The groaning of creation

We screened the People’s Emergency Briefing film in the week before this message, so the climate crisis loomed menacingly. In the film, Jennifer Saunders of Absolutely Fabulous fame asks a good question: “What’s the matter with us?” What is the matter with us as a civilisation?

There is no eco-crisis in the New Testament, but we often read Romans 8:19-21 as an expression of Paul’s conviction that the whole of creation will eventually be set free from the consequences of the fall of humanity.

I think that misses the point.

Read more...
Church as eschatological community (part 1)
I gave a talk last night at Community Church Harlesden on church as eschatological community. It was a little complicated, as you can see from this handout, so I promised to write up a summary. I'll do it in two parts. If you're not sure what "eschatology" means—or at least, what I mean by… ( | 3 comments)
Adam, original sin, and wrath against the Jew
At the THINK Conference last week Tom Wright made the interesting observation that Judaism shows very little interest in Adam and his original sin until after the destruction of the temple. With slightly different emphases the apocalyptic texts 4 Ezra and 2 Baruch, written around AD 100, both make… ( | 18 comments)
The Lord said to my lord...
I have argued in a number of posts recently (see below) that the confession that Jesus is Lord is not the same as the confession that Jesus is God, and that we are likely to miss a critical part of New Testament teaching if we carelessly conflate the two. There is an eschatological or… ( | 55 comments)
Rob Bell: What we don’t talk about when we talk about God
I have been listening to Rob Bell talk about his book [amazon:978-0062049667:inline] with Justin Brierley and Andrew Wilson on Premier Radio’s Unbelievable podcast. I download one of these discussions from time to time if I have a long car journey to make. I find them a bit rambling, and most… ( | 15 comments)
Is the Shema really so important for understanding “one God… one Lord” in 1 Corinthians 8:6?
Richard Worden Wilson has drawn attention to a short piece by Scot McKnight on the relation between Paul’s statement about one God and one Lord in 1 Corinthians 8:6 and the Shema, the great Jewish confession that “The LORD our God (yhwh eloheinu), the LORD (yhwh) is one” (… ( | 8 comments)
Tweaking Richard Bauckham on Jesus and the God of Israel
In his valuable book [amazon:978-0802845597:inline] Richard Bauckham argues that the unique identity of God in scripture is characterized in two ways: he is the particular God of Israel, known to them as YHWH, who brought them out of Egypt and revealed himself to Moses as “YHWH, YHWH, a God… ( | 41 comments)
Some rough and ready “rules” for doing a narrative-historical reading of the New Testament
In response to persistent demands that I explain my hermeneutic, here is a list of seven rough and ready “rules” for doing a narrative-historical reading of the New Testament.  They loosely outline or summarize what is to my mind a coherent and defensible methodology, but I have not offered… ( | 23 comments)