Ike Miller - Seeing by the Light: Illumination in Augustines and Barths Readings of John

CD Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics

De. Doc. Chr. Augustine, De doctrina Christiana

De Trin. Augustine, De Trinitate

GD Karl Barth, Gttingen Dogmatics

Tr. in Io. Ep. Augustine, Tractatus in Iohannis Epistulam

Tract. Augustine, Tractatus in Iohannis Evangelium

T he gratitude that I feel toward all who have been a part of making this book possible far exceeds my capacity to express it. Looking across the span of time in which this journey has taken place, so many people have stepped into our lives not only to make this journey possible but to make it a fulfilling and enrichening experience for my entire family. We have been fortunate enough to have found truly life-giving community in three different churches at various stages in this process. Serving in ministry alongside Andrew and Melissa Brownback at Willow Creek North Shore not only proved to be an important pastoral balance to life in academia but also afforded us a friendship with an extraordinary couple that will truly be lifelong.

Not long after the birth of our first son, Isaac, we connected with an incredible community of people at Alpine Chapel. Dave Mudd and Alex and Caryn Hartmann opened their church, their life, and their friendship to us in ways that rarely happen more than once in a lifetime. In the small group we led there we found what may be one of the warmest communities of friends we will ever know. Moving away from this community of friends will long be one of the more heartbreaking decisions we have had to make.

And now, as we have journeyed over the last year of answering the call to plant Bright City Church in Durham, North Carolina, we have developed such an incredible community of people, dedicated to this mission and gifted for this task of church planting in ways only God could have foreknown. Bright City is a light that shines the glory of God on earth and is a foretaste of that coming kingdom, which needs no sun because God himself gives it light. Thank you to an incredible team of people who have made Bright City a reality. You are surely the embodiment of the light of divine life on earth.

Two people without whom this work would have been categorically impossible are my father-in-law and mother-in-law, Rich and Deborah Hodde. As Sharon and I worked simultaneously to complete PhD programs, write books, have children, and plant a church, there is simply no way it could have all been done without the endless time and energy that they have so generously and abundantly given to us. On top of that, they have offered tremendous affirmation and emotional support at times when we have needed it most. Thank you!

My mother, Ellen Miller, has likewise offered me tireless support. This support has come not least in the form of weekly trips to our home to help with our little ones so that Sharon did not carry the weight of this work herself. She has offered incredible encouragement at every turn, and in an intangible way, there are few greater joys in the world than to see your parents playing with your children. She has loved me so well, but not simply by loving me, but by loving well the other most important people in my life.

Early in my doctoral program, Thomas McCall not only challenged me to think with a relentless pursuit of clarity in academic matters but proved an important and even reassuring voice as I worked to find my place in the Trinity Evangelical Divinity School community. Richard Averbeck was nothing short of a pastor to our community of PhD students and the model of an individual who truly approaches his academic work as his ministry. Finally, I want to express the inexpressible, my unspeakable gratitude to Kevin Vanhoozer, who directed the project that serves as the backbone and basis of the present study. His dedication to me as a student, to this project, to the advancement of theology, and above all to my spiritual and theological formation have been evident at every point in this journey. His remarkable capacity to both encourage and instruct with an incredible humility made him a pleasure to work under, even as he would accept nothing less than excellence in this projects execution. Above all else, his attentiveness has not ceased to amaze me. He has cared not only for the project but for me as the person behind the project, and for that I am eternally grateful.

The gratitude I owe the very most of all, however, is to my wife. I could write a book simply on all the reasons I am thankful for you, Sharon. At the very heart of it all is your steadfastness. You have been my anchor. Regardless of the challenges of being in doctoral programs together while having children, working full-time, serving in ministry, and writingand now colaboring as we plant Bright City Churchyou are what makes the beauty of us happen. You are both my inspiration and my place of peace, my motivation and my escape. You and our childrenIsaac, Coen, and Sadiemake my world go around, and life with you four is full of unspeakable joy. I love you.

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