The malaise of the 21st century Western church, in an increasingly hostile secular culture, urges us to penetrate its cause and radically re-cast the Christian vision for the 21st century. What is required is nothing short of the recovery of the biblical vision for a kingdom-shaped ecclesia; designed and destined by God to transform entire cultures and disciple nations. Even … [Read more...]
The Pauline Correspondence: Its Mode & Message
Part 3 of 3 In Parts 1 & 2 we discovered that Paul's call and commission, as the pioneer apostle to the Gentiles, was unique and normative for the church universally. We will now explore these implications for the apostolic mode and message. Mode As the pioneer – and thus proto-type – apostle to the Gentiles Paul modelled God's strategy for the expansion of the Gospel … [Read more...]
God’s Purpose
God’s purpose is for time-space history. God has purposed that his ‘will’ be done on earth. Through the biblical motif of the ‘Kingdom of God’ we learn that God's Government is designed to bring human flourishing to all spheres of life, which entails another biblical motif of ‘Creation and New Creation’, promising the renovation of the cosmos—a New Heavens and a New … [Read more...]
What is the Gospel?
Introduction God’s good news—the Gospel—is the best and most important news you will ever hear. It is found permanently recorded in God’s Word—the Bible. The Bible is the final authority regarding God’s news for us—and this is where you should go to check up on what anybody says about God and His relationship to man. There are many ways to summarize the Gospel. One way … [Read more...]
The Society Envisaged by Isaiah 60-62
The prophecy in Isaiah 60-62 utilizes figurative and poetic language, related to Israel’s history as a nation, to envision postexilic life in a restored and magnified Zion. As the ideal theocratic society, it is the place of God’s visible glory in his people: righteousness, justice, prosperity, and unceasing peace and joy, causing the influx of the nations to serve Zion. … [Read more...]
