I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, we do not need a theory of the atonement. Theories of the atonement are nothing but excess intellectual furniture. We can’t move in here at the moment because the place is heaped up with ponderous medieval dining tables, fussy baroque wardrobes that go nowhere, and hard, threadbare Victorian armchairs, all covered in a thick layer of dust. We don’t need it. It’s all just clutter. Centuries of obstructive theological clutter. What we need to do—sorry, what I think we need to do—is tell the story of how Jesus’ death around AD 30 fundamentally and lastingly impacted the people of God, and to tell the story as the New Testament tells it, as prophetically interpreted history.

In my post on the Gentiles and the Holy Spirit I made the remark that Cornelius is described as a ‘pious man, who feared God, who prayed continually; a righteous and God-fearing man, who was “well spoken of by the whole Jewish nation”’ (Acts 10:2, 22). Mike has asked in what version Cornelius is described as being “righteous”. I thought at first that he was being facetious (I get a bit paranoid sometimes), but it looks like a reasonable question.

Daniel Kirk wrote a piece recently about Christians “being greater than angels”, looking at Paul’s enigmatic remarks in 1 Corinthians 6:1-3 about the saints judging not only the world but also angels. It’s a short piece, and the focus is mainly anthropological: an “idealized humanity” will judge the world; a “redeemed humanity occupies a higher place in the cosmic order than angels”. But what about the eschatology of this passage? What about the when?

In the garden of Gethsemane, shortly before his arrest, Jesus becomes “greatly distressed and troubled” and says to his disciples, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death. Remain here and watch.” He moves some distance from them, falls to the ground, and prays “that, if it were possible, the hour might pass from him”. Mark records his words: “Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will” (Mk. 14:32-36; cf. Matt. 26:36-39; Lk. 22:41-44).

I’m currently in Sulaymaniyah in the Autonomous Region of Kurdistan in northern Iraq with my wife, meeting some extraordinary people who are doing some extraordinary things. I say that partly to impress, partly to explain why I’ve been a bit slow following up on comments and questions. But I do want to keep my series on the role of the Holy Spirit in the story of Israel, as it is being told in the New Testament, plodding along.

I have argued that “salvation” in the context of Peter’s sermons in the early chapters of Acts means the salvation of at least some part of Israel from the coming disaster of the war against Rome, the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple, the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Jews, the humiliation of a nation. This prospect is part and parcel of the “word” that is proclaimed by the disciples in Jerusalem: only those who call on the name of the Lord Jesus will be saved and will experience the life of the age to come. But what of those who lose their lives for the sake of this gospel? Yinka asks the question:

Wondering how martydom of the righteous plays into this. In what sense is one who has called on the name of the lord, only to lose his/her head, ‘saved’?