Ben Witherington engages in a really interesting discussion on Jesus the Seer and the Progress of Prophecy.

There are few things that all scholars agree on when it comes to the historical Jesus. One of those however is that Jesus used two key phrases in his public discourse– Son of Man and Kingdom of God What is seldom asked about this usage is– is there an OT text where we find both these phrases or essential concepts together? The Answer surprisingly is— Yes.

Scot McKnight reposts his entire and important series on Keys of the Kingdom.

We begin today a series on the relationship of the kingdom of God to the Church and I do so for several reasons:First, I have long wanted to sort out the evidence in the Gospels and Epistles again. I did some very serious work on kingdom in the 80s and 90s but have felt a need to return to that same evidence with new questions.

Best book on kingdom: See GR Beasley-Murray, Jesus and the Kingdom of God .
Second, many today have chosen to prefer “kingdom” over “church” in a way that is not unlike this idea: as I like Jesus instead of the Church, so I like kingdom instead of Church. This concerns me, and it concerns me deeply. It plays off the distinction between kingdom and church in a way that is out of line with what the New Testament says.

Third, in the history of the Church, many have either equated or come close to equating kingdom with the Church. E.g., Augustine, many Roman Catholics (and I assume Eastern Orthodox), and in some ways in the Reformed traditions. Today’s rather cavalier playing off of these two concepts, then, needs to be more respectful of these Church traditions, even if it disagrees with them. (It bothers me when folks dismiss this view without really even knowing about the history.)

Fourth, Dispensationalism has at times (what it is now is no longer what it was) made a radical distinction between kingdom and Church, not unlike our “second” point, but with a different set of factors: kingdom being more related to Israel and God’s governance in earthly terms and Church being a spiritual organism. The second group tends to eliminate Israel from “kingdom of God”, sees kingdom as justice and peace and good government in this world, and see the Church in other terms (though I’m not always sure where this group might be on this question).

Fifth, George Ladd’s famous discussion in his NT Theology (chp 8.), the book on which my generation cut its teeth, defines “kingdom” as a dynamic relationship with God and therefore the kingdom “is never to be identified with the church” (109). This is a non sequitur in my judgment, but it is also our QED — what we are looking at in this series.

As an undergraduate, one of the most important papers I wrote was on the image of the Kingdom of God in the Synoptic Gospels. This is clearly related to Witherington’s post above and I would recommend reading them in succession. I have not done so in any careful or critical fashion yet. I intend to do so and would recommend that anyone else also do so for the texts both of these posts mention as even a devotional exercise.

Totally unrelated is another interesting exploration of the link between sci-fi and theology at Exploring Our Matrix. James McGrath concludes:

We need to check from time to time to see what we have: religion, or a dangerous infection. The latter cannot be cured by religion, or science, or knowledge per se, since such approaches can themselves be infected. The only cure is the recognition of the value in other perspectives, in diversity, in the existence of the other, and a refusal to flatten it out through a dogmatic drive for uniformity.

This has re-directed somewhat into a discussion regarding free will.

Finally, Mike Higton at Kai Euthus continues his examination of The God Delusion. This time he focuses on chapter 4 of the book and this is surely worth a read and further discussion.

Dawkins has returned from unfamiliar territory to home ground, and the difference in intellectual quality is astonishing: the assurance and incisiveness of his arguments is of a whole different order of magnitude. It helps, of course, that I agree with nearly everything in the chapter. Dawkins takes on creationists (including the ‘Intelligent Design’ crowd) and knocks them out of the ring: it is a real joy to watch. Dawkins’ summary of the argument, given in advance at the end of ch.3, gives the gist (’A designer God cannot be used to explain organized complexity because any God capable of designing anything would have to be complex enough to demand the same kind of explanation in his own right’); chapter 4 simply fills in the detail. If chapter 4 were simply presented as an attack on creationism, I’d be able to applaud, and leave it at that.

It is always a pleasure for me to see such fantastic thinking posted in the sphere of public intellectualism. I would wish upon the academy that this would be a continuing trend for scholars to engage the public.

Enjoy!