Christian Formation: Integrating Theology and Human Development

by James R. Estep (Editor), Jonathan H. Kim (Editor)

For Christian education professors and students, Christian Formation provides a composite view of human development and learning from integrated theory, theology, and educational practices in the church. By design, the book integrates these elements into a cohesive foundational piece for Christian education. Contributors include:


• James Estep - “Christian Anthropology: Humanity as the Imago Dei,” “Developmental Theories: Foe, Friend or Folly?” “Moral Development and Christian Formation”
• Jonathan Kim - “Intellectual Development and Christian Formation,” “Psychological Development and Christian Formation,” “Cultural Development and Christian Formation”
• Timothy Jones and Michael Wilder - “Faith Development and Christian Formation”
• Greg Carlson - “Adult Development and Christian Formation”
• Mark Maddix - “Spiritual Formation and Christian Formation”

Genres: Theology, Counselling, Education, Textbooks, Religion

288 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 2010

Reviews

[Liam Thompson]

Thought it was great! Now, some of the language was difficult to comprehend, but when I sat in it I found amazing helpful pieces of information. Very interesting!

[Brenden Fjelsted]

MASTERS BOOK: Hard to read at some points. Ch1 was great about imago dei, ch 3-6 about development models (intellectual, personality, moral, and faith) were interesting. Intellectual was dope to wrestle with! Ch8 was a fire chapter about how it all ties together in spiritual formation. Ch9 about cultural development had good just written weird (other stuff on cultural development is way better). Prob wouldn’t recommend this book except for theological study on human anthropology in Ch1 and spiritual formation in ch8

[Ainsley Hartman]

Read for “Development across the lifespan”

I overall thought it was good, but it was very dry.

[Joseph Mundo]

Christian Formation is a well-organized and thoughtful book that presents multiple perspectives on spiritual growth while keeping Jesus Christ at the center. Unlike more experience-driven formation books, it maintains a clearer connection to Scripture and helps readers understand how faith develops across different stages of life and within the church.

Its greatest strength is the way it allows readers to filter various ideas through the Word of God rather than elevating personal experience above biblical truth. Compared to Celebration of Discipline, this book is far more grounded, descriptive, and theologically responsible. Its main weakness is the limited use of direct Scripture, which would have strengthened some of its applications.

This book requires minimal discernment and is best suited for mature Christians, pastors, and students, though new believers should read it with guidance. Overall, it is a valuable resource for understanding Christian formation and earns a solid 4 out of 5 stars.

[Kendall Davis]

The chapters of this book are written by several different authors and the quality of the various chapters is fairly inconsistent. At worst I felt like I was reading undergraduate papers. At best I was reading disconnected summaries of psychological theorists with little argument or real constructive engagement.

The authors' understanding of theology and especially church history often appeared to be simplistic. The authors also routinely made strong claims with little to no argument or support other than alleged prooftexts, e.g. the final essay's rejection of certain postmodern perspectives. The authors routinely used terminology improperly and resorted to etymological fallacies to explain key terms.

Perhaps the most frustrating issue was the lack of any coherent argument in most of the essays. The essays never seemed to drive anywhere and read like mere literature reviews. Most conclusions were made through bare assertion or appeals to authority rather than argument.

[Robin]

This was such a mixed read. Some chapters were excellent, some fine and some terrible. Timothy Paul Jones' chapter on faith development contains some of the finest critique and reconstruction of Fowler's work that I have read. Kim's work is solid, even though I disagree with his approach. This is the most academic evangelical engagement with developmental approaches that I've come across and I'm grateful for it. I wish it was more critical in places and it has a problematic approach to natural theology which mars the volume, but there is a lot of good here. The chapter on cultural developmental was particularly stimulating. Ultimately the whole thing left me just wishing it was better.
One of the main problems is its production - as an academic book endnotes aren't good enough, poorly printed, unjustified text is a horror, the lack of clarity on authors in the contents, and the number of missing entries in the index makes it nearly unusable. Shame really.

[Nathan Schneider]

Very intriguing study of human development theory and spiritual formation. The aim of the book was to find a middle ground between what stems from general (development theory) and specific (Scripture) revelation. What results is a comprehensive approach to discipleship/ sanctification for the next generation. This book is especially helpful for someone who has not studied social sciences in depth.

[Sarah Gump]

Chapter 1-3 are foundational. They set the stage for the importance of being a student, both of the word and of a discipline. The rest of the chapters are high level overviews of theories of development and it was hard for me to grasp a common theme.

[Brittany]

I read this for a child and adolescent development class for seminary and it was great! Good overviews of a variety of developmental theories and excellent application to a Christian ministry setting. Highly recommend for anyone in ministry!

[Olivia Crosby]

Book for seminary. Good insight into psychological theories. I did not always love the integration with spiritual formation.

[Jason Worsley]

I find some of this work to be stimulating, but frankly too much of it is belittling those that do not hold to the same position.

[Kayla Daine Burroughs]

Some chapters made me feel stupid 😐☹️

[Warren Pace]

Found myself asking why this theory with the Biblical understanding?

[Dr. Jason Frazier]

Incredibly boring.

[Sarah]

a bit arduous to read...and by that I mean a little boring. Enjoyed "Nurture that is Christian" quite a bit more...