In this stirring book, Grounds has ably sketched the background against which the theology of revolution has emerged. Grounds puts it this way:I have sought to let the critics of the Establishment, Christian and secular alike, present in their own words the case for revolutionary change. I have also sought to let the revolutionary theologians set forth their interpretation of Christianity in detail. Quite literally, I have allowed them to speak for themselves. I have sought, further, to let Christian scholars who dissent from this new theology engage its proponents in debate. Very heavily I have drawn upon the work of Jacques Ellul, the towering French sociologist who is rapidly gaining in the United States the attention and respect which his rare fusion of professional distinction, intellectual power, and biblical commitment deserves. I shall feel amply regarded if through these pages he wins a wider readership among American evangelicals. An additional purpose has been to confront my own ecclesiastical tradition, that of Protestant orthodoxy, with the inexpressibly pressing need of permitting the anguish of our world to drive theological conservatism back to a New Testament discipleship which is nothing less than revolutionary.
