Recent posts

The salt of the earth
In the context of Jesus’ address to the community of renewed Israel it makes more sense to translate gē as ‘land’ than ‘earth’. The issue here is the role of the disciples in the eschatological transition from second temple Judaism under judgment to a restored people of the Spirit. The… ( | 0 comments)
Christ collectives
An article by Holland Cotter in The New York Times (‘Collectives blurring the lines of who makes modern art’) got me thinking about what the phenomenon of ‘art collectives’ might teach us about the nature and purpose of the church. An art collective represents the sort of fusion of community,… ( | 0 comments)
Getting frustrated by An Emergent Manifesto of Hope
I have been reading with some considerable frustration An Emergent Manifesto of Hope, edited by Doug Pagitt and Tony Jones. The book describes itself on the back cover as: a coming together of divergent voices into a collection of writings that will bring you the latest thinking of the… ( | 0 comments)
The stone rejected by the builders
The comment about the stone rejected by the builders and the preceding parable are addressed to the ‘chief priests and the elders of the people’ (21:23), who question his authority to enact (through the events of his arrival in Jerusalem) the judgment and restoration of Israel. The parable is… ( | 0 comments)
One died for all
In a vigorous Fulcrum article entitled ‘The Cross and the Caricatures: a response to Robert Jenson, Jeffrey John, and a new volume entitled Pierced for Our Transgressions’, Tom Wright argues that in order to make sense of the idea of ‘penal substitution’ we must locate itwithin the biblical world,… ( | 1 comment)
In the regeneration
Jesus tells his disciples that in his kingdom, in the ‘regeneration’ of the people of God, ‘when the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel’ (Matt. 19:28; cf. Lk. 22:30). ‘Regeneration’ is … ( | 0 comments)
What it means to be perfect
A man comes to Jesus and asks what good thing he must do to inherit the life of the age to come (not ‘eternal life’ in the traditional sense). Jesus tells him that in order to enter life he must keep the commandments. The man has done this. What is still lacking? Jesus tells him that if he would be… ( | 0 comments)
The gates of Hades will not prevail against it
This verse has often been used to support a theology of spiritual warfare. In fact, Jesus is saying something quite straightforward but crucial for the continuation of the community of believers and the success of the message that they proclaimed. 1. ‘Gates of hades’ (pulai hadou) is a… ( | 4 comments)
Who do men say that the Son of man is?
In 1998 Dr Andrew Overman discovered the ruins of a large Roman temple at Horbat Omrit. He believes that the temple was built by Herod in Caesarea Philippi to honour Augustus at the time when the emperor was coming to be worshipped as a living God. He suggests that the phrase ‘the son of living God… ( | 0 comments)
Seven spirits worse than the first
The reference to this wicked generation locates the saying historically. I would suggest that Jesus is talking about the generation of Jews that would suffer the horrors of the war against Rome. He casts out demons from Israel, but he warns that these homeless spirits will return with a vengeance… ( | 0 comments)
The destruction of body and soul in gehenna
This verse comes in the context of Jesus’ instructions to the twelve before sending them out to proclaim the imminence of the reign of God (10:7). In particular it presupposes the warning that they will face persecution from the Jews as they go through the towns of Israel (Matt. 10:23). There is no… ( | 1 comment)
The sick need a physician
The allusion to Hos. 6:6 LXX (‘I desire mercy and not sacrifice’) brings into view the wider context of Hosea’s prophecy. The people of Israel will take their sacrificial animals to the temple, but they will not find the Lord there (Hos. 5:6). He has withdrawn from them until they acknowledge… ( | 0 comments)
The way of life and the way of death
Jesus tells the disciples to choose a difficult road leading to life rather than an easy road leading to destruction. The basic question to be addressed here is this: Is this a choice exclusively for the community of his followers in the context of first century Judaism, or does Jesus have in mind… ( | 5 comments)
The Lord’s prayer and its eschatological context
Here is a good example of the sort of tight corner that a historical reading of New Testament eschatology can get us into. The Lord’s prayer is a central element in our formal and informal liturgies. We assume that it is timeless: we imagine that we pray it in the same way and for the same… ( | 0 comments)
The beatitudes
The beatitude in Judaism The beatitude is a common Jewish literary form, found widely in biblical and post-biblical writings. Essentially, it is an affirmation of those who have gained divine approval or of a way of life that will ensure divine approval: a man is blessed, for example, if he fears… ( | 0 comments)
They will call his name Immanuel
The announcement that Jesus will ‘save his people from their sins’ is followed immediately by the reference to the prophecy in Isaiah about a virgin or young woman who will bear a son whose name will be Immanuel (Isaiah 7:14). This child will not actually do anything: he does not grow up to become… ( | 0 comments)
He will save his people from their sins
Joseph is told by the angel that the boy will be called Jesus because ‘he will save his people from their sins’. We expect the Christmas story to have universal relevance, good news for all mankind, but the message here is only that Jesus will be Israel’s saviour: he will save … ( | 0 comments)
The birth announcement
Conceived by the Holy Spirit The Christmas stories have to do more with Jesus as Messiah than with the incarnation. There is no suggestion that only in this way could he be sinless, etc.; it is not taken as an argument for Jesus’ divinity. Rather the virgin birth is a ‘sign’ to Joseph (the… ( | 0 comments)
The ‘rapture’ in its literary and historical setting
This passage has traditionally been understood to describe an end-of-history coming of Jesus to take the church to heaven to be with God. It needs to be read, however, with a strong awareness of the historical setting, on the one hand, and of the nature of the prophetic language, on the other. If… ( | 2 comments)
Headship, submission and cultural context
1. Paul’s argument in 1 Cor. 11:2-16 has nothing to do with submission - that is simply not what he is talking about. The word exousian occurs in verse 10 but what he says here is that a woman ‘ought to have authority over (exousian echein epi) her head’, which I take to… ( | 0 comments)