One of the more interesting aspects of Tom’s treatment of Rom. 8.5-11 which is the next subsection, is his reading of the last verse of the section, which he takes to mean that the Holy Spirit who lives within the believer ‘will give life to your mortal bodies on a parallel to the way God physically raised Jesus from the dead. This Spirit is said on the one hand to be God’s Spirit, but also elsewhere Jesus’ Spirit (presumably because... Read more
Forget speed reading, or skimming, but with technical texts you need to take a detached approach, take the time to back up and get some perspective on what is being claimed in the text, and then ruminate on what you’ve learned. As it says in Alice in Wonderland— Feed your head. Read more
And you thought it was impossible, but no. Buster sets the new Myrtle Beach record for power-lifting by someone who weighs .009 lbs. Rumor has it he works for minnow man wage. Read more
If you know the story about the ancient spice road that went through Petra in Nabatea and up to Syria and Mesopotamia, you will know the story about how frankincense and myrrh made its way to the Holy Land, but archaeologists have been unable to figure out why the road itself, and not just the trade that went north and south on it was called a spice road— until now. This truck was caught in the act during a storm,... Read more
Ben: Allan what was it that prompted you to write this particular book? In so many ways, it is a unique cross-disciplinary study, helpful in various ways? Allan: All the subjects touched upon have fascinated me from childhood. Bible stories, travel narratives, and real adventures go back to my earliest years. My family, living in a gas-lit former coal mining cottage, was also full of story-tellers, and stories and the best way of telling them were absorbed from infancy... Read more
I love sports as much as the next person, almost as much as I dislike the hype that comes with it. But the Super Bowl yesterday was frankly— NON-COMPETITIVE. Poor ole Patrick Mahomes didn’t have even 3 seconds to get rid of the ball, so strong was the pass rush of the Eagles, and they didn’t even blitz. This led to uncharacteristic mistakes, and pretty soon, in fact before half time things were looking really dire for the repeat winners... Read more
There are lots of lines in this masterpiece that deserve attention, for example ‘There’s no time no space/ Holy Spirit full of grace’. talking about God’s work of creation, and then more lines about everlasting life. Kudos to Leonid for him and his son putting lyrics to this incredible song written by a friend of Leonid’s who passed away. Read more
The modus operandi of Tom Wright in this book is absolutely commendable, and worth repeating by others. He divides his discussions into three parts: 1) after a fresh translation (including a parallel transliteration of the Greek) there is a looking at the overall structure of a passage, especially including the beginning and end to see where the discussion is going; 2) looking at the connective tissue in the arguments– the conjunctions, or other connections such as gar, de, oti, kai etc.... Read more
By almost universal consent, Romans 8 is a conclusion to a major subsection of Romans. I would say that we have to recognize it as the climax of the positive arguments or ‘probatio’ in Romans before he goes on to argument refuting some common misunderstandings, particularly by Gentiles, about Israel, and whether or not they are still God’s chosen people, if they have not yet accepted Christ as the Jewish Messiah, a people for whom God has a plan. Without... Read more
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