Paul’s teaching on the role of wives and slaves in the Christian household are among the most (tragically!) misinterpreted passages in scripture. In this episode we examine the tension between ideals and reality, between what is ultimately true and how close (or not) we can approximate it at any particular moment in time. As...
Tag: introduction to church history
Understanding the Bible 41: What Must I Do to Be Saved? Or Why We Are All Semi-Pelagianists at Heart
Every philosophical and religious tradition has a view on the requirements of membership – what it takes to belong to the community of “salvation.” In early Judaism, for example, membership within “true Israel” belonged to those who were at least: descended from Abraham, circumcised (men), obedient to the food laws and observant of the Sabbath. For...
Understanding the Bible 40: The Early Church’s Struggle for Unity
What happens when you take people from different geographical regions, religious traditions, languages and cultures and tell them they are now “one in Christ” – the family of faith…? As anyone who has ever sat in a church committee meeting will tell you, the answer is: arguments! Since there has been church, there has been...