Here is a couple of depressing news article about The Episcopal Church in the USA. See Why is the Episcopal Church Near Collapse on Beliefnet and What Ailes the Episcopalians in WSJ. Their general convention just finished and it made such wonderfully Christian decisions as approving liturgical blessings of same-sex relationships (I understand this, but I disagree), funeral rites for dogs and cats (I do not understand this), and apologised for exposing Native Americans to Christianity (I understand this and... Read more

While I was in St. Andrews attending the Scripture and Theology conference, I made time to learn to play the bagpipes. Check this out. Read more

Darrell Bock, who is touring Australia at the moment, wrote a very good essay on “The Gospel Before the Gospels: The Preached Core Narrative” in the recent Howard Marshall festschrift. In particular I like these two quotes: In the church today we often present the gospel as if it were about forgiveness of sins alone. Jesus died for our sins, so believe and be saved. However, what this speech [Acts 2] highlights is not so much how Jesus saves us, but... Read more

The Zondervan blog Koinonia announces a give away for the book Four Views of the Apostle (ed. by Mike Bird with Douglas Campbell, Thomas R. Schreiner, Mark Nanos, and Luke Timothy Johnson) which is due out at the end of the month. They write: To enter the giveaway, comment below with your answer to this question: Which adjectives come to mind when you think of Paul? Also, a bonus entry is available if you comment a second time letting us know that... Read more

Over at RBL is a review by Joseph B. Tyson of Paul and the Second Century edited by M. Bird and J. Dodson. Read more

I’m now in the third stage of my European trip. Justin Hardin and I are heading up by train to St. Andrews. Justin and I are both giving papers at the conference; the difference is he’s really a Galatians scholar! He’s wrote his thesis at Cambridge Galatians and the Imperial Cult (see now WUNT 2008). Justin teaches at Oxford at Wycliffe Hall. It is great fun to travel with Justin. We led a study tour of Greece & Turkey together... Read more

Over at Kingdomview, Joseph Torres notes my analogy of Romans 5.12-21 with the Star Wars Saga. Something that probably only GenXers will understand! Read more

Just reading through Origen’s Commentary on Matthew and I noticed how he applies “blessed are the peacemakers” to harmonizing parts of scripture together: [He] becomes a …peacemaker as he demonstrates that that which appears to others to be a conflict in the Scriptures is no conflict, and exhibits their concord and peace, whether of the Old Scriptures with the New, or of the Law with the Prophets, or of the Gospels with the Apostolic Scriptures, or of the Apostolic Scriptures... Read more

Hans F. Bayer (Covenant Theological Seminary) has a neat little book on discipleship in the Gospel of Mark. Mark is my favourite Gospel and I’ve written on the discipleship theme myself elsewhere (see here). It is called: A Theology of Mark: The Dynamic Between Christology and Authentic Discipleship (Philipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2012).  There is an interview with Bayer over at Credo Magazine which is quite good. In his interview Bayer states: At one point in my research I asked a... Read more

Lawrence Garcia of Academia Church reviews Justification: Five Views. My favourite line was, of course, this one: Though all the contributors are to be commended for their work in this reflective-cornucopia on justification, the most persuasive presentation was Michael F. Bird’s Progressive Reformed view. And the angels wept! Read more