Winter Break!

I am finally done grading exams and ready to enjoy a much-anticipated winter break! In addition to spending time with my family and relaxing, I have a number of projects that I want to complete during the break. Here are my goals for the next month:

1. Finish a book review for Church History
2. Complete the syllabus and assignments for my spring course at UTC on "Religion in the Age of Jonathan Edwards, John Wesley, and George Whitefield"
3. Secure the rights for all the images in my forthcoming book on Jonathan Edwards and Transatlantic Print Culture
4. Write the conclusion and finish editing my book on Jonathan Edwards and Transatlantic Print Culture

Several notable scholars have been kind enough to read the manuscript for my forthcoming book. For the past several weeks I have been receiving comments from these scholars, and I hope to incorporate their suggestions during the next month. I have just a few more images to secure for the book, and I hope to complete the necessary paperwork within the month.

Besides finishing my book, my other major project is to put the finishing touches on a course at UTC that I will be teaching this spring. I am calling the course, "Religion in the Age of Jonathan Edwards, John Wesley, and George Whitefield." The course will not simply be about these leading figures, or about eighteenth-century evangelicalism. Rather, I plan on talking about religion as a whole during the so-called "Age of Reason," and how Christians responded to the culture and intellectual movement known as the Enlightenment, as well as political and economic pressures present during the eighteenth century. I have selected Sarah Osborn's World by Catherine Brekus, A Short Life of Jonathan Edwards by George Marsden, John Wesley: A Biography by Stephen Tomkins, and George Whitefield: America's Spiritual Founding Father by Thomas Kidd as my required texts. I will also be having the class read primary sources from these and other influential figures. It should be a fun class, and I hope it will be interesting for the students.