Ron Highfield

"Ron Highfield has made a significant contribution to the present-day discussion of LGBTQ+ claims by a tight focus on the work of Karen Keen. Highfield's The Choice is a careful and erudite analysis of Keen's work that uncovers a species of argument being offered from many quarters. First, he lays bare Keen's postmodern substitution of feeling and rhetoric for Scripture and sound reasoning. "From the postmodern perspective," he notes, "autobiography is argument." In such a case, Scripture can be displaced by personal desire. Second, he skillfully explains the implications of such an approach to an orthodox view of the Bible. If only those historic demands of Scripture that pass muster with one's self-defined notions of kindness, justice, love, secular psychology, and minimal human suffering (i.e., inconvenience, restraint of desire) are obligatory to Christians, we are back to the ancient times in Israel when every individual is a law to her/himself. Contrary to Keen's claim to show how evangelicals can defend an "affirming" case for same-sex marriage, Dr. Highfield demonstrates that her case abandons an orthodox view of God-breathed Scripture in order to read into the Bible what our postmodern culture otherwise could only wish it had said." -Rubel Shelley, MTH, PhD; Teaching Minister, Harpeth Hills Church of Christ, Brentwood, TN; Author of Male & Female God Made Them: A Biblical Review of LGBTQ+ Claims and The Ink is Dry: God's Distinctive Word on Marriage, Family, and Sexual Responsibility

Have you ever found yourself repeating expressions such as ""Jesus saves"" or ""Jesus died for our sins"" without really understanding them? When popular speakers ""explain"" how Jesus's death satisfied God's wrath so you could be forgiven, do you ever think to yourself, ""I don't get it""? If so, you're not alone, you're not dumb, and the problem is not with you. Ron Highfield reframes Christian teaching about the atonement so that it comes alive with fresh meaning. Drawing on biblical and traditional sources, Highfield explains why our frustration in trying to understand how Jesus's death satisfies God's judicial wrath is inevitable . . . because the idea doesn't make sense and the Bible doesn't teach it Instead of viewing the atonement as the solution to God's problem of how to forgive sins while remaining perfectly just, Highfield argues that the atonement is God's solution to our problem. In Jesus, God rewrites the human story, forgiving our sins, correcting our mistakes, and realizing our destiny. As one of us, Jesus lives a perfect life, passes through death, and enters into eternal life. As the new Adam, he invites us to join his family, share his life, and enjoy his victory.

In this book, veteran Pepperdine University professor of theology Ron Highfield makes the case for the truth of Christianity and defends it from attack. But so do many other books. Why do we need another? Because there are also plenty of books that deny Christianity's truth, attack it in new ways and from almost every conceivable angle Hence the work of Christian evidences and apologetics is never done. Christian truth does not change, but contemporary culture and thought change almost daily. To communicate effectively with our contemporaries we must listen to them, come to understand their most basic beliefs and values and learn how to explain Christian faith to them in ways they can understand. This task is not easy to accomplish, and there is no shortage of failed attempts. Indeed, the Christian cause suffers almost as much from its friends as it does from its enemies. Many efforts to support and defend Christianity have done as much damage as good and created as much doubt as confidence in the Christian faith. Some arguments for Christianity overstate their case and understate the force of objections. Others try to prove too many things. Good thinkers from the time of Socrates until today know that making bad arguments in favor of a good cause is worse than silence. This book is full of good arguments.

In this scholarly and accessible volume, Ron Highfield presents an overview of creation, providence and the problem of evil. He explores a wide range of issues, including the biblical accounts of creation, the dialogue between theology and science, models of providence, philosophical problems of evil and the proposals of open theism and process theism.

Does God's all-encompassing will restrict our freedom? Does God's ownership and mastery over us diminish our dignity? The fear that God is a threat to our freedom and dignity goes far back in Western thought. Such suspicion remains with us today in our so-called secular society. In such a context any talk of God tends to provoke responses that range from defiance to subservience to indifference. How did Western culture come to this place? What impact does this social and intellectual environment have on those who claim to believe in God or more specifically in the Christian God of the Bible? Professor of religion Ron Highfield traces out the development of Western thought that has led us our current frame of mind from Plato, Augustine and Descartes through Locke, Kant, Blake Bentham, Hegel, Nietzsche--all the way down to Charles Taylor's landmark work Sources of the Self. At the heart of the issue is the modern notion of the autonomous self and the inevitable crisis it provokes for a view of human identity, freedom and dignity found in God. Can the modern self really secure its own freedom, dignity and happiness? What alternative do we have? Highfield makes pertinent use of trinitarian theology to show how genuine Christian faith responds to this challenge by directing us to a God who is not in competition with his human creations, but rather who provides us with what we seek but could never give ourselves. God, Freedom and Human Dignity is essential reading for Christian students who are interested in the debates around secularism, modernity and identity formation.

Questions about divine providence have preoccupied Christians for generations: to what degree does God concern himself with and intervene in the affairs of everyday life? This book introduces readers to four prevailing views on divine providence, with particular attention to the questions of human free will, the problem of evil, and God's perception of time.Volume contributors and their basic viewpoints are: Paul Helseth - God causes every creaturely event that occurs. William Lane Craig - through his "middle knowledge," God controls the course of worldly affairs without predetermining any creatures' free decisions.Ron Highfield - God controls creatures by liberating their decision-making. Gregory Boyd - human decisions can be free only if God neither determines nor knows what they will be.Introductory and closing essays by Dennis Jowers give relevant background and guide readers toward their own informed beliefs about divine providence.Four Views on Divine Providence helps readers think theologically and biblically about all the issues involved in exploring this doctrine. The point-counterpoint format reveals the assumptions and considerations that drive equally learned and sincere theologians to disagreement with each other. It unearths the genuinely decisive issues beneath a philosophically dense debate. The Counterpoints series presents a comparison and critique of scholarly views on topics important to Christians that are both fair-minded and respectful of the biblical text. Each volume is a one-stop reference that allows readers to evaluate the different positions on a specific issue and form their own, educated opinion.

In keeping with the classic Christian tradition, Great Is the Lord sets out the doctrine of God in a way that illumines the mind, moves the heart, and stirs the soul to praise the triune God. Ron Highfield introduces students, ministers, and others to the -traditional- doctrine of God held by the majority of the church from the second to the twentieth century: God is triune, loving, merciful, gracious, patient, wise, one, simple, omnipotent, omniscient, eternal, omnipresent, immutable, impassible, and glorious. Irenically challenging open theism and process theology, Highfield shows that the classical doctrine of God actually preserves our confidence in God's love and his liberating action better than its opponents do. This traditional doctrine, Highfield argues, grounds our dignity and freedom in the center of reality, the trinitarian life of God. Highfield's work maintains the highest intellectual standards throughout even as it offers a true theology for the praise of God.