I’m a committed continuationist, but we continuationists must be serious about the continuing gift of discerning spirits–not everything is what it claims to be. My friend Michael Brown helped me get this article onto Christian Post, Charisma News, and the Stream. I have given one of the links below (pardon the typo on my name 🙂 )
Category Archives: Uncategorized
Importance of Bible background (video)
Although Craig recorded this for his upcoming lectures on Bible background in Brazil, it introduces the subject in ways that can be useful elsewhere too. Since he has not been posting many videos lately, and since this one is just eight minutes long, he is posting this one: Introducing the importance of Bible background
Round Robin
Review of Gordon Fee, Jesus the Lord according to the Apostle Paul
Here is my review of Gordon Fee’s book. I hardly ever review books–don’t have time–but this is a very special exception. Gordon was a mentor from afar, a role model for me. http://pneumareview.com/gordon-fee-jesus-the-lord-according-to-paul-the-apostle-reviewed-by-craig-s-keener/
Degraded paper
Why don’t we always FEEL like we have a new identity in Christ?
Paul repeatedly emphasizes our new identity in Christ (e.g., Romans 6:1-10; 2 Cor 5:17). We don’t always feel that identity, but we need to reckon it so (Rom 6:11), renewing our minds (Rom 12:2). Thoughts and behaviors shape our brains with habits and ingrained responses; because of neuroplasticity, however, brains can be rewired. Thus we may still have old habits and kneejerk responses, but we can retrain ourselves based on our new identity.
Those of you who are old enough might remember the Lion King. Simba remained a royal lion by nature, but he was growing up behaving according to the influences around him. We are new in Christ but sometimes forget and disbelieve our new identity. This is, of course, an incomplete analogy. Our new identity in Christ is based not on our past but on our destiny with Christ. Nevertheless, because we already share in that future with Christ, it is who we are in God’s sight and who we should be in our sight also. Thus in Romans 4, Paul says eleven times that God has “reckoned” righteousness to our account. Using the same Greek word, Paul summons us in 6:11 to “reckon” it to our own account.
Many Pauline scholars speak of this as a tension between the indicative and the imperative: “Be what you are.” Embrace your new identity in and with Christ, and begin to live accordingly. Like Simba, you are more than you are inclined to imagine that you are.
In Christ, we can live a new life empowered by God’s own Spirit at work within us, transforming us. In the language of Jonathan Edwards, God’s Spirit can suffuse our minds. If I saturate tissue paper with water, it may still be tissue paper, but its form changes. As we are saturated with God’s presence in Christ by the Spirit, we are transformed by the renewing of our minds to embrace the new identity we have because of Christ.
Beefing up security at the seminary
Some writing tips?
Sometimes people ask me for writing tips so I tried to offer a few here:
NIVAC Revelation
Zondervan has informed me that my NIV Application Commentary (eBook edition) is on sale at this moment for $4.99: http://bit.ly/nivacebooks This sale ends November 12.
Nabeel Qureshi’s Passing and Hope
I have been praying hard for my friend Nabeel Qureshi ever since I learned of his stage 4 stomach cancer. Nabeel was so humble and a persistent and honest seeker after truth. Nabeel was also in the prime of life and health, and unlike some of us who are older, I thought, he should have decades of fruitful ministry ahead of him. I saw the cancer as an attack on his ministry that was so strategic. The survival rate for stage 4 stomach cancer is one out of 25 (4 percent) after five years, and most do not survive the first year; but those statistics are descriptive rather than prescriptive and need not limit our prayers.
Today I learned that Nabeel passed away at age 34, after over a year with the cancer.
The news is heartbreaking to all of us who loved and respected him, and sometimes things don’t make sense from our mortal perspectives.
Nevertheless, for myself and for others who are mourning, there are some things we can say for sure:
- Nabeel touched more people in his fairly short life than most of us get to touch in a long one. God used him greatly, both to testify about the truth of Christ and to teach us Christians a much deeper love for Muslims.
- Nabeel’s passing is NOT due to any failure of faith or lack of prayer. Vast numbers of people prayed faithfully for him; in my own case, in the past months his healing has been my most consistent prayer. Some were fasting a day each week. Some of those who prayed for him in person have seen equally incurable cases cured through prayer and experienced visible miracles—just not this time (in the hoped-for way).
- Nabeel himself kept his lively trust in God to the end, even if, at the end, it became clear that this would not mean healing. His faithfulness in the face of death is itself a testimony for all of us who, one way or another, will also face death if the Lord tarries. Faith is not just faith that God will say Yes; faith is trusting God’s plan even when He says No.
- All of us as believers in Jesus share the same ultimate hope. We will be reunited with Nabeel, and others, at the resurrection.
- Each of us has our place in God’s plan, and ultimately the gates of death will not prevail against the church (Matt 16:18). That is, when God allows any of us to be taken, it does not stop God’s work. It just means we get to rest from ours (Rev 14:13).
- The prayers will not be wasted. God sees our hearts and will still achieve his purposes.
Although this is incidental to the point, Nabeel had shared times when someone prayed for him and he had a special experience with the Spirit or even a temporary relief from the suffering. That is, God was hearing the prayers all along. Even though God has said No in this case, there is a bigger Yes in the long run. Nabeel’s labor has ended, but may the legacy of his work be multiplied a million times over in this generation.