via Evangelical Alliance

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The books feature a unique and easy to read translation, followed by the exegesis and commentary.  The most amazing thing is, despite writing some of the densest tomes in recently theology, Wright is quite capable of writing on the popular level.  The commentaries work quite well as an extended introduction, a basic academic study, or even devotional reading.

Speaking of devotional reading, I’ll be working through Lent for Everyone. Wright’s commentaries have been reworked to line up with the lectionary calendar for the year.

Lent for Everyone, as well as the other books in the For Everyone series are available in paperback and kindle.

The post Wednesday Spotlight: Tom Wright’s “For Everyone” appeared first on Chris Morton.

“The point of the resurrection…is that the present bodily life is not valueless just because it will die…What you do with your body in the present matters because God has a great future in store for it…What you do in the present—by painting, preaching, singing, sewing, praying, teaching, building hospitals, digging wells, campaigning for justice, writing poems, caring for the needy, loving your neighbor as yourself—will last into God’s future. These activities are not simply ways of making the present life a little less beastly, a little more bearable, until the day when we leave it behind altogether (as the hymn so mistakenly puts it…). They are part of what we may call building for God’s kingdom.”

— N.T. Wright (Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church)

The post The Point of Resurrection appeared first on Chris Morton.

The basic thesis of the book is this: The Bible promises a literal physical resurrection, like Jesus’s.  This has serious implications for how we view life, death and the mission of the Church.

The book reexamines basic principles taught by evangelicalism, and western Christianity in general.  Unlike greek dualism, which separates the physical from the spiritual, and condemns all things physical, he shows how the Bible teaches that creation is good and our bodies are good.  Jesus resurrection is not an odd one time occurence, it is the first act of new creation.  God plans to give us all resurrected bodies, and unleash the same power on the universe itself.

Having dismantled greek infused ideas about a disembodied heaven and fundamentalist teachings about escaping the world before it all burns away, Wright gets to his main point: how does impending resurrection and new creation shape the mission of the Church? 

If God loves his creation, and plans to affirm that in resurrected bodies and a new heaven and new earth, then the mission of the Church is to anticipate God’s new creation. 

Chew on that for now, and I’ll share some quotes at another time.

For my traditional conservative friends, don’t worry: I have every intention on reading John Piper’s rebuttal.

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