Bøger i Reading the New Testament: Sec serien

"It is all too easy for the church to conform itself to the norms of a consumer capitalist society, marketing spirituality to an experience-hungry culture, or to allow itself to be co-opted into the belligerence and self-righteousness of one side or the other in the culture wars of our time. It is much harder, and infinitely more beautiful, to live out the way of life that Paul urges the readers of Ephesians to pursue, performing an identity that is grounded not in soil, skin, nostalgia, or utopianism but in the person of Christ, and asserted not in anger and coercion but in gentleness and love. Given the prominence of those two factors within the situation that Paul is addressing in Colossians, it is not surprising that the letter has a double purpose. Negatively, it warns the readers not to submit to teachings that are framed "according to human tradition, according to the elements of the world, and not according to Christ" (2:8)"--

"As a letter directed not to a universal, much less a modern, audience but to a specific church in a specific place with a specific set of problems, 1 Corinthians requires the interpreter to take careful consideration of the letter's ancient milieu and the circumstances that precipitated its composition. This commentary aims to offer a culturally informed interpretation of the letter in light of a hypothetical reconstruction of the problems that lay behind it. In offering such an interpretation, the commentary offers not a word-by-word analysis but broad exposition of the text focused on the structure of Paul's argument in each of the letter's main units. Preliminary to interpretation, it is necessary to consider certain background issues relating to the historical context in which the letter was written, the identity of the audience and author, and the unique features of the letter as a literary composition"--

"Reading John and 1, 2, 3 John seeks to help readers-whether students or scholars, ministers or laypeople-gain a greater understanding of and appreciation for biblical texts in their original contexts. To this good end, commentaries in this series attend not only to lexical, historical, and critical concerns but are also attuned to and interested in, as the subtitle of each volume signals, literary matters and theological meaning"--

"Mark constitutes a well-crafted, astute theological narrative of "the good news/gospel of God" and God's just and gracious rule breaking out anew on earth through God's Messiah (Christ) and Son, Jesus of Nazareth (Mark 1:1, 9, 14-15). If we have "eyes to see and ears to hear" (4:9; 8:18) Mark's incisive message of Christ in its own images and idioms, if we mark this Gospel's words carefully and considerately, we discover a remarkable story worth engaging afresh"--