God's Revolution: Justice, Community, and the Coming Kingdom

by Eberhard Arnold, Stanley Hauerwas (Introduction)

Overview

A radical vision for a society transformed by the teachings and spirit of Jesus.

Do you feel powerless to change the injustice at every level of society? Are you tired of answers that ignore the root causes of human suffering? This selection of writings by Eberhard Arnold, who left a career and the established church in order to live out the gospel, calls us to a completely different way.

Be warned: Arnold doesn’t approach discipleship as the route to some benign religious fulfillment, but as a revolution—a transformation that begins within and spreads outward to encompass every aspect of life. Arnold writes in the same tradition of radical obedience to the gospel as his contemporaries Karl Barth and Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781636080000
Publisher:	Plough Publishing House, The
Publication date:	05/04/2021
Series:	Eberhard Arnold Centennial Editions
Edition description:	3rd ed.
Pages:	232
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.25(h) x 0.75(d)

About the Author

Eberhard Arnold (1883–1935) studied theology, philosophy, and education at Breslau, Halle, and Erlangen, where he received his doctorate in 1909. He became a sought-after writer, lecturer, and speaker in his native Germany. Arnold was active in the student revival movement sweeping the country and became secretary of the German Christian Student Union. In 1916 he became literary director of the Furche Publishing House in Berlin and editor of its monthly periodical. Like thousands of young Europeans, Eberhard Arnold and his wife Emmy were disillusioned by the failure of the establishment – especially the churches—to provide answers to the problems facing society in the turbulent years following World War I. In 1920, out of a desire to put into practice the teachings of Jesus, the Arnolds and their five young children turned their backs on the privileges of middle-class life in Berlin and moved to the small German village of Sannerz. There, with a handful of like-minded seekers who drew inspiration from the Youth Movement, the sixteenth-century Anabaptists, and the early Christians, they founded an intentional community on the basis of the Sermon on the Mount. The community, which supported itself by agriculture and a small but vibrant publishing house, attracted thousands of visitors and eventually grew into the international communal movement known as the Bruderhof.

Table of Contents

This Crumbling World and God’s Coming Order
- On the Edge of Catastrophe
- The Kingdom Breaking In
- Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount
- The Kingdom of God
The New Order Fleshed Out
- The Church
- Unity and the Holy Spirit
- Community
- Repentance and Baptism
- The Lord’s Supper
- Worship
- Mission
The Individual and the Community
- The Body of Believers
- Leadership and Service
- Admonition and Forgiveness
- The Individual in the Community
- Marriage and Family
- Education
- Living Naturally
Peace and the Rule of God
- Nonviolence and Refusal to Bear Arms
- Attitude to Government
- World Poverty and Suffering
- This World’s Revolution and God’s Revolution

Editorial Reviews

The undeniable power of Arnold’s writing owes to the fact that there is no difference between what he professed to believe and the way he lived. It gives his words a resonance and depth, a right to be heard. —Juli Loesch Wiley, New Oxford Review

The aim of God in history is the creation of an all-inclusive community of persons with Christ as its prime sustainer and most glorious inhabitant. Arnold’s vision incarnates just such a community. —Richard Foster, Celebration of Discipline

Arnold’s writing has all the simple, luminous, direct vision into things that I have come to associate with his name. It has the authentic ring of a truly evangelical Christianity and moves me deeply. It stirs to repentance and renewal. —Thomas Merton, The Seven Storey Mountain

From the Publisher

There is no better introduction to the thought and spirit of this twentieth-century prophet.

Robert Ellsberg

Simple and prophetic. Restores the vital connection between belief and obedience.

Jim Wallis