Readers will gain new insights into the work of great theologians like Luther, Hegel, Edwards, and of course, Jenson himself. Anyone who reads this book carefully will never again be able to think about death, consciousness, freedom, reality, wickedness, or love in the same way.

The respected American theologian Robert Jenson here, in brief compass, presents his uncluttered understanding of the Christian message in a form ideal for beginning students, laypeople, and clergy. Professor Jenson sees the heart of the gospel as "the unconditional promise of the ultimate triumph of the love of Jesus of Nazareth." This gospel is based on the story of Jesus and is worked out in the lives of men and of nations as the promise it brings moves towards fulfillment. Story and Promise--we dare to call it a "one-volume dogmatics"--leaves no element of the Christian faith untouched: the classical doctrines concerning God, Christ, the Holy Spirit, man, the church; the clearly radical implications of these doctrines for personal and social transformation; the focus of Christian vision on the future as the time when God comes and man becomes what God intends. This book clarifies the traditional problems of faith, and also raises the revolutionary issues marking the end of this century. It is a thoughtful and satisfying piece of systematic theology in a time of shattered understandings of the faith.

A Theology in Outline: Can These Bones Live? began with an undergraduate course taught by Robert W. Jenson at Princeton University in the spring of 2008. Based on a series of twenty-three course lectures, it offers a concise and accessible overview of Christian theology while retaining the atmosphere of Jenson's classroom. Much as does Jenson's Systematic Theology, A Theology in Outline treats a standard sequence of doctrines in Christian theology--God, Trinity, creation, humanity, sin, salvation, church, among others. However, its organizing principle and leitmotiv are less traditional. Reflecting his recent interest in theological interpretation of scripture, Jenson frames the whole of Christian theology as a response to the question posed to the prophet Ezekiel: "Son of man, can these bones live?" For Jenson, to ask this question is to ask whether Christian theology itself is a pile of dead bones. Can the story that God lives with his people be told today? From first to last the chapters of this book proceed under the impelling pressure of this question. They thus comprise a single sequence of illustrative conversations for the purpose of introducing beginners to Christian theology.

The author argues that Edwards was very much a figure of the Enlightenment, but was able to use Enlightenment thought in his theology without yielding to its mechanistic and individualistic tendencies.

Pastors and leaders of the classical church--such as Augustine, Calvin, Luther, and Wesley--interpreted the Bible theologically, believing Scripture as a whole witnessed to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Modern interpreters of the Bible questioned this premise. But in recent decades, a critical mass of theologians and biblical scholars has begun to reassert the priority of a theological reading of Scripture. The Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible enlists leading theologians to read and interpret Scripture for the twenty-first century, just as the church fathers, the Reformers, and other orthodox Christians did for their times and places. In this addition to the series, esteemed theologian Robert W. Jenson presents a theological exegesis of Ezekiel.

North America has rarely produced a theologian as creative and productive as Robert W. Jenson. A truly ecumenical thinker, Jenson consistently demonstrates the way that the church’s confession of the triune God of scripture restructures Christian thinking. Jenson’s work on the nature of theology has focused on the category of “promise”: a way with language that opens up new possibilities. At the heart of Jenson’s theology of the gospel is the conviction that, in Christ, God discloses a word of pure promise to us, enabling new patterns of life. Just as the gospel opens up new ways of living, good theology unfolds into new interpretations and articulations. Engaging Jenson’s work across vital areas, this volume lays out the contours and key contributions of Jenson’s thought for modern Christology, theological interpretation of Scripture, the doctrine of the Trinity in light of the recent Trinitarian revival, and ecumenical theological relations. This volume gathers together essays by some of contemporary theology’s most capable thinkers, such as Oliver Crisp, Stephen Holmes, Joseph Mangina, Peter Leithart, Telford Work, Eugene Rogers, R. Kendall Soulen, and Peter Ochs, to examine the ways in which Jenson’s own theology functions as “promise,” enabling further theological visions and articulations.

Robert Jenson has been praised by Stanley Hauerwas, David Bentley Hart, Wolfhart Pannenberg, and others as one of the most creative and important contemporary theologians. But his work is daunting for many, both because of its conceptual demands and because of Jenson's unusual prose style. This book is an attempt to give Jenson the kind of hearing that puts his creativity and significance on display, and allows newcomers to and old friends of his theology the opportunity to hear it afresh.