Where God Meets Man: Luther's Down-to-Earth Approach to the Gospel

by Gerhard O. Forde

Overview

This book about Luther's theology is written out of a two-fold conviction. First, that many of our problems have arisen because we have not really understood our own traditions, especially in the case of Luther; and second, that there is still a lot of help for us in someone like Luther if we take the trouble to probe beneath the surface. It is an attempt to interpret Luther's theology for our own day. The fundamental theme of the book is the "down-to-earth" character of Luther's theology. In using this theme, Forde points out that we have failed to understand the basic thrust or direction of Luther's theology and that this failure has caused and is still causing us grief. Modern scholarship has demonstrated that Luther simply did not share the views on the nature of faith and salvation that subsequent generations have foisted upon him and used to interpret his thinking. This book attempts to bring the results of some of that scholarship to light and make it more accessible to those who are searching for answers today. The central questions of Christianity are examined in this fresh restatement of Luther's thought--the God-man relationship, the cross, the sacraments, this world and the next, and the role of the church. The author presents the "down-to-earth" character of Luther's theology in the hope that it will help individual Christians today to be both faithful to God and true to their human and social responsibilities.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780806612355
Publisher:	1517 Media
Publication date:	01/01/1972
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	128
Product dimensions:	5.00(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.33(d)

About the Author

Gerhard O. Forde, Lutheran theologian and pastor, taught at St. Olaf College, Luther College, and Luther Seminary. In addition to his teaching, he served as a member of the Lutheran-Roman Catholic Dialogues for twenty years. He authored several books, including Justification by Faith: A Matter of Death and Life (1982), Theology Is for Proclamation (1990), and On Being a Theologian of the Cross: Reflections on Luther's Heidelberg Disputation, 1518 (1997). Three published collections of Forde's essays and sermons have been edited by Mark Mattes and Steven Paulson: A More Radical Gospel: Essays on Eschatology, Authority, Atonement, and Ecumenism (2004), The Preached God: Proclamation in Word and Sacrament (2007), and The Essential Forde (2019). Another collection of sermons, We Preach Christ Crucified: Sermons by Gerhard O. Forde (2016), was edited by his wife, Marianna. Gerhard Forde died on August 9, 2005.

Table of Contents

Preface

"Up the Down Staircase"

The "Down to Earth" God

The Glory Road or the Way of the Cross?

A Man for This Earth

Treasure in Earthen Vessels

This World and the Next

The Church and the Charter of Freedom