Blogs

I had initially planned to continue the topic of areas of NT study which need investigation, but some urgent publishing work has come up which has taken precedence. I thought it would be informative to let you know what that was.

A reader recently asked what areas of study I felt needed attention in the academy presently. This post and the next are going to address that topic.

One thing that a professor must always do is research. You have to stay current in your field in order to make a worthy contribution. This blog will occasionally delve into various aspects of my research that I think might be of interest to bible.org readers.

This is my last post on the courses I teach. Because my interest is in the Gospels, I have had the opportunity to teach three other classes related to these books. I hope to add more to my repertoire in the near future.

NT305 is an elective which deals with Gospel narrative. Simply speaking, it picks up where NT104 left off and addresses the question of how to do exegesis within the Gospels. We discuss issues such as historical and cultural background, how to compare the Gospels to one another properly, and how to understand theology from the narrative.

My apologies for being away for a while. My family has been fighting off various sicknesses, so my attention has been drawn to other things. Regular posting will resume post haste!

One recent comment asked how to prepare for academic ministry. I am asked this often enough that I thought it would be best to devote an entire post to the question. My response here is pretty general, focusing more on life habits, so if there is more interest in this topic I perhaps will suggest some specifics.

Bible.org has a number of blogs running presently, the newest of which is PrimeTime Jesus. Dr. Darrell Bock has gathered a group of well-known Jesus scholars and organized them to contribute regularly to the blog on any and all matters related to Jesus, including texts, archeology, cultural issues, and the like. He has graciously invited me to contribute as well (although I recognize that I am walking among giants!), so look for some posts over there from me from time to time.

NT104 is another course I teach. This is our course on introduction to exegesis. In it we focus on the method of exegesis, and we walk through the content of Ephesians in the process. We cover many different aspects of the method and then practice that in Ephesians with ample opportunity along the way to deal with important issues and problems in that book.

I teach within the New Testament Studies department at DTS, so as you can imagine most everything I do centers around the NT. We have seven required courses in NT here for students in the Master of Theology program, and I teach five of them.

As I mentioned in my last post, as a professor I have two major professional requirements: I have to know my subject area, and I have to be able to teach that subject to others. My love for the New Testament initially drove me to academic ministry, but as I have taught over the last few years I have grown in my appreciation of the latter professional requirement. The longer I teach, the more I realize what a privilege it is to teach others, especially when I am teaching them about matters of eternal significance.