Origen (3rd century church father) spent three decades writing a commentary on the Gospel of John which remained incomplete at his death. In the preface to “Book 32” of the commentary (an exposition of John 13:2-33) he wrote about the work utilzing the analogy of the wilderness wandering of Israel. These are encouraging words to any of us writing commentaries: Guided by God through Jesus Christ, let us walk in the great and life-giving way of the gospel, in hope... Read more

I’ve been working through various Ph.D theses by David Lincicum, Guy Waters, J. Ross Wagner, Preston Sprinkle, and Matthew Bates on Rom 10:5-8. And whoa, let me say that it is one doozey of a text and it is a brave soul who tries to cover these verses in an academic monograph. That said, I’ve got my own spin on the passage which I give below in a very loose paraphrase: Moses certainly provided the premise for Israel’s pursuit of righteousness... Read more

The story of Israel’s “fall’ might, after all, seem remote and scarcely interesting to gentile Christians in Rome. I sometimes wonder whether such imagined uncomprehending listeners are rally the coded presence of modern western scholars and preachers who are hoping that Paul will, in his every sentence, say something readily accessible to the deeply non-Jewish concerns of our own day. But what is of most concern to Paul, speaking as he says ‘to those who know the law’ (Rom 7:1),... Read more

Over at Harnessing Chaos, James Crossley comments on the value of the “criteria of authenticity” used in historical Jesus research. After assessing the relative strengths and weaknesses of the various “criteria,” Crossley concludes: So what can we say in (what is hopefully) a post-criteria world? To some degree, we are simply left with an old fashioned view of historical interpretation: interpretation of the material (and, as Rafael Rodriguez has stressed, we are doing nothing but relentlessly interpreting even when using the criteria), guesswork... Read more

I’m really excited to promote the soon-to-be-released bundle of courses on the Gospels from in Logos’ Mobile Education. Here’s the promo for my John course. Along with the John course there are 8 other courses by preeminent gospel scholars. Here is the list of individual title: NT251 The Sermon on the Mount by Jonathan Pennington NT252 Parables of Jesus by Daniel M. Doriani NT253 Miracles of Jesus by Daniel M. Doriani NT301 The Gospels as Ancient Biography: A Theological and Historical... Read more

Can the Gospel compete with alternative worldviews? A review of The Gospel in the Marketplace of Ideas, P. Copan & K. Litwak, IVP, by Kara Martin Available at Amazon.com Earlier this year I preached about contextualising our gospel in response to popular culture, for which Acts 17:16–34 was the obvious model. Paul’s speech on Mars Hill is a sensational example of a deep understanding of the culture of the time, including their philosophers and poets. However, my sermon would have been... Read more

The latest issue of the Journal for the Study of Paul and His Letters is dedicated to a review of N.T. Wright’s Paul and the Faithfulness of God. The issue features responses by Thomas Schreiner, Michael Gorman, David Starling, Martinus de Boer, Markus Bockmuehl, and Beverly Gaventa, as well as a 15 page rejoinder by N.T. Wright himself. Its a great discussion and some sparks fly!  If you want to get your hands on this issue and even take out a subscription to JSPL, go over... Read more

I found this very interesting passage in Martin Kähler’s The So-Called Historical Jesus and the Historic Biblical Christ. Kähler offers his solution to the knotty problem of the historical origins of both the Bible and Jesus. Kähler places supreme value on the history of the effects of Jesus and the Bible as evidence for its reliability and credibility. The great reality of the Bible has always prevented me from simply putting it in the same category as other literary productions. That is to say, I came to... Read more

The required textbooks for my three courses at NPU in the fall semester: 4th Year Seminar – Topic: Theological Interpretation of Scripture Introduction to the Bible Jesus of Nazareth Read more

Over at CPX, John Dickson interviewed the British Bible Society’s resident theologian, Dr. Paula Gooder, on the historical reliability of the Gospels. Read more