Includes bibliographical references and index.

A living way : emergent visions series foreword -- Introduction: What is emergent? -- Leaving the old country -- Church is dead? -- Signs of death and life -- The problem on the left -- A case study : go where I send thee -- The problem on the right -- A case study : don't ask us about the chickens -- The real problem : left versus right -- Caught in the crossfire --- Dispatch from the blogosphere : musings of a postmodern Negro -- Dispatches from the frontier of the American church -- An allegory -- An alternative ending -- Geological musings -- What exactly is emerging? -- The beginnings -- The Bible is propaganda? -- The new kind of Christian effect -- Meanwhile, across the pond -- Then till now -- The church's choice -- Dispatch from the Rocky Mountains : Katie and Kristen -- Who are the emergent Christians? -- Hunches and intuitions -- Influencing culture or influenced by culture -- An envelope of friendship -- An emergent voters' guide -- Dispatch from I-35 : the terrific tale of Trucker Frank -- The theology, stupid -- Dartmouth days -- What, exactly, is theology? -- Theology on the rise -- Going deep -- Skiing the slippery slope -- So, a biblicist and a relativist walk into a pastor's conference -- The expurgated lectionary -- Dispatch from seminary : legalisms of the left -- After objectivity, beautiful truth -- The thrill of interpretation -- Reading the whole Bible -- Sonny, it ain't nothing till I call it? -- Truth (a.k.a. God) -- After objectivity : dialogue -- Beautiful, messy, incarnational truth -- Paradoxes -- Dispatch from the end of a three-mile dirt road : recovering church -- Inside the emergent church -- It's a great day at Jacob's well! -- Wikichurch -- Tightly knit : journey -- Binitarians -- The people's liturgy : Church of the Apostles -- Time to rethink seminary -- My church : a paean to Solomon's porch -- Epilogue: Feral Christians.

Explores the beliefs, practices, and faith of emergent Christians around the country, discussing the origins, theology, interpretation of Scripture, and sense of community promoted by the emerging church movement.