Plowing in Hope is a book that aims to be a biblical theology of culture. It examines the culture in its redemptive-historical context beginning with the first two chapters of Genesis dealing with God's commands to Adam and Eve and then ending in Revelation with the revelation of the New Jerusalem. David Bruce Hegeman, the author, defines culture as "the product of human acts of concretization undertaken in the evolutionary transformation of the earth according to the commandment of God." Hegeman wrote this book because of comments and encouragement from people in a couple of Sunday school classes where he taught about Christianity and culture. The book has ten chapters and is divided into two parts. The first part deals with “A positive theology of culture” and the second part deals with “Culture and redemption”. Cultural history (the history of the cultural process) and the history of redemption (the history of human salvation brought about by God) are two strands of history that are decreed and governed by God, in which Hegeman finds it useful to see culture operating within it . Hegeman argues in the first part of his book that the Bible implicitly teaches that: (1) real cultural development exists, (2) occupational differentiation and social stratification are necessary to fulfill God's command for global cultural development, and ( 3) some artefacts are recognized as having greater value because they are more intellectually and aesthetically refined and made with greater skill. (p.15) In chapter two, the transformation and development of the earth from a garden-paradise to a glorious city of God occurs through the manifestation of God's purpose for man, which is cultural history. Now, cultural history is the branch of history that deals with the creation of culture. Here we see that human history begins in a garden and ends in a city. Moving on to chapter four, we see that man's cultural activities arise from his relationship with work on the land. This in turn shows that culture is a manifestation of humanity's unique place within God's creation, bearing the image of God. So we see how there are varying degrees of expressive intensity in which culture manifests itself. A "high" culture designates cultural artifacts for prolonged use as objects of intellectual, aesthetic contemplation, or for religious service. On the other hand, a "low" culture designated objects made for common purposes that focus primarily on utility.