By the time I had read this book, I'd already read countless books and essays on religion and truth and love. This book offered me something extra - and opened my eyes to a wonderful new truth - mainly this - that love is enough.

Never having been trained in the social graces, I always felt like a bit of a clutz in social settings such as dinner parties and even simple get-togethers.

Drummond makes the point that if you have love - if you can feel and express love - you have it all. So instead of focusing on which fork to use for the shrimp and salad, I started focusing on how much God loved me and everyone around me.

And that little simple truth enabled me to feel more at ease in every circumstance and in every situation.

Drummond's book is about grace, love, truth, Universal spiritual laws - it's got it all. From little things (like social graces) to big things (like loving our fellow man - irrespective of his lot in life) this book will change your life.

This should be required reading for everyone.

I have always been told that faith is the greatest thing a Christian can have. I have read 1 Corinthians 13 many times before, put I just thought of it as poetic. I never realized it tells us plainly LOVE is greater than faith and hope. Without love our faith and our hope is worthless junk. This book is an easy read, and short, but full of insight and intelligence. It gives the reader a new perspective on the greatest thing a Christian can have; LOVE

I read this book at least once a year to keep me focused on what's important in my life. Love is the greatest, most important force in our universe. This book explains the essense of love and provides profound insights on it purpose and how we may employ it in our daily lives. Read it, learn it, and do it. Your life will be fulfilled!

I used this book as part of a two semester masters course in systematic theology. I -am- dispensationalist so am probably biased but I liked the level of treatment this book gave.
All the topics were tackled, lots of biblical references and it wasn't so wordy that I got bored.
I really liked the section on soteirology, I was actually inspired to get a couple of gospel messages out of it.
Systematic Theology can be dry. This book isn't.

This is one of the better intro's to theology. It is concise, yet very informative. It is also from a Dispensational perspective. Most of the more popular systematic theologies are not Dispensational, except for Ryrie's and Chafer's.

As for the revised version changing from election based on God's foreknowledge (Arminian view) to election based on God's sovereignty (Calvinist view), I believe it was a mistake. To change the position of the original author is to take away from the book. One doesn't have to agree with everything he says to benefit from his writings. And besides, Dispensationalists are divided on this view, as are many evangelicals, so why not just leave Theissen's view in Theissen's book? My 5 star rating is for the original work.

This book is one of the best introductory systematic theology books out there. This book can go side-by-side with Charles Ryrie's "Basic Theology". Both books are for introductory level systematic theology students, and both are dispensationally oriented. Thiessen gives concise yet full treatments on every doctrine out there in evangelical theology. He does not go on and on with each doctrine, but goes right to the point. The change made by the most recent edition of the book regarding predestination is correct. This is the only dark spot about Thiessen's views. The editors were correct when they opted for the Calvinistic view of election rather than the Arminian. However, besides that one minor error, this book is a good way to start off systematic theology study before going into those multi-volume works. It is unfortunate that dispensationally oriented systematic theology books are few. Chafer's eight-volume work may be considered out-of-date even with classical dispensationalists. For all those looking for a good introductory level systematic theology book, this does the job.

By scholarly standards, this book should be out of date. However, Haring's book is still an excellent guide to the structure of government in Spain's former American empire. Haring goes into far greater detail about government than any other general Latin American textbook that I have seen. Of course, the book leaves out any indepth look at post-1940 obsessions such as class, race, gender, and culture, although Spanish high culture in America does merit a quick overview. Haring's greatest fault is allowing what we now call "ethnocentric" conceits to slip in here and there, such as using the term "savages" to refer to natives in America. If you can overlook that, then Haring's book really is a goldmine of information about how the Spanish tried to govern the New World.