What is the role of the will in believing the good news of the gospel? Why is there so much controversy over free will throughout church history? R. C. Sproul finds that Christians have often been influenced by pagan views of the human will that deny the effects of Adam's fall. In Willing to Believe, Sproul traces the free-will controversy from its formal beginning in the fifth century, with the writings of Augustine and Pelagius, to the present. Readers will gain understanding into the nuances separating the views of Protestants and Catholics, Calvinists and Arminians, and Reformed and Dispensationalists. This book, like Sproul's Faith Alone, is a major work on an essential evangelical tenet.
Discover how yielding ourselves wholly to God, especially in the midst of challenging circumstances, lends new purpose to our lives. “Vivian Mabuni is a kind and trustworthy guide through one of adulthood’s secrets: life doesn’t go like you thought it would.”—Jen Hatmaker, New York Times best-selling author of For the Love and Of Mess and Moxie As women after God’s heart, we honestly desire to please God. We want to be used by Him and to experience the peace and fulfillment He wants for us. Yet it’s all too easy to fall into living mechanically, with a rule-based approach to the Christian life, or to focus on getting what we want when we want it. Even when we want to be willing, saying yes to whatever God asks often feels scary, and the distractions of this world get in the way. Vivian Mabuni knows this all too well, but she’s discovered that open-handed living starts with an intentional posture of the heart. Through surrender to His will, we draw closer to God in a way that makes our day-to-day lives more purposeful, powerful, and pleasing to Him. With Vivian’s warm encouragement in Open Hands, Willing Heart, you’ll learn how to step out in courageous trust as you invite God to give and take—and move and work—in your life as He sees fit. Along the way you’ll discover true joy and serenity that will carry you through every circumstance.
"By analyzing a variety of texts from across Augustine's career, Augustine on the Will: A Theological Account traces the development of Augustine's thinking on the human will. Augustine's most creative contributions to the notion of the human will do not derive from articulating a monolithic, universal definition. He identifies four types of human will: the created will, which he describes as a hinge; the fallen will, a link in a chain binding human beings to sin; the redeemed will, which is a root of love; and the fully free will to be enjoyed in the next life when perfection is made complete. His mature view is "theologically differentiated," consisting of four distinct types of human will, which vary according to these diverse theological scenarios. His innovation consists in distinguishing these types with a detail and clarity unprecedented by any thinker before him. Augustine's mature view of the will is constructed in intensive dialogue with other Christian thinkers, and, most of all, with the Christian scriptures. Its basic features shape, and are shaped by, his doctrines of Christ and the Holy Spirit, as well as creation and grace, making it impossible to abstract his views on willing from his account of the central Christian doctrines of Christology, Pneumatology, and the Trinity. The multiple facets of Augustine's conception of will have been cut to fit the shape of his theology and the biblical story it seeks to describe. From Augustine, we inherit a theological account of the will. Augustine Will Free will Voluntas Uoluntas Grace Fall creation eschaton Christ"--
The eagerly-awaited second volume of The Cambridge Translations of Medieval Philosophical Texts will allow scholars and students access for the first time in English to major texts in ethics and political thought from one of the most fruitful periods of speculation and analysis in the history of western thought. Beginning with Albert the Great, who introduced the Latin west to the challenging moral philosophy and natural science of Aristotle, and concluding with the first substantial presentation in English of the revolutionary ideas on property and political power of John Wyclif, the seventeen texts in this anthology offer late medieval treatments of fundamental issues in human conduct that are both conceptually subtle and of direct practical import. Special features of this volume include copious editorial introductions, an analytical index, and suggestions for further reading. This is an important resource for scholars and students of medieval philosophy, history, political science, theology and literature.
On Power (De Potentia) is one of Aquinas's ''Disputed Questions'' (a systematic series of discussions of specific theological topics). It is a text which anyone with a serious interest in Aquinas's thinking will need to read. There is, however, no English translation of the De Potentia currently in print. Fr. Richard Regan has produced this abridgement, which passes over some of the full text while retaining what seems most important when it comes to following the flow of Aquinas's thought.
Seeking what he describes as "the utmost limit of the knowledge our natural reason can achieve . . . concerning the True Existence [that is God]," John Duns Scotus (1265–1308) offers in this treatise one of philosophy’s most rigorous and ambitious attempts to deduce God’s existence from purely metaphysical theorems. As elucidated by its concise philosophical commentary, Thomas M. Ward's new translation of the Treatise on the First Principle puts a masterpiece of natural theology within reach of a new generation of English-reading students of philosophy.
