Patterns in the Stoning of Stephen

Where in the Bible is the GOSPEL

Acts 6:8-7:60 Luke’s account of the death of Stephen is unmistakably patterned after the suffering and glory of Jesus. Stephen, like Jesus, was full of grace and power, working signs and wonders among the people (Acts 6:8). He charged the religious leaders of Jerusalem with killing God’s prophets (Acts 7:52), just as Jesus had done (Luke 11:47). As a result, the Jews were incensed against… Read more »

Adam and the First Garden

Where in the Bible is Resurrection

Recalling Adam and the first garden, with its two trees of death and life in the midst (Gen 2:9), the evangelist poetically places Jesus’ cross in the midst (John 19:18) of his account of the Garden of Gethsemane (John 18:1) and the Garden Tomb (John 19:41). It is upon the cross, then, that John presents Jesus as the new Adam, whose own tree of cursing… Read more »

The Apostolic Interpretation of the Creation of Woman

Where in the Bible is Resurrection

(Genesis 2:18-24) We begin with Paul’s magnificent reading of Moses’ account of the creation of Eve. In his Ephesian letter Paul describes the privilege of the Christian husband to imitate Christ’s own sacrificial love in his relationship to his wife. “Husbands love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her” (Eph 5:25). The apostle derives his doctrine from the… Read more »

The Elijah Theme in the Gospel of Mark

Where in the Bible is the GOSPEL

If we assume the integrity of the longer ending of Mark’s Gospel, Christ’s answer in Mark 9:12-13 to the disciples’ Elijah question occupies a position almost precisely in the center of the book. The centrality of the Elijah question suggests that one purpose of the Gospel of Mark was to respond to the query that arose as a consequence of the scribal teaching (certainly based… Read more »

We have said that our method will be to identify the “third day” passages of the Old Testament and examine them to see if they mark a pattern foreshadowing the “suffering and glory” of the Christ.  But we should say a word about what we are likely to see.  The hermeneutic of the Lord and his apostles was largely figural in character, requiring a poetics… Read more »