Social Holiness

Rarely does one find a book on the topic of holiness with such depth as well as breadth. Kreider takes us on a journey deep into biblical territory and back again into the lives of nations, churches, families
and individuals. In this journey the reader is convicted and drawn by the beauty of holiness. We Pentecostals need this word.
--Cheryl Bridges Johns, Church of God Theological Seminary

Kreider's Social Holiness surprises! While holiness indeed owns the otherness of God and the call to be God's separated people, it does much more. Holiness unleashes in history a living force, a dynamism that envisions the sanctification of God's entire creation. Holiness is positive, the 'heartbeat' of Missio Dei. I highly recommend this book for its life-changing potential, both personally and for the church as God's new nation.
--Willard M. Swartley, Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary

Alan Kreider writes a masterful narrative about social holiness from which Pentecostals can learn much as they reaffirm and recover this important dimension of their heritage. Its familiar terrain serves not only as a timely reminder of a way of life Pentecostals still cherish, but also as a challenge to reconsider crucial features of that way of life long forgotten.
--Dale M. Coulter, Regent University

Alan Kreider has gifted us with an inspiring, hopeful, and transformative invitation to follow Jesus on the journey toward personal and social holiness. His prophetic call to participate in Jesus' transnational renewal movement challenges families, congregations, students, and all Christians with practical ideas emerging from the biblical story of God's kingship and our citizenship in the holy nation. [ I appreciate his emphasis on moral zeal, experience, liberating action, storytelling, praise, and the risk of repentance and trust, and think] this book can be a great resource for helping the church with our public witness to Christ's shalom in a broken world.
--Paul Alexander, Azusa Pacific University

Kreider's Social Holiness breaks new ground and makes new connections, both in his overview of biblical history and in his application of social holiness to the contemporary church. I hope this book will help many believers today - Wesleyans, Anabaptists, and those from other traditions - become more fully and authentically a part of God's 'holy nation' in the world today.
--Howard A. Snyder, Asbury Theological Seminary


Ours is the age of bombast, exaggeration, hyper-activism and self-importance--all of which leaves us feeling empty. We have lost the capacity for reverence, awe, and experience of the transcendent. Alan Kreider has the audacity to call us back to the transforming presence of God so that we become God-like. This book's message can help set us free from the bondage of our self-centeredness and liberate us to participate in the mission of God. --Wilbert R. Shenk, Fuller Theological Seminary

Lively, gutsy . . . Holiness is about practical social matters--such as economic relationships, making peace, working for justice . . . Kreider takes us through the Bible to show how deeply these themes are embedded in the text and how persistent has been the failure of the community of faith to be true to them . . . A must for serious-minded Christians today. --Rt. Rev. John Gladwin, Bishop of Chelmsford, in Third Way



Alan Kreider is Associate Professor of Church History and Mission, Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary, and author of English Chantries: The Road to Dissolution and The Change of Conversion and the Origin of Christendom.

Dale M. Coulter is Associate