Welcome to my digest of Christian comment.
For Biblical commentary, use the Bible Commentary menu above, and for topical comments, use the categories list on the right.
Jonathan
Reading While Black – 5
In chapter 5, Esau McCaulley discusses the issue of black identity.
For some people, he says, Black Christianity is a false notion, foisted upon black people by their oppressors.
History says otherwise. In the days of the early church, there were three centres of Christianity – Rome, Antioch and Alexandria. It cannot be true, then, that Christianity first came to Africans via slavery. Christianity belongs to Africans as much as it belongs to Europeans. Ethiopia was evangelised in the 4th century, and Nubia (in what we now call the Sudan) by the 6th century.…
Reading While Black – 4
Chapter four is subtitled: ‘The Bible and the Pursuit of Justice.’
The burden of this chapter
‘is to outline the ways in which the Gospel of Luke contains a vision for the just society transformed by the advent of God that speaks to the hearts of Black Christians.’
Luke was a Gentile Christian. As such, his very place in the Christian community would have been a matter of some controversy at first.
Luke’s Gospel reflects the resolution of this early controversy by heralding the fulfilment of God’s age-old plan to create an international, multi-ethnic people for his own glory.…
Reading While Black – 3
In chapter three, Esau McCaulley discusses ‘the New Testament and the Political Witness of the Church’.
The white Christian consensus in America, writes McCaulley, has reduced its political theology to two things: prayer (as per 1 Timothy 2:1-4) and law and order (as per Romans 13:1-7). Not, of course, that that there is anything wrong with these two things! But to limit political theology in this was is to misread those very texts, and also to ignore the wider witness of the New Testament.…
Reading While Black – 2
Chapter 2 of Esau McCaulley’s book Reading While Black discusses ‘The New Testament and a Theology of Policing.’
McCauley selects two texts for consideration. The first has implications for the state, and the second for the individual law enforcer.
Romans 13:1-7
13:1 Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except by God’s appointment, and the authorities that exist have been instituted by God. 13:2 So the person who resists such authority resists the ordinance of God, and those who resist will incur judgment 13:3 (for rulers cause no fear for good conduct but for bad).…
Reading While Black – 1
Having read Ben Lindsay’s book We Need to Talk About Race, I have now turned to Esau D. McCaulley’s Reading While Black (IVP, 2020).
I am finding it a more satisfying read.
McCaulley is an American biblical scholar and Assistant Professor of New Testament at Wheaton College, Illinois.
Subtitled, ‘African American Biblical Interpretation as an Exercise in Hope’, this book advocates an approach to biblical interpretation that is faithful to the inspired Scripture but that also reflects the experiences, needs and perspective of black readers.…
Genesis 9:20-25 – the ‘Curse of Ham’
Genesis 9:20 Noah, a man of the soil, began to plant a vineyard. 9:21 When he drank some of the wine, he got drunk and uncovered himself inside his tent. 9:22 Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father’s nakedness and told his two brothers who were outside. 9:23 Shem and Japheth took the garment and placed it on their shoulders. Then they walked in backwards and covered up their father’s nakedness. Their faces were turned the other way so they did not see their father’s nakedness.…
New life, new lifestyle – sermon notes
Text: 1 Corinthians 6:1-11
You should be ashamed of yourselves!
- Down the Lechaion Way – neighbours locked in a boundary dispute
- Alexandra’s jewelry business – unpaid invoice
- In the family of Fabius – a feud over inheritance
And these are all Christians suing one another! What are the godly doing, asking the ungodly to resolve their differences?
‘Why not rather be wronged?’ (v7)!
Root problem: Christians are using worldly means to settle their petty disputes.
Norwich in 2021 is not the same as Corinth in AD50. …
Slavery and the early church
Mark Brumley, a Roman Catholic author, asks: Did the early Church endorse slavery?
He answers:
Certainly, the early Christians more or less tolerated the slavery of their day, as seen from the New Testament itself and the fact that after Christianity became the religion of the Roman Empire, slavery was not immediately outlawed. Even so, this doesn’t mean Christianity was compatible with Roman slavery or that the early Church did not contribute to its demise.
…George Whitefield: slaveholder and evangelist
George Whitefield (1714 – 1700) was an outstanding evangelist. When, in 1740, he first traveled to North America he was appalled by the way slaves were treated:
‘Your dogs are caressed and fondled at your tables; but your slaves who are frequently styled dogs or beasts, have not an equal privilege. They are scarce permitted to pick up the crumbs which fall from their masters’ tables.… Although I pray God the slaves may never be permitted to get the upper hand, yet should such a thing be permitted by Providence, all good men must acknowledge the judgment would be just.’
…Why did so many Christians in the South support slavery?
It seems incredible to most of us today that mature and thoughtful Christians leaders in the American South (including J.H. Thornwell and R.L Dabney) persisted in defending the institution of slavery.
It should not be supposed, however, that they did so from simple-minded malice. Anyone who thinks about the matter would do well to reflect on the ways in which they attempted to justify the practice.
An article in Christianity Today summarises the key reasons given by church leaders in the South:
Biblical Reasons
• Abraham, the “father of faith,” and all the patriarchs held slaves without God’s disapproval (Gen.…