When I jumped on to Amazon this evening, I noticed a link to a forthcoming (June, 2014) book by N.T. Wright called The Bible Says where Wright comments on controversial topics like evolution, women’s ordination, and politics. Read the fine print, though, and you will notice this does not appear to be a brand new book, but a collection of previous material. Even though I was disappointed at first to see it is not a new work, I think it could... Read more

Here’s my list of best books of 2013. I am sure I forgot a few, but these were the ones that quickly came to mind. Best Overall Academic Work I am confident that this award should go to William Baird’s outstanding History of New Testament Research Vol 3 – organized sensibly, anecdotally satisfying, insightful, fair. I was surprised to find it so enjoyable to read. Best Commentary This prize belongs to Scot McKnight’s excellent Sermon on the Mount commentary that kicks off... Read more

I am excited to give notice that I have a new article out with the periodical Canadian Theological Review (2013). The title of the article is: “Beholding the Word of Christ: A Theological Reading of Colossians.” This is my contribution to the question about the theological substance or subject matter (Sache) of this important text. One thing I do in the essay is bring Colossians canonically into dialogue with Deuteronomy and the Gospel of John since there are some important shared... Read more

The Justice Conference (Feb 21-22, 2014, LA) will feature a number of outstanding speakers including N.T. Wright, Bernice King, Rich Stearns, Jim Wallis, and my friend Bethany Hoang (and others). Its fun to know that this yearly event is growing and continuing to attract high quality speakers and artists. Sadly, I won’t be able to attend this year, but I hope it will fit better into my schedule and life in 2015! Read more

Today I had to sit at a car repair shop while my car was being checked out. I took along the new Zondervan Four Views on the Historical Adam (ed. Matthew Barrett and Ardel Caneday). You might say, “how can there be four views when the Bible says there was a real Adam, and that should do it?” Well, that really did do it in the pre-modern era, but the theory of evolution and recent study of genetics has put into doubt... Read more

One of the greatest satisfactions I get in my job is seeing scholars argue. Really. It reminds me (1) they are regular people (not really, but they can be like regular people in some ways) and (2) there is great need out there for great scholarship. I just finished reading Five Views on Biblical Inerrancy (Zondervan, 2013) which features these five men: R. Albert Mohler (Classic Biblical Inerrancy) Peter Enns (Classic Biblical Inerrancy Doesn’t Work) Michael F. Bird (Inerrancy is Not Necessary... Read more

Recently I reviewed the late R.T. France’s outstanding commentary on Luke in the new Teach the Text (TT) series from Baker. While the format and purpose of the series is well-conceived, I said that the quality of each book will ultimately be determined by the strengths of the author. In the case of Luke, France was the perfect choice. The first TT volume in New Testament is the one on Romans by C. Marvin Pate. I will not give his... Read more

Nation, I am not going to lie to you – I love me some good missional theology. While scholars who are missionally-minded come from various disciplinary sectors (cultural theology, missiology, biblical studies, ecclesiology, historical theology), they often read each other’s work. Nevertheless, usually we feel “at home” especially in our own discipline. Thus, I was pleased to see Dean Flemming (New Testament scholar) write a book called Recovering the Full Mission of God: A Biblical Perspective on Being, Doing, and Telling (IVP,... Read more

Here. Great to see Jan Lambrecht in this issue, but does he know that Wright did not actually write Romans 4? Shaw’s article looks very interesting as well! Matthew Thiessen ‘The Rock Was Christ’: The Fluidity of Christ’s Body in 1 Corinthians 10. Fernando Bermejo-Rubio (Why) Was Jesus the Galilean Crucified Alone? Solving a False Conundrum David A. Shaw Apocalyptic and Covenant: Perspectives on Paul or Antinomies at War Alexander V. Prokhorov Taking the Jews out of the Equation: Galatians... Read more

In 2005, I happened to have picked up the first two volumes by William Baird of his History of New Testament Research. Truth be told, since that time, I have had little time to read either of those volumes, though I know them to be excellent based on reviews and recommendations. This past summer, I was delighted to acquire the latest and last volume in the series subtitled From C.H. Dodd to Hans Deiter Betz. One might have wished for Baird to... Read more