Church in Gods Program (Handbook of Bible Doctrine)

Rating:
Summary: Excellent--great foundation for new and seasoned believers
Review: Excellent presentation of fundamentals of church doctrine. Great for new and seasoned believers. Every chapter supported by lots of scripture. Addresses everything from church purpose to worship to baptism and communion. Great for personal or small group bible study.

Rating:
Summary: A Fine Book on Ecclisiology
Review: People that want to learn about the nature and work of the church should consult this book.

Rating:
Summary: Good Introductory Work in Ecclesiology
Review: Saucy wrote this book a number of years ago, but it is still a frequently used text in a number of seminaries, particularly those of a dispensationalist bent. It's a good book that will expose the reader in a pretty summarized fashion to the major issues in ecclesiology, or the study of the church.

Among the strengths of the book are that most every traditional ecclesiastical issue is covered in this book - church government, ordinances, discipline, church officers, and how the church figures into the study of eschatology. Saucy's analysis of these areas is sufficiently detailed to be pretty thorough, while presenting many of the distinctives in summary fashion. Saucy provides a very good bibliography at the end for readers to conduct further studies on particular areas of interest.

There are a few weaknesses which compel me to give the book a 4 star rating. First, the book is frankly pretty dry. Thus, it is not likely to be the kind of book that a casual reader would pick up and read. Ecclesiology may not be the most riveting theological topic in existence, but there are many issues in this area of study that are important and interesting. But it is very difficult to find any book emphasizing ecclesiastical issues that has captured the attention of casual readers and lay Christians. It would be nice if such a book existed, but this book by Saucy isn't it. Secondly, because the book is an ecclesiastical summary, it is uniquely positioned in the realm of ecclesiastical studies. The purpose of the book may have been to present these issues in a way that lay readership could understand, while also being a useful tool for more advanced studies. As indicated, I don't think the book particularly succeeds in speaking to the lay reader, and because it's a summary oriented book, it's usefulness to the scholar is also somewhat limited (although again, the bibliography is quite helpful in this regard), although I think it's very useful to seminary students. Lastly, Saucy is a progressive dispensationalist and his eschatological treatment of the church in this book is decidedly dispensationalist. For readers who reject dispensationalism, this area of Saucy's book will be a disappointment.

However, it is a good book with sufficient amounts of material to help seminary students as well as lay readers who are interested in getting their feet wet in ecclesiology, although the material tends to be presented in a rather dry fashion here.

Rating:
Summary: Good Introductory Work in Ecclesiology
Review: Saucy wrote this book a number of years ago, but it is still a frequently used text in a number of seminaries, particularly those of a dispensationalist bent. It's a good book that will expose the reader in a pretty summarized fashion to the major issues in ecclesiology, or the study of the church.

Among the strengths of the book are that most every traditional ecclesiastical issue is covered in this book - church government, ordinances, discipline, church officers, and how the church figures into the study of eschatology. Saucy's analysis of these areas is sufficiently detailed to be pretty thorough, while presenting many of the distinctives in summary fashion. Saucy provides a very good bibliography at the end for readers to conduct further studies on particular areas of interest.

There are a few weaknesses which compel me to give the book a 4 star rating. First, the book is frankly pretty dry. Thus, it is not likely to be the kind of book that a casual reader would pick up and read. Ecclesiology may not be the most riveting theological topic in existence, but there are many issues in this area of study that are important and interesting. But it is very difficult to find any book emphasizing ecclesiastical issues that has captured the attention of casual readers and lay Christians. It would be nice if such a book existed, but this book by Saucy isn't it. Secondly, because the book is an ecclesiastical summary, it is uniquely positioned in the realm of ecclesiastical studies. The purpose of the book may have been to present these issues in a way that lay readership could understand, while also being a useful tool for more advanced studies. As indicated, I don't think the book particularly succeeds in speaking to the lay reader, and because it's a summary oriented book, it's usefulness to the scholar is also somewhat limited (although again, the bibliography is quite helpful in this regard), although I think it's very useful to seminary students. Lastly, Saucy is a progressive dispensationalist and his eschatological treatment of the church in this book is decidedly dispensationalist. For readers who reject dispensationalism, this area of Saucy's book will be a disappointment.

However, it is a good book with sufficient amounts of material to help seminary students as well as lay readers who are interested in getting their feet wet in ecclesiology, although the material tends to be presented in a rather dry fashion here.