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Whereas discussion of Israel’s role as God’s servant is one of several key themes in Isaiah 40-48, a new pattern emerges with chapter 49. There Servant Israel himself is represented as speaking for the first (...)

Krister Stendahl, a teacher and mentor, worked to “undo” the introspective Lutheran-Augustinian reading of Paul and to read the letters of Paul in their historical context of the first century — Stendahl put Paul back (...)

This passage — and much of Romans for that matter — reveals an ethnic conflict within the Christian community in Rome (cf. Romans 14:1-15:6). How should non-Jewish believers (i.e., the ethnoi, in Greek) relate to (...)

We often confuse unity with uniformity, because it is much easier to gather with people who are like ourselves than it is to reach across the divisions which mark our culture. Thus, few of our (...)

As was the case with Romans 13 last week, so also this week’s text from Romans 15 draws us into the double- or even triple-exposure of time that happens as the old year hands off (...)

This week is the first Sunday of Advent, the first Sunday of the new year in the church calendar. The season of Advent is a season of waiting; as a time of waiting it is (...)

This “servant song” (with 42:1-7; 49:1-6; 50:4-9) has been the subject of much scholarly debate.1 The suffering servant has been linked to Jesus since NT times, though direct references are uncommon (e.g., Matthew 8:17; Acts (...)

We often talk of hope as wishful thinking: “I hope it won’t rain”; “I hope I win the lottery”; “I hope my team wins the Super Bowl” but Paul’s concept of hope in Romans is (...)

Romans 1-3 indicates that God shows no partiality to humans. All have sinned, but God’s gift of righteousness is extended to all — both Jews and Gentiles — in Jesus Christ. Paul uses Abraham’s story (...)

It’s common to say we’re dead to sin in terms of our spiritual self, or that “when God looks at me, God sees Christ and not my sinful human self.”1 In reality we’re still sinners; (...)