Book Reviews -- By: Anonymous

Journal: Journal for Baptist Theology & Ministry
Volume: JBTM 18:2 (Fall 2021)
Article: Book Reviews
Author: Anonymous


Book Reviews

The Gospel of Our King: Bible, Worldview, and the Mission of Every Christian. By Bruce Riley Ashford and Heath A. Thomas. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2019. 208 pages. Paperback, $22.99.

The two authors of The Gospel of Our King, Bruce Ashford and Heath Thomas, are well-known and well-versed within their respective fields of study. Ashford completed both his MDiv and PhD in Theological Studies at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, where he recently concluded his service as Provost and Professor of Theology and Culture. He is now a Fellow in Public Theology at the Kirby Laing Institute for Christian Ethics. He has written several books, including the recent release, The Doctrine of Creation (IVP Academic, 2020), co-authored by Craig Bartholomew. He also edited Theology and Practice of Mission (B&H Academic, 2011). Thomas completed his MA in Theology from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and his PhD in Old Testament from the University of Gloucestershire. For nearly a decade, he served as a Professor of Old Testament and Hebrew at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. Now, he serves as President and Professor of Old Testament at Oklahoma Baptist University, where he has been since 2015. Like Ashford, Thomas has authored and edited several books, including Poetry and Theology in the Book of Lamentations (Sheffield Phoenix, 2013) and Faith Amid the Ruins: The Book of Habakkuk (Lexham, 2016).

In The Gospel of Our King, Ashford and Thomas aim to answer a simple question: what are people for? They are clear at the outset that “the world exists, you and I exist, for the King,” an answer that “draws us to identify both the purpose of humanity and what counts as responsible action in the world” (1). To do this, they also seek to identify the Bible’s main point, a necessary step in explaining what people are for. They believe “the Bible presents God and Jesus within a universal story” (3). Their summation of that story comes in four parts—creation, fall, redemption, and restoration—a four-fold description of Scripture that has become more common in recent years, especially for the simplicity it brings to gospel proclamation. Once a believer comes to terms with this

four-fold explanation of Scripture—or once an unbeliever is saved and comes to terms with it—he can and should see how it affects the way Christians live; that is, how it affects the mission of every Christian as those who “exist... for the King” (9).

Creation, fall, redemption, and restoration are each dealt with in the first four chapters, respectively. Those chapters, together, articulate the Bi...

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