Slides on Introducing the Theology of Paul
I have had the fun of teaching a three-hour introduction (with breaks!) to the Theology of Paul for the (Anglican) Diocese of Leicester’s lay training programme on 12 March 2023. Here are the slides, saved in pdf format, for those interested. Thoughts and comments welcome!
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Good stuff, thank you. I find it helps to sharpen up the theology of the ‘in between times’ to consider how we are called to live in the time between when the New Age is declared and accomplished by Christ, and Christ’s second coming ‘in power’. The between-age is like being Robin Hood and company under the reign of bad King John, sworn in allegience to Richard the Lionheart, living true to Richard’s good and gracious reign, and working against the self-serving purposes of John, even when this puts us in serious trouble. In this way we both prove our allegience to the gracious reign of Richard, and hone our commitment to it by having to suffer for it (because otherwise voting for Richard only when he comes in power is another kind of selfishness a la John…). Only being committed to goodness when it works out well for you is just another kind of selfishness, i.e. another kind of badness. People at funerals these days like to fondly think that their loved one has necessarily gone to a better place, without thinking about how it can be better if it’s all just the same people as we have here in this world at present. The call to follow Jesus in the here and now is the call to live by the Spirit (love, joy, peace, patience etc.) in a setting where it won’t necessarily go well for you if you do, but you do it anyway because that is who you are; your citizenship is in heaven where Christ is in power. It’s like waiting your place in the queue because you are a British citizen and that’s what we do, even if we are for the time being in a setting where lots of people are jumping the queue…. That’s why we turn the other cheek: retaliation and revenge are just not things that we do in the Kingdom of God — and we make the point by offering the other cheek as well because even if you repeat this insult we are not going to hit you back.
Thanks David. I love your metaphors!