The Good Works Reader

Published by Eerdmans in 2007 in the Classic Christian Readers series, following The Justification Reader (2002). In the publisher's description, Oden listens to the patristic writers who defined orthodoxy in the first five centuries, from Augustine, Irenaeus and Eusebius to lesser-known figures such as Oecumenius, Pseudo-Basil and Peter Chrysologus, and gathers their teaching on the treatment of the poor, the outcast, the imprisoned and "the least of these". The book runs to about 360 pages and combines the ancient texts with Oden's own exposition.