Rediscovering the Gospels.

I was doing some reading tonight when I came across this quote from Tom Wright:

I am forced to conclude that there is a substantial swathe of contemporary evangelicalism which actually doesn't know what the gospels themselves are there for, and would rather elevate "Paul" (inverted commas, because it is their reading of Paul, rather than the real thing, that they elevate) and treat Matthew. Mark, Luke and John as mere repositories of Jesus' stories from which certain doctrinal and theological nuggets may be collected.

I think he is dead on with this. It took me back to a conversation we had while we were in the Bahamas for Soularize. His statement at that time was that for a substantial section of evangelicalism "Paul" is where we go for the "Gospel," while the Gospels themselves are simply the stories about Jesus. It was as if the writings of Paul were the real theological substance, while the Gospels were somehow lesser in theological stature. What Wright was inviting us into to was nothing less than a re-discovery of what the Gospels are - beautifully crafted representations of the message of the Kingdom, proclamations of what the "Gospel" of God is and looks like.

Could not agree more.

What would our Christian faith look like if it were shaped as much by the Gospels as it is by the writings of Paul?

Comments

[Derek Rishmawy]

That is why I am really excited about the next couple of books in Wright's Christian Origins and the Question of God series. The next two are "Paul and the Justice of God" which will finally be his big-daddy volume on Paul and "The Gospels and the Story of God" which looks at the Gospels as theologians in their own right. I am actually really excited to see what he does with John since he spent a lot of time on the Synoptics already in "Jesus and the Victory of God."

By the way, I'm reading J.D.G. Dunn's volume "The New Perspective on Paul" and I have to say that I think I might be more easily reconciled to his view on the whole more than Wright's reworking of the entire doctrine of Justification. It seems easier to reconcile with "the old perspective." I'm not sure though still.

[Mike]

If you can get your hands on Dunn's book - Jesus, Paul and the Law. It contains a lecture he gave entitled "The New Perspective on Paul," which was the first groundbreaking exploration of the New Perspective. In it he took the work of E.P. Sanders and applied it to various NT texts. It is a must read.

[Derek Rishmawy]

Yeah, actually this volume is about 500 pages of collected articles of his from different sources which includes that article. It also has an introductory 100 page article in which he summarizes and updates most of the developments in the conversation up until a couple of years ago. Actually, this volume is extremely useful.