In the Beginning God: Creation, Culture, and the Spiritual Life
Marva J. Dawn
Paperback: 124 pages
Publisher: IVP Books
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0830837078
ISBN-13: 978-0830837076
Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.4 x 0.4 inches
Buy Here: Amazon.com
Thanks to Adrianna Wright and IVP Press for sending me a copy to review!

Marva J. Dawn, whether you tend to agree with her or not, is always a refreshing read for me. She never fails to point the reader back to worship. Her newest book, In the Beginning, God is no different.
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Last night, I led a small group on (essentially) the last 6 chapters of Job. Inevitably, the discussion took a hard turn toward discussing evil and suffering.

Job is quite a paradoxical book. It is a simple book, with a simple narrative. It certainly is easy to read, and one can follow the story-line without much trouble. At the same time, there is hardly a book that is harder to comprehend than Job. The opening scene, where it is God who brings Job to Satan’s attention, knowing what would happens, is particularly hard for us to grasp, as is God’s answer to Job in chapters 38 through 41. If the narrative is simple, the details are extremely difficult.

So what do we do with the book of Job? I can’t offer answers that will satisfy everyone, but I do want to offer a few things for consideration when reading Job.
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The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate
John H. Walton
Paperback: 192 pages
Publisher: IVP Academic
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0830837043
ISBN-13: 978-0830837045
Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 0.7 inches
Buy Here: Amazon.com

Thanks to Adrianna Wright and IVP Press for sending me a copy to review!

Introduction

It’s funny how polar opposites can be entangled. Both the beginning and end of history are sources of debate and sensationalism. Both have as many theories, and conspiracies, as people who are willing to discuss them. When was the universe and the earth created? How was it created? Is evolution and theism compatible? What role does creationism or Intelligent Design have in teaching science? If you’ve had a pulse in the last century, you’ve certainly heard, or probably even discussed, any number of these questions and more. Just within the Christian camp, there are legions of views, it quickly becomes overwhelming hearing them all. The debate just seems to be the same points rehashed.

Into this haze comes John H. Walton’s new book, The Lost World of Genesis One. Walton presents a theological and contextual reading of Genesis 1 presented through 18 propositions (one per chapter) that explains Walton’s suggested reading of the text, how it effects our theology, and ultimately what it’s implications for modern science and school curriculum. The books is a fairly easy read, especially considering its content which drifts in and out of theology, metaphysics, science, and others. Just hearing that list may scare some readers from picking up this book, but Walton does a fine job of explaining unfamiliar terminology and ideas. Also, though chapters and books on this subject tend to be very convoluted, the chapters in this book are pretty short—long enough to present the proposition in full, but short enough that the reader does not lose focus. The Lost World stands firmly in the tradition that I’ve noticed lately of being both scholarly/academic and accessible at the same time. I hope to see this trend continue.
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Whenever anyone asks me how old I think the earth is, I usually go through a huge spiel on believing the earth is younger than most Old Earthers think, and older than most Young Earthers think. I then go into something about the literary features of Genesis 1, the beauty of the frame-work view, followed by why that doesn’t necessitate that God couldn’t create the universe just like it’s written even though it’s literary. Then I go into how it’s weird that the options are either thousands of years or 7 days, and how I think Augustine might have been on to something with an instantaneous creation. Then I usually just shrug my shoulders and say “I don’t know.”

You would think that eventually I’d just skip to the last part.

In his book, “The Lost World of Genesis One,” scholar John Walton keys in on the age of the earth debate:

“If the seven days refer to the seven days of cosmic temple inauguration, days that concern origins of functions not material, then the seven days of Genesis 1 as a whole have nothing to contribute to the discussion of the age of the earth… The point is not that the biblical text therefore supports an old earth, but simply that there is no biblical position on the age of the earth. If it were to turn out that the earth is young, so be it.”

Over a month ago, I wrote a post answering the question “Why was Jesus Baptized?” where I argued that no answer has been truly satisfying, there were two paradigms that are very helpful to me. The first paradigm, argued for in the first post, was the “tri-perspectival” paradigm where I said that the entire baptism event (baptism, Spirit descending, and the voice of God) should be held as a unity integrating ideas such as identification, anointing, and pronouncement. Please see the first post for an actual treatment of this view. In this post, I’m going to look at the Biblical-Theological view. I also want to restate that I don’t think this is an either/or issue, but that both paradigms shed led on the baptism event. Nor do I think these are the only valid paradigms. Jesus’ baptism can be found in Matthew 3:13-17, Mark 1:9-11, and Luke 3:21-22.
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I’ve been thinking recently on Jesus’ baptism. If John’s baptism was one that represented repentance and cleansing, why would the sinless Jesus have to receive such a baptism? I have never been fully satisfied with any one answer, and I don’t think we ever will be. With that in mind, I’m going to try and look at his baptism through two different paradigms. By doing this, I’m not saying the issue is either/or… but both/and. In other words, we shouldn’t use one paradigm to the exclusion of the other, but that both can be utilized in understanding what is going on in Jesus’ baptism. Also, by giving two paradigms, I’m not saying that these are the only two ways of looking at the issue- there maybe be several, maybe even many, others- but I am just focusing on the two that have come to my mind recently in thinking through the issue. Jesus’ baptism can be found in Matthew 3:13-17, Mark 1:9-11, and Luke 3:21-22.
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Immanuel in our Place: Seeing Christ in Israel’s Worship
Tremper Longman III
Paperback: 228 pages
Publisher: P & R Publishing (August 2001)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0875526519
ISBN-13: 978-0875526515
Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.4 x 0.6 inches
amazon.com

After Jesus had risen from the dead, he met two of his disciples as they were walking on the Emmaus Road. He told them that all of the Scriptures, the Old Testament, pointed to Him as their fulfillment. Since then, Christians have debated exactly to what extent the Old Testament points to Jesus- is it every word? Every part? Certain parts? And in what way? In the book, “Immanuel in our Place: Seeing Christ in Israel’s Worship,” Tremper Longman III seeks to give us an answer to that question– at least in regards to the Israelites’ practices of worship.

The book is part of the “The Gospel According to the Old Testament” series, and is an excellent addition, both to the series and to the Christian’s library. Longman’s writing is theologically penetrating, yet very clear and accessible, and often doxological. He handles the text with great insight, all while keeping a broad audience in view. The book is broken into four units:
Part One: Sacred Space
Part Two: Sacred Acts
Part Three: Sacred People
Part Four: Sacred Time
This review will look at the book according to these units, and not necessarily by chapter.
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David fell under great conviction. How was it that he could live in such a great house while God was confined to living in a tent? It was an honorable conviction- with a deep respect for God’s honor. Surely, God would be pleased with such an honorable motive. Imagine David’s surprise, then, when God announced that it would not be David that would build Israel’s temple, but his son Solomon.
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Today I was taking a look of the idea of “blessing” in the book of Genesis and found some interesting facts- like the fact that the term is used in Genesis 1 – 11 as an action of God five times, and then used five more times in Genesis 12:1-3. Certainly an interesting literary device to connect the primordial narrative with that of the narrative of the Abrahamic covenant which basically is the rest of the book (as it gets repeated to Isaac and Jacob).

I also stumbled across an interesting discussion in Walter Brueggemann’s INT commentary, in his section on “Blessing Theology.” Brueggemann argues that in God’s blessing of creation, where he proclaims it “Good” and “Very good,” that he is not giving it a moral/ethical value, but an aesthetic value. He says that the word טונ should actually be translated “beautiful” instead of “good.” This is the first I’ve heard anyone mention this that I can remember- unless I just passed over it in skimming a page. Jenni-Westermann¹ lists this within its semantic range, as does TWOT ², though I am unfamiliar with this use in the Old Testament (by this I mean, I don’t know enough to know when this is the word behind my translation). What do you guys think? Anyone else put this forward as their interpretation of the creation account?

At Sojourn Community Church, we are doing a year-long preaching series on the Old Testament. Every Sunday we will be looking at snapshots throughout the Old Testament narrative, as we see how it builds to a crescendo in the coming of the Messiah. Already, we have looked at the creation accounts of Genesis 1 and 2, followed by a look at the fall in Genesis 3. In order to facilitate reading through the Old Testament, Sojourn has produced a reading guide for the entire year of 2009. It’s a great way to go through a portion of the Bible that is often overlooked or ignored today.
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