Thielicke here studies the themes of doubt and appropriation in modern Protestant thought. A leading advocate of dialectical theology, Thielicke examines the work of the great German Protestant religious philosophers from Lessing and Schliermacher through Barth and Tillich, probing these theologians' understanding of their context and how this tradition can impact our own engagement with our times. Clear, finely nuanced, historically and philosophically mature, this is a vital reflection on the history of theology and in systematic theology.

Here are sermons from which to learn how the old Gospel, first given in a very different world, may come with all the living comfort and the regenerative force of truth and reality to our own age too, made relevant by the Holy Spirit on the lips of the sensitive and dedicated preacher."--Geoffrey W. Bromiley.

Jesus Christ came to us to suffer temptation, to suffer our fate with regard to God, and to become our brother. Let us go to him in the desert to see what he had to endure, and how he had to fight, so as thus to become our brother. Here we shall learn who we are and how it stands with this our world.... The desert is our world; the tempter is our tempter; the forty days and nights are our time, and we are Jesus, for here he stands in our stead. Who are we then, O God, who are we?

"The question of where we come from and where we are going is one of the elementary challenges of life. Perhaps it is the question of life. Only when we get an answer to it do we learn who we are." So begins How the World Began, a book that asks the most fundamental of all questions: who are we? And what did God intend us to be? Despite - perhaps even because of - the immense technological advances of our time, and the frightful consequences for the human race of the misuse of that power, humanity is brought face-to-face time and again with the essential problem that has haunted us since the...

Christians have always turned to the Sermon on the Mount for inspiration. In Life Can Begin Again, Helmut Thielicke, himself one of the great preachers of the twentieth century, comes to grips with what is often seen as a collection of lovely but impossible ideals. Thielicke makes it clear that the Sermon on the Mount can never be understood if, even for a moment, we forget the person of the Preacher of the Sermon. For without the person and work of Jesus Christ the marvellous words of the Beatitudes and the injunctions that follow them are the most radical and devastating distillation of...

In his introductory essay to this selection from the writing and preaching of C.H. Spurgeon, Helmut Thielicke - himself among the best preachers of the twentieth century - expresses his surprise and delight at his discovery of the great Victorian preacher. He draws out those qualities which made Spurgeon one of the most influential ministers of his day, and explains what it was that attracted him to the self-educated Baptist preacher. They share a recognition of the urgency of their message: 'We stand in need of the simple way in which Spurgeon dares to say that what really and ultimately...

A potentially difficult text for today's Christians, The Ethics of Sex gives a fascinating insight into the mindset of how a Christian thinker considered gender and sexuality when the definitions of both were becoming more and more fluid. Caught between the points of the harsh restrictions of the Third Reich, and the revolutionary approach popularised in the 1960s, Thielicke offers a modern reader the opportunity to understand more of this pivotal period in history. In The Ethics of Sex, Thielicke confronts hot-button issues, many of which are still controversial today, like abortion,...

Between Heaven and Earth grew out one of Thielicke's visits to the United States in 1963, during which he travelled across the country preaching and lecturing. The conversations recorded here are the fruit of his more informal discussions with small groups of clergy, students and lay people. "You have disturbed our peace and upset our doubts," said one pastor. "You have freed the fettered and bound the wandering spirits," said another. The questions that American Christians asked of Thielicke are direct and wide-ranging, concerned not only with the fundamental problems of faith but with its...

In this series of sermons, first delivered over radio and television in Germany during the 1960s, Helmut Thielicke wrote about the true meaning of Christian festivals such as Good Friday, Easter and Pentecost. He saw deeply into the mystery, despair, and confusion of life in his time and spoke a truly prophetic word to Christians that still resonates today. As Thielicke meditates on Christmas, the reader will understand anew how light shines in the darkness of this world. As he preaches about Christ's suffering on the cross, humanity's suffering is given meaning; and, in talking of death, he...