Crucible 7, 1 (May 2016)

The latest issue of Crucible, published by the Australian Evangelical Alliance and largely produced by the faculty of the Australian College of Ministries, is now available online here, with the below articles (abstracts included, where available). This one is billed as a ‘Malyon College Special Edition’.

The Cauldron: peer reviewed articles

Donald L. Morcom

Was Peter Capable of Writing the Greek of 2 Peter? An Exploration

Among the many arguments advanced against the notion that the Apostle Peter was the author of the New Testament letters bearing his name, it is alleged that as an uneducated Galilean fisherman Peter was not capable of writing the kind of Greek found in these letters. This paper challenges that particular allegation. Utilising evidence from elsewhere in the New Testament, exploring the history of investigation into the language/s spoken by Jesus and his disciples, and harnessing some recent advances in our understanding of the extent of the Hellenisation of Peter’s Galilee, this paper explores the plausibility of Peter possessing the necessary Greek linguistic skills to be the genuine author of 2 Peter.

Peter Sondergeld

Peter: A Biblical Basis for Self-Worth

Self-esteem has been, and continues to be, a critical concern for those in the helping professions, both in an academic context and also in a popular cultural context. There have been many proponents, and many critics of the concept of self-esteem and its remedy, self-love, for many years. The continued existence of the concepts of self-esteem and self-love, in both academic and popular thought, suggests that these concepts accurately describe a particular aspect of the human experience – that a common existential struggle for humanity is a low sense of personal value.

Within Christian thought and practice there are many different approaches to self-esteem, self-love and personal value. These approaches range from those who see no value in the self-esteem construct, and are opposed to any kind of self-love, to those who think self-esteem and self-love are essential and have made them central to an understanding of the core human condition. This article will challenge the adoption of the self-esteem construct as an explanation of the core human condition, and will argue that human value will not be derived from self-love, but from a return to our original created anthropology as worshippers and imagers of God.

We will begin with a short discussion of the problem of personal value and its remedy, and then move on to an analysis of humanity’s original biblical anthropology (that humans were created in the image of God and are unceasing worshippers), and the effect that the corruption of this anthropology (idolatry of the heart) has had on personal value. We will conclude with a further discussion of self-love as a remedy for low personal value and see that it is not virtuous; in reality it is idolatry of the heart, leading to further idolatry, as created things are enlisted to shore up a lack of personal worth. The only remedy for the restoration of personal value is for humanity to return to imaging and worshipping God.

Anne Klose

Church and Mission in Redemption: Exploring Church and Mission through the Communal and Missional Priesthood of All Believers

This article proposes that any perceived contest for priority between church and mission is based on a failure to understand both as penultimate phenomena which are only comprehensible in light of God’s redemptive plan. Such redemption as it is revealed across the narrative scope of Scripture is trinitarian and, therefore, communal in nature, and in consonance with this, both church and mission must be viewed in such terms. Whilst this may already be the case within academic circles, a broader more thorough-going shift in paradigm will require richly drawn canonical narratives with the power to strengthen the imaginative and practical grasp of church communities on their being and function. One such narrative is that of communal and missional priesthood expressed through representation of both God to his world and the world to God. 

The Test-tube: ministry resources

John Sweetman

Maintaining Personal Health in Pastoral Ministry

Peter Francis

The Challenge of Contextualisation, Presence and Proclamation in Short-term Cross-cultural Mission

The Filter: book reviews

Centre for Public Christianity (March 2016)

The Centre for Public Christianity has posted an audio interview with John Smith and Collett Smart ‘about where true self-worth might be found’, and an audio interview with screenwriter Paul Aiello and producer Patrick Aiello on their latest movie, Risen, talking about ‘the writing process, casting Jesus, and why the resurrection is still an important story to tell’.

Also posted are some video interviews with Roland Chia ‘about why theology and the humanities generally are relevant to questions of biomedicine and biotechnology; why bioethics is an issue for everyone; why we should resist the commodification of the human body; and how people with very different worldviews can have a productive dialogue about these issues’.

I’m Special?

I contributed this week’s ‘Connecting with Culture’, a weekly email service provided by the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity.

The takeaway pizza box won’t fit in the fridge.

Too many presents. Had to walk twice to my room carrying stuff.

I can’t get the high def working on one of the flatscreen TVs in my yacht.

You might recognise these as examples of the First World Problems meme. Writing in The Independent this week, John Walsh takes it to task for telling people that their problems ‘count for nothing in the hierarchy of what’s serious’. Indeed, some first world problems are far from minor; nor do we have a monopoly on the need to negotiate everyday trivialities. Even so, #firstworldproblems at its best is a valid reminder that the ‘challenges’ we face are often small compared with many others around the globe.

More seriously, perhaps, the meme has become so commonplace that it’s in danger of lacking any serious empathy for global issues. It draws attention to our narcissism in a knowing, ironic way, which allows us to show how self-aware and ‘switched on’ we are, though without doing anything about it.

And if research is to be believed, narcissism is on the rise. A recent, widely-reported New York Times piece profiled Jean M. Twenge, Professor of Psychology at San Diego State University, whose close study of narcissism has led her to give the designation ‘Generation Me’ to young adults in the west. To be fair, not all accept her findings, with the alleged generational differences being particularly contentious. Still, as one commentator notes, ‘even if we’re not more narcissistic now than we’ve been in the past, I’m willing to entertain the notion that our popular culture is more narcissist-friendly’.

In The Big Ego Trip (IVP), writing from a Christian perspective, Glynn Harrison shows how the promotion of self-worth – ‘boosterism’ as he calls it – has gained widespread acceptance in different parts of culture, including the church, and explores whether there’s ‘a biblical and more psychologically secure approach to the big questions of significance and worth’. He makes it clear he is not arguing against the need for an ‘accurate self-concept’, but calling instead for a ‘radical self-compassion’, where questions of self-worth are ‘sorted out in the context of a larger “story” about our identity and purpose’. We’re special because we’re called to be part of something special, with an identity grounded in the grace and forgiveness of God.