest to those who have an academic interest in the area of the emergent church.