The Now and Not Yet Pilot: Mike Bird on Romans / Analytic Theology by Th...

“How Did Jesus Become God?” - Bart Ehrman and Michael Bird in Dialogue + Q&A 2016

The real stuff starts at minute 31.

Enclave Theology

Via Mike Bird:

By ‘enclave’ theology, I mean a theology based narrowly in a single tradition that seeks not to learn from other traditions and to enrich them, but instead to topple and defeat them, or at least to withstand them. Enclave theology is polemical theology even when it assumes an irenic facade. Its limited agenda makes it difficult for it to take other traditions seriously and deal with them fairly. Whether openly or secretly, it is not really interested in dialogue but in rectitude and hegemony…Because of its temptation to misrepresent or devalue traditions with which it disagrees, such theology is finally divisive and futile … Enclave theology makes itself look good, at least in its own eyes, by making others look bad. George Hunsinger (“The Eucharist and Ecumenism”, p. 1)

Sadly, I encounter these type of people way too often.

Is your tablet/iPad replacing your Bible in the Pulpit and at church.

The people at The Gospel Coalition (don't get me wrong, there are some nice folks there, but sometime they come up with the most amusing things!) are bringing this issue to the forefront.

How many of you have fallen into the "sin" of not taking your bible to the pulpit, but your tablet/iPad? Matthew Barret, one of the folks over that TGC, has blogged how this may be a detriment to our churches today.

Michael Bird, from Ridley College, has answered with a bit of sarcasm, but facing the fact that the introduction of any theology into the church, causes bad taste and rejection.

From a personal view, is like those churches that don't allow any musical instruments at their service, yet preach with iPads, or have the latest types of sitting at church.

Enjoy the readings.

Top scholars including N.T. Wright headed to Australia in July

From Eternity Newspaper

NEWS | Sophie Timothy

Thursday 4 April 2013

Writer and popular New Testament theologian N.T. Wright will be among hundreds of scholars visiting Perth in July for the largest gathering of New Testament specialists ever to be held in the southern hemisphere.

It will be the first time the Society for New Testament Studies has met in Australasia, and a number of local scholars have been selected to present papers alongside their international counterparts.  Among them are Ridley Melbourne’s Principal Brian Rosner (formerly of Moore College, Sydney) and Theology Lecturer Mike Bird (previously of Queensland Theological College).

Mike is currently working on a New Testament Introduction co-authored with N.T. Wright and he’s organised for N.T. Wright to spend a week in Melbourne before heading to Perth.

N.T. Wright will speak at three public conferences in Melbourne during the week of July 16-20, the first of which will be held at Ridley, where he will speak on “Paul, Jesus, and the Mission of God’s People”, while the second conference is based on his new book: “Paul and the faithfulness of God”. He’ll then finish his visit to Melbourne with some filming and a two-day conference for the Uniting Church of Australia on “Wisdom’s Feasts” before leaving for Perth.

N.T. Wright is a Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at the University of St Andrews, Scotland, and was the Bishop of Durham until 2010.  Not afraid to challenge the status quo, N.T. Wright has made ripples in evangelical circles in the last 20 years by questioning the reformed/traditional understanding of the relationship between salvation and the law in the Apostle Paul’s writings. This so-called “New Perspective” aims to take into account a more positive view of Jewish beliefs at the time of Christ. The traditional view is seen as oversimplifying their relationship to God, as based on keeping the law. The most outspoken critics of the New Perspective include John Piper and D.A. Carson. It is a topic which will no doubt be canvassed during Tom’s time in Melbourne.