I had a conversation last week with an old friend, Scott Lencke, about what I have been calling a “narrative-historical” approach to the reading of the Bible and of the New Testament in particular. Scott has made it available on his new podcast, or you can watch the whole thing on YouTube.

He says that the approach will be a “great challenge to our typical evangelical approach, but one I think is worth chewing over in order to better read the Bible.” Agreed, but it may be less of a challenge here in the UK than in other parts of the English-speaking evangelical world.

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Nothing much to see here, just a footnote to my argument about Jesus being “in the form of a god,” but some people may find it interesting. ()
From my limited perspective (other limited perspectives are available), it appears that the church in the West is changing or being changed quite dramatically. It is adapting to a marginalised and diminished presence by re-imagining the manner of its engagement with the world around it. We are… ( | 1 comment)
Under what circumstances did Paul imagine that “all Israel” would be saved? How did he think it would come about? I want to look at two passages here that point to national disaster as the circumstances and means by which such a reversal might happen. The second is the obvious one: ()
Paul makes reference in Romans 2:7 to people who “by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality” (ESV). Who are they, what are they seeking, and what do they get on the day of God’s wrath? I ask because the question came up in an X/Twitter exchange, and I want to take the… ( | 5 comments)
I really shouldn’t be going on about this, but I keep running into the same issue, and it is irksome. Reading Romans in Context: Paul and Second Temple Judaism (2015), edited by Blackwell, Goodrich, and Maston, ought to be a useful, if elementary, resource for exploring the abundant… ( | 1 comment)
There is an obvious contradiction—at least in the popular imagination—between the values of Jesus and the practices of Christendom, and it is not surprising that what is left of the Christendom church in the West now largely views its past with horror and shame. Surely, the conversion of the Roman… ( | 2 comments)
I am writing this in hope of offering some encouragement to Liam, who is planning to go to university in September to study theology but is worried that he may be wasting his time.Liam is caught on the horns of a classic dilemma and at risk of falling torn and bruised between them. One horn is… ( | 15 comments)