Contents
- Borders and Bombs — Response by Austin Fischer
- The most annoying types of airline passengers
- Jackson Wu’s ETS papers
- Please, Please Watch The Gender Conversation Now!
- What Happened to Jesus?
- We marry better than we evangelize
- 5 Wrong Ways to Talk About Sin
- Knowing Your Self-Worth Is a Commandment
- Scot McKnight’s King Jesus Gospel: Has The Gospel Coalition Caved?
- Think Really Hard About Why You Might Be Wrong
- Narrative Theology Explained
- Christians, MLK Day, and Historical Amnesia
Borders and Bombs — Response by Austin Fischer
A clip is circulating of Robert Jeffress, pastor of FBC Dallas, using Romans 13 to argue that the Christian response to the Paris attacks is “borders and bombs.” It got me curious about Romans 13, so I went back to my trusty New Interpreter’s Bible to see what the trusty N.T. Wright has to say about it. Below is a summary of Wright’s commentary, with a few reflections on them and Jeffress’ comments in light of them.
Wright argues that, despite some understandable arguments to the contrary, Romans 13 is in fact a general statement about ruling authorities. In essence, in this time between the times where God’s new world is on its way but not quite here, government is something God has put in place to preserve some measure of justice and order and to prevent the world from falling into complete anarchy and chaos. To disagree with this general sentiment is to endorse actual anarchy, which, on the whole, is far worse than government, even though government can certainly go horribly wrong.
The most annoying types of airline passengers
Have you dealt with seat kickers and other annoying airline passengers? Expedia has ranked the top 10 most annoying types of fliers.
- Have Theologians No Sense of Shame?: How the Bible Reconciles Objective and Subjective Shame
- Seeking God’s Face: Honor and Shame in the Sacrificial System
Please, Please Watch The Gender Conversation Now!
Morling College (a Baptist College in Australia) last year hosted a great event called The Gender Conversation with a variety of speakers and presenters from all over Australia. I gave a talk on the NT household codes, other people talked about egalitarianism, gender dysphoria, gender and ministry, and singleness, controversial stuff, but lots of perspectives represented. The videos for that conference are now available for renting or purchasing.
But note this!
EVERYONE should watch the three videos about Gender, Biology, and Identity! If you do not have a medical degree or expertise in gender theory or know how to make heads or tails of the whole transgender/gender dysophoria thing, then you really, Really, REALLY need to watch this.
The intent of James D.G. Dunn’s 3-volume set is to take us from Jesus to the threshold of the Great Church, from Jesus to about 180AD. In volume Dunn examined Jesus Remembered and in the 2d volume he examined the earliest church up to about 70AD (Beginning from Jerusalem). Volume 3, Neither Jew nor Greek (NJNG) examines the period from roughly 70 to 180AD.
What is noticeable is that he doesn’t let the later creeds or the ecclesiastical history to take control. Rather he wants to follow the path as it developed, not to begin with where it ended. He doesn’t want to ask How did we get the Great Church?, but instead, What happened to Jesus? What happened to Paul, and to Peter, and to John?
We marry better than we evangelize
Suppose you are a single 20-something. Your friends tell you about a woman named Jesse, whom they think would be a great match for you. They go on and on about all her good points. They tell you that she’s smart, beautiful, conversational, honest, comes from a good family, is low maintenance yet seeks excellence in all she does.
After a solid 5 minutes or more of this, they finally ask the big question, “So, are you willing to marry her?”
Putting yourself in this situation, how would you answer these enthusiastic messengers?
5 Wrong Ways to Talk About Sin
Christianity is inextricably bound up with the notion of sin. The Bible tells the story of the triune God’s rescue mission to redeem rebels out of their sin and guilt, which alienates them from his shared life of light and love. The gospel of Jesus Christ is the central message of how the Son came in the power of the Spirit to conquer sin and death through his own life, death, and resurrection. Without seriously considering the weight of sin, as Anselm so famously urged us to do, we can’t possibly understand the glory, goodness, and mercy of God’s liberation. Neither can we respond to it appropriately with repentance, faith, and worship. This is why Christians have historically spent so much time talking about sin.
Knowing Your Self-Worth Is a Commandment
For many Christians, the idea of loving yourself is one we either shy away from or we don’t give much thought to. It may be that we’re concerned that if we pay ourselves too much attention, we could become prideful and push God into the background. Or it may be that we were just taught simply to not think about ourselves, in an attempt to focus only on God.
But there’s an important difference between selfishness and self-worth.
Scot McKnight’s King Jesus Gospel: Has The Gospel Coalition Caved?
I think this is a landmark book because it summarizes and communicates the important issues of New Perspective, NT Wright and the Kingdom/Paul debate for everyday Christian life in a way the average adult Christian can grab hold of. That’s a feat! I have been trying to teach New Perspective on Paul, NT Wright on God’s “making all things right,” for years. I have been trying to teach how the gospel is not an either/or – kingdom or justification. It is bigger than both and includes both. This book does what I couldn’t do. My student’s light bulbs have been going on this quarter and they are using this book with elders in their churches.
Think Really Hard About Why You Might Be Wrong
Almost no one who thinks about bias — what forms it takes, how it trips up effective decision-making, and so on — does so more often or more carefully than behavioral economists do. So it’s always interesting to hear them talk about the subject. Back in July, for example, Melissa Dahl flagged a conversation between Danny Kahneman and The Guardian’s David Shariatmadari in which Kahneman explained that if he could rid the world of one human bias, it’s overconfidence.
So here is my revised and updated admittedly concise description of “narrative theology” and why this approach to Scripture and theology has no need of “inerrancy.”
What Is “Narrative Theology?”
Christians, MLK Day, and Historical Amnesia
On the second day of Martin Luther King Jr.’s imprisonment in a Birmingham jail, a guard slipped him a copy of the morning paper. By the dim light of his cell, King read the tall black letters that headlined the second page: WHITE CLERGYMEN URGE LOCAL NEGROES TO WITHDRAW FROM DEMONSTRATIONS.
