Did the Apostles Know they Were Writing Scripture?
There is no good reason to think the predication of “scripture” upon Paul’s writing is anachronistic within Paul’s lifetime.
Category: Biblical Theology
A Wizard is Never Late
On the one hand, the delay is a function of God’s desire to see “everyone” repent, since he does not desire the death of the wicked. At the same time, it allows the people of God to grow (in the case of the New Covenant, through covenant children and through evangelism) in number and in maturity until it is sufficient (quantitatively and qualitatively) to be caretakers of the promised land, that is, the world to come.
“The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ” is when, exactly?
Each gospel highlights, in their very first sentence, the importance of where the gospel story begins, and yet each of the gospels begins in a different place.
Pentecost: A Conversation with Dick Gaffin and Nancy Guthrie
I recently had the great privilege of joining Nancy Guthrie and my mentor and friend Dr. Dick Gaffin for a podcast about Pentecost. Pentecost is a surprisingly under-appreciated moment in the history of redemption.
Is the NT Reliable? Part 3: Theology
The church speaks as one: we are Judean and Greek, we are one body, we will affirm one another’s expression of our common faith in Jesus the Christ. Amidst the diversity of Christian expression–some Christians live like Judeans and are zealous for the law of Moses (Acts 21), and some live like Gentiles (and yet have forsaken the ways of their forefathers, 1 Pet. 1:18)–amidst the diversity there is, nevertheless, a common core: Christ is Lord.
The Law was Added: A Paraphrase of Galatians 3:15-29
Ok, but then why add the Covenant of Law at all? What purpose would it serve? Why not just fulfill the Covenant of Promise without any intermediary period of Mosaic Covenant (and with it, the seed as national Israel)? The law was added to illustrate, illuminate, incubate, impede but also aggravate the problem of transgression.
Only John Witnessed the Ascension Twice
As far as I can tell, there’s only one apostle that had the privilege of seeing the ascension twice, at two different times in his life, and from two different points of view: John,...
Another way to Read the Lord’s Prayer
So our path begins with the observation that the Lord’s prayer is not just the kind of prayer that our Lord taught, but rather the kind of prayer our Lord prayed.
The Gated Community: A Biblical Theology of Gates
I recently had the privilege of writing about “Gates” over at TableTalk. Here’s an excerpt: The high walls of the new Jerusalem are punctuated by a dozen gates (that’s a lot), and these gates...