The Collected Works of James Wm. McClendon, Jr., Volume 3 - Hardcover

This valuable book, the last in a series of three volumes on the collected works of renowned, twentieth-century Baptist theologian James Wm. McClendon Jr. allows readers to witness McClendon the gifted preacher. Whereas earlier volumes demonstrate his academic scholarship, here is McClendon at his best in the area of pastoral, applied, or practical theology--what he personally referred to as 'first-order theology' done in, with, and for the church as community. -- Michael S. Whiting -- Baptist History and Heritage Journal For students of McClendon who wish to be internally coherent to his theology, this is an essential source for interpreting his work. For those interested in homiletics this is a collection which at least poses, if not explicitly answering, questions about the distinctly prophetic and baptist nature of preaching. -- Stuart Blythe -- Journal of European Baptist Studies In these sermons, McClendon weaves the biblical stories, the stories of the preacher, and the stories of the listeners. He steps deftly and imaginatively from to the other and back again. -- Donald J. Brash -- American Baptist Quarterly

James Wm. McClendon, Jr. (1924a2000) was the most important "baptist" theologian of the twentieth century. McClendon crafted a systematic theology that grew out of the immediacy of preaching the text, refused to succumb to the pressures of individualism, and lamented the stunted public witness of a fractured Protestant ecclesiology. This third and final volume of his Collected Works provides a compendium of McClendon's sermonsaexamples of what he called "first-order" theology in action. While McClendon was predominantly known as a philosophical theologian, he persisted in the belief that the theology that mattered most occurred in ordinary congregations seeking to bear faithful witness in the world. The sermons in this collectionamany rarely seen and never before publishedaprovide an important window into McClendon's own theology and witness to his convictions about theology's purpose and end. This third volume serves as an invaluable resource for ministers, students, and theologians who seek a fuller understanding of McClendon's "baptist" theology.