Chris Skinner has the news on the sad death of Paul Achtemeier. The Achtemeier’s, Paul and Elizabeth, were quite a biblical studies duo, covering both OT and NT! Read more

Over TGC, John Starke reviews the books on gender and ministry by Keller, Bird, and Dickson. It’s a critical but non-polemical review, though I do have a few points of contention against Starke’s criticism: The fact that I use language like “infer” or “speculate” at times, while it might diminish my rhetorical appeal, was done out of pure honesty. Some arguments are inferential or lead us to imagine a certain situation that the texts either assumes or creates. Given that... Read more

Michael P. Jensen Sydney Anglicanism: An Apology Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock Available from Amazon.com (USA) – $9.99 on Kindle Available from Mosaic Books (Australia) Here’s the blurb: Sydney’s evangelical Anglicans have been the focus of a great deal of controversy and criticism in the Anglican world. Their blend of conservatism towards doctrine and radicalism towards the institutional church has made them something of an enigma to other Anglicans. But what makes them really tick? Michael Jensen provides a unique insider’s... Read more

I’m pleased to announce that the book, Introduction to Messianic Judaism, I co-edited with David Rudolph is coming out next month. HT: Katya Covrett Read more

I recently received an email from a student who wrote to thank me for my Paul course which he apparently found very foundational. He wrote a couple of the things he remembered me saying that made a great impact on him. Here’s my favorite. My goal is not, necessarily, for you to agree with me. It is to help you learn how to think. Though, if you do disagree with me you better damn well know why. Read more

Thanks to the reminder from Nijay Gupta, co-editor of JSPL, the latest issue is out and it has some cracking good papers on Galatians: “Salvation History in Galatians and the Making of a Pauline Discourse” (Bruce Longenecker) “The Nature of Salvation History in Galatians” (Jason Maston) “Salvation History in Galatians?” (response to both above by M.C. de Boer) “‘It Has Been Brought to Completion’: Lev 19:18 as Christological Witness in Gal 5:14″ (Michael Suh) “‘Once Upon a Time’: Galatians as... Read more

I am proud as punch to announce the release of my first novel Iskandar and the Immortal King of Iona. In a nutshell, “Iskandar” is a religious themed fantasy novel (more like LOTR than the Narnia Chronicles). It has messianic themes, good vs. evil, redemption, immortality, deification, an evil god named “Marduk,” determinism vs. freedom, even a minor character called “Aquinas.” The story is set in the mythical kingdom of Iona where King Morpeth and Queen Prisca are seduced by the... Read more

A Response to Peter Bolt’s Critique of Hearing Her Voice: A Case for Women Giving Sermons by John Dickson (I am grateful to Mike Bird for hosting this piece. My preference was to post a guest blog on Mark Thompson’s site – keeping it in the family, so to speak. I wrote to him via the comments function on his blog and received no response. Nor did the comment appear. I then emailed him on Jan 16 and have not... Read more

Over at Sydneyanglicans.net, Michael Jensen of Moore Colloege has a nice piece on A Surprising Consensus? where he notes the agreements between Bird, Dickson, and Keller that women can share in the didactic ministry of the church. [W]hat is interesting to me is that there seems to be emerging an agreement from all sides in this discussion that the New Testament features women in speaking roles in front of mixed congregations to a far greater extent than is often now... Read more

In the on-line Journal of Moral Theology, in its latest issue, Michael Gorman has a nice piece on Paul and the Cruciformed Way of God in Christ. Gorman concludes: Paul offers a vision of divine enemy/love reconciliation, generosity, and hospitality that, he says, must be embodied in Christian communities. Moral theologians and biblical scholars need to work together to discern the concrete ways in which we can instantiate the story of God in Christ into our own communal practices by the... Read more