Another Personal Update

About 2 weeks back I finished up my Masters of Applied Statistics, so that means that I will have a lot more time on my hands. This will mean a significant increase in posting to this blog. I am going to start a series on 1 Corinthians much the series I had done on Paul's Thessalonian correspondence. I would expect a post most weeks, even if not quite weekly. I'll also do occasional book reviews. These won't be at quite the same regularity as they used to be for two reasons. First, my wife is no longer a professor, so I don't have library access anymore and have to buy anything I want to read. Second, most of my reading will still be focused on the Exploring the Christian Way of Life series.

The timing of finishing school is good for me in that regard. By early next year I'll be up to Karl Barth who will be followed by Balthasar. Reading those two will take an inordinate amount of time. If I am able to complete a review of their Christology by the end of 2018 and finish my fourth paper, that would be an accomplishment. The next paper, which will focus on modern theologians and current Christian experience and movement of the Spirit, will take another six to nine months. Then I plan to edit all five papers into a cohesive whole (including a thorough rewrite of the first two) issuing a pdf hopefully by the middle of 2020.

Thanks if you've stuck with this blog and me though there hasn't been much content the past three years. I hope and pray it provides nutritious food for thought and conversation.

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Commentary Series Overview

When I write commentary reviews, one of my main goals is to assess how well the commentator hit the intended audience of the commentary and utilized the format of the commentary. This often necessitates cluttering up the post discussing issues of format. To eliminate that, I thought that I would make some general remarks about the format and audience of each of the series that appear in my reviews. Terms like liberal, conservative, etc. are not used pejoratively but simply as descriptors. Many of you are familiar with Jeremy Pierce's commentary series overview. If you don't see a particular series covered here, check out his post to see if it's reviewed there. I am making no attempt at covering every series, just the series that I use. Additionally, new series (such as the NCCS) have been started in the five years since he wrote his very helpful guide, so I thought that it might not be completely out of order to have another person tackle commentary series overviews. This…

Paul's Argument in Galatians 3:15-29

15 Brothers and sisters, let me take an example from everyday life. Just as no one can set aside or add to a human covenant that has been duly established, so it is in this case. 16 The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. Scripture does not say “and to seeds,” meaning many people, but “and to your seed,” meaning one person, who is Christ. 17 What I mean is this: The law, introduced 430 years later, does not set aside the covenant previously established by God and thus do away with the promise. 18 For if the inheritance depends on the law, then it no longer depends on the promise; but God in his grace gave it to Abraham through a promise. 19 Why, then, was the law given at all? It was added because of transgressions until the Seed to whom the promise referred had come. The law was given through angels and entrusted to a mediator. 20 A mediator, however, implies more than one party; but God is one. 21 Is the law, therefore, opposed to the promises of God? Absolutely not! Fo…

Commentary Review: Daniel

In my opinion, Daniel is not the best covered Old Testament book as far as commentaries go. This isn't an uncommon phenomenon among Old Testament books. Though I've looked at them, I'm not going to review some of the older Evangelical Daniel commentaries (like e.g., Baldwin). They don't provide much that you can't get in either Longman or Lucas. If you're unfamiliar with the series that one or more of these commentaries are in check out my commentary series overview.

It was a very close call but my favorite commentary on Daniel is Goldingay's. While there were a few places where I disagreed with his interpretation, I found the commentary to be exemplary. If you're going to teach Daniel, especially the apocalyptic portions, you need a commentary that provides you with a lot of background material. Goldingay, while not as broad as Collins, certainly provides you with quite a bit. His exploration of the background to the apocalyptic symbolism is very helpfu…

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