Please open https://hotaudiobook.com ONLY on your standard browser Safari, Chrome, Microsoft or Firefox to download full audiobooks of your choice for free.

Title: An Agenda for Change

Subtitle: A Global Call for Spiritual and Social Transformation

Author: Joel Edwards

Narrator: Orion Bradshaw

Format: Unabridged

Length: 2 hrs and 39 mins

Language: English

Release date: 12-22-09

Publisher: Zondervan

Genres: Religion & Spirituality, Christianity

Publisher's Summary:

Here is a compelling tract for our times, addressed to evangelicals, designed to set the agenda for the coming years. It calls for presenting Christ credibly to the 21st century, rehabilitating the term "evangelical" to mean good news, and engaging in spiritual and social transformation.

©2008 Joel Edwards (P)2009 Zondervan

Members Reviews:

Five Stars

Great book!

Five Stars

It's a good book to read

A Short But Powerful and Thought-Provoking Book

I received An Agenda for Change: A Global Call for Spiritual and Social Transformation written by Joel Edwards in the mail from Zondervan with a slew of other books they sent me to preview as I was putting together syllabi for a number of new classes. The reason why that is pertinent is that honestly I had never heard of this book before. It came with others related to the various topics of urban studies, urban ministry, and community transformation. When I pulled it out of the box and read the back cover I was eager to dive in. Added to that fact was that it was written by a Jamaican born leader who lives in the UK and has done extensive work with global poverty. I was doubly hooked ...

In the front matter of the book Edwards writes:

In brief my argument is this: biblical witness is not called to tip-toe through the twenty-first century. It is meant to transform society. It will do so by presenting Christ credibly to the culture. For evangelicals this means reclaiming the idea that we are good news, called to a long-term vision for spiritual and social change. (12)

What is immediately noticeable is the blending of the good news as both spiritually and societally transformative. They are interlinked and cannot be separated. The starting point can be found in the incarnation. "Transformation is the inevitable result of incarnation." (97) Building off that idea is that the scope of transformation, while it may start with individuals, is indeed society-wide. "But personal salvation is just the starting point." (100) Anything short of that reveals a short-circuit in the process. Salvation and the good news must change more than simply equating a higher number of people are sitting in church on Sundays. Also, this hope of the good news has legs and feet ...

Hope is a cow in a field; it's a fishing boar after a tsunami; it's a red tractor shared between several families. Hope is practical. It's God's way of saying that tomorrow is possible and that he is everybody's God." (102)

Though very short as a book, Edwards does a great job of packing it full of rich content. The book's brevity simply means he got to his point in a timely manner. I ended up reading it in about two sittings which was beneficial. I was able to really delve in to the book and trace how his arguments and thesis was fleshed out. Like I mentioned in the first paragraph, a key component is not only his ethnicity but his place of residence. Our lives our deeply enriched when we can read from those of various ethnic and cultural backgrounds. What happens is that it exposes us to different thought processes and even conclusions about the same topic which in this case is about the good news and spiritual and societal transformation. Perspective is everything.

It was most certainly a fun book to read. He challenged my thoughts and assumptions and has given me much to think through the past few days.