I must confess that I spend far too much time looking at the “coming soon” pages on various publishers websites, planning what I will buy and read next after I have finished (!) the huge mountain of books by my bedside.
Baker Academic were always one of the worst for making it easy to find what was coming soon, and keeping it up to date, but they have recently redeemed themselves by posting a comprehensive guide to their forthcoming releases in the format of three PDFs.
Here’s what’s on my shopping list…
Commentary on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament in the New Testament edited by G. K. Beale & D. A. Carson. I’ve heard rumours about this one for years, and it finally is set to appear in Nov 2007. At 1,152 pages and with a very distinguished list of contributors this is surely set to become the standard work looking at OT use in the NT.
Baker Exegetical Commentary on Acts by Darryl Bock. Coming in October 2007 this is a welcome follow-on from the man who wrote what is widely recognised as the premier evangelical work on Luke.
Baker Exegetical Commentary on Matthew by David Turner (Feb 2008). I don’t know much about David Turner, but the BEC commentary series is rapidly becoming one of my favourites. Combined with R T France’s recent volume on Matthew in the NICNT series, this is a good time to be studying the first gospel.
Reformed and Always Reforming by Roger E Olson (Oct 2007). This is one of those books that could go either way. It is subtitled “a postconservative approach to evangelical theology” and looks at the contributions of theologians such as Grenz, Vanhoozer, Pinnock and Volf. I’ve come across postevangelical, postchristian and postcharismatic, but postconservative is a new one on me.
Spiritual Formation as if the Church Mattered by James Wilhoit (Feb 2008). Another book with an arresting title. The point seems to be that much writing on “spiritual formation” focuses on the individual Christian’s discipleship with little or no reference to the church.
Central Themes in Biblical Theology edited by Scot Hafemann and Paul House. This covers seven themes in 336 pages – “The Covenant Relationship”, “The Commands of God”, “The Atonement”, “The Servant of the Lord”, “The Day of the Lord”, “The People of God” and “The History of Redemption”. This looks like it would be good as a reference to use for an overview of these subjects that repeatedly crop up throughout the Bible.
The Jesus Legend by Paul Rhodes Eddy and Gregory Boyd. Subtitled “A Case for the Historical Reliability of the Synoptic Jesus Tradition”, this comes with glowing reviews from historical Jesus heavyweights such as Richard Bauckham and Craig Evans. It looks like a genuinely useful contribution to the debate although at 480 pages it may be too long for the casual reader to tackle.
The Evolution Controversy by Thomas Fowler and Daniel Kuebler. This book is designed to present the different sides in the debate rather than to argue for one particular position. I’ve been looking for a book that will do this for a while, as I have not kept up to date understanding all the different approaches found amongst evangelicals.
Getting to Know the Church Fathers, An Evangelical Introduction by Bryan Litfin (Oct 2007) looks like it will be a good way to start learning about the church fathers from an evangelical perspective, getting the basic facts on their lives and teaching without getting too bogged down by the sheer volume of their writings (I got Augustine’s City of God recently and it is huge!).
i think postconservative is roughly the same as postevangelical or those who are sympathetic to the emerging ethos – narrative over propositions, more hesitant about inerrancy, things like that.
I just read Turner’s review of Keener on Matthew, and I was a bit disappointed to discover that he’s with Keener on the late date and non-Matthean authorship. That surprises me from the BECNT series. I’m hoping he’s an anomaly, because it’s been reliably conservative so far with every volume already out. We’re starting a series on Matthew in December, and I was wondering if I should get both France and Turner, but I think at this point I’m just getting France and waiting to see several reviews of Turner before getting that too. I just wish I had a better idea when Carson’s revision is supposed to be out. It’s the one NT volume that Zondervan hasn’t announced.
thanks, interesting info Jeremy. I was planning to get France first anyway. I wouldn’t be surprised if Carson is deliberately waiting so he can respond to France over his preterism. Its not as if he hasn’t got enough writing projects on his plate already
But Carson did say in his commentary review that his Matthew revision should be out within the year. The commentary review was delayed beyond expectations, and it was out in January, which means even a January publication for the EBC Matthew-Mark volume would be later than Carson seemed to expect, unless he edited his Matthew comment after the delay of the commentary review took place.
I’ve not got his commentary review (thought it might make me spend too much money if I read it!). Last I looked at the Zondervan site, it looked like some of the OT volumes are slated to come out next year, but still no sign of the Matthew/Mark volume.