Overview
Christians today are focused on two important creation topics: how the world came to be and how we should care for it. A highly respected Old Testament theologian recommends that before discussing these questions, we focus on God the Creator and God's ongoing work in creation. We should explore what the Bible tells us and let the text set the agenda for our reflections.
Combining his storytelling gift with rigorous biblical exegesis and deep reflection, Ben Ollenburger describes the action of God the Creator as presented throughout the Old Testament. He shows how creation is about more than origins. It is about God acting against the hostile forces of chaos that can be historical, political, and military. About how God created a well-ordered world, and how human transgression ruptures God's relationship with humans and threatens creation. About how God responds as Creator to those threats by disturbing and reordering the disorder, bringing about what God intended--a world ordered in the social, political, and natural realms that is characterized by the justice, righteousness, and peace required for human flourishing.
Combining his storytelling gift with rigorous biblical exegesis and deep reflection, Ben Ollenburger describes the action of God the Creator as presented throughout the Old Testament. He shows how creation is about more than origins. It is about God acting against the hostile forces of chaos that can be historical, political, and military. About how God created a well-ordered world, and how human transgression ruptures God's relationship with humans and threatens creation. About how God responds as Creator to those threats by disturbing and reordering the disorder, bringing about what God intended--a world ordered in the social, political, and natural realms that is characterized by the justice, righteousness, and peace required for human flourishing.
Table of Contents
Contents
Introduction
1. God's World at Peace: Genesis 1
2. From Virtually Nothing to the Garden of God: Genesis 2
3. From God's Peaceful Garden to Peace Divinely Disturbed: Genesis 3:1-11:9
4. "In Primeval Days": Creation Texts before the Bible
5. "Who Is the King of Glory?": God the Creator in the Psalms
6. "The Lord by Wisdom Founded the Earth": God the Creator in Wisdom Literature
7. Royal Theology: God the Creator in Isaiah
8. "Who Treads the Heights of the Earth": God the Creator in the Prophets after Isaiah
9. Rearranging the World: God the Creator in Zechariah and Daniel
10. God the Creator beyond the Old Testament
Indexes
Introduction
1. God's World at Peace: Genesis 1
2. From Virtually Nothing to the Garden of God: Genesis 2
3. From God's Peaceful Garden to Peace Divinely Disturbed: Genesis 3:1-11:9
4. "In Primeval Days": Creation Texts before the Bible
5. "Who Is the King of Glory?": God the Creator in the Psalms
6. "The Lord by Wisdom Founded the Earth": God the Creator in Wisdom Literature
7. Royal Theology: God the Creator in Isaiah
8. "Who Treads the Heights of the Earth": God the Creator in the Prophets after Isaiah
9. Rearranging the World: God the Creator in Zechariah and Daniel
10. God the Creator beyond the Old Testament
Indexes
Endorsements
"In God the Creator, Ollenburger synthesizes and expands his career-long investigation of biblical concepts of creation. On display are the author's finest characteristics: keen attention to primary texts, breadth and depth of scriptural engagement, restraint of other scholars' overstatements, and the rare gifts of clarity and accessibility. Taking the Creator God as its touchstone, this book articulates a concise biblical theology: an assessment of divine-human interaction within the framework of the world's nature and structure. It comes most highly recommended."
C. Clifton Black, Otto A. Piper Professor of Biblical Theology, Princeton Theological Seminary
Author
Ben C. Ollenburger
Ben C. Ollenburger (PhD, Princeton Theological Seminary) is professor emeritus of biblical theology at the Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary (AMBS) in Elkhart, Indiana, where he has taught since 1987. Prior to AMBS, he taught for 7 years at Princeton Theological Seminary. Ollenburger has written or edited numerous books, including Old Testament Theology: Flowering and Future and the New Interpreter's Bible commentary on Zechariah.