The editor of this book, Dr. Riku P. Tuppurainen, Dean of Graduate Studies of Summit Pacific College in Abbotsford, BC (xii), has skillfully assembled a festschrift of “Essays in Honor of Professor Roger Stronstad” (T.p.) for Roger’s 75^th Birthday. These essays are divided into four major sections: PART I—Roger Stronstad as Biblical Scholar, Pentecostal Theologian, and Educator (vii); II—Reading St. Luke’s Text: Hermeneutical Considerations; III—Reading St. Luke’s Theology: Pneumatological Ambiances; and, IV—Reading St. Luke’s Pneumatology with Other Texts. All 21 scholarly contributors of the book’s 22 chapters hold doctorates and because of their contacts over the years with the honoree knew him well enough to make personal references to him. Unfortunately, among the Pentecostal scholars who personally know him, not one of them is a Pentecostal woman academician. The contributors are scholars currently living in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Belgium, or Australia.

The work consists of two bibliographies, one of which is a “Comprehensive Bibliography of Roger Stronstad’s Published Works” by Alford Deeley (xxix-xxxiii). He holds the Roger J. Stronstad Chair of Biblical Theology at Summit Pacific College. The other “Bibliography,” near the end of the book (265-290), precedes the Indexes. Besides Roger Stronstad, who has the most bibliographic entries in the festschrift, are the contributors Amos Yong, Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen, Robert P. Menzies, Craig S. Keener, Martin William Mittelstadt, and Rikki E. Watts, each with a comparatively large number of bibliographic sources.

The primary foci of the book are both biblical and pneumatological, reflected by the Old Testament (including the Septuagint) and by the New Testament. In addition, Old Testament apocryphal and Pseudepigraphic literature, other ancient Jewish writings, early Christian writings, and other ancient literature appear. Tongues speaking, pre- and post-Stronstad eras, socio-rhetorical criticism, postmodernism, ecclesiology, Charismatic ministries, missional pneumatology and prophetic learning are discussed. Although Lukan, Matthean, Markan, and Johannine theologies are presented, Pauline theology is limited to one specific and comparative essay: “What Does It Mean—According to the Book of Acts and the Letter to the Ephesians—to Be ‘Filled with’/’Full of’ the Holy Spirit?” This contribution is by Dr. Sven Soderlund, Professor Emeritus of Biblical Studies, Regent College, Vancouver, BC. Of all Scriptural passages selected for the basis of an essay to represent Pauline theology, arguably to be “Filled with” or “Full of” the Holy Spirit is one of the most important for Holy Spirit living. But considering the importance to Pentecostals of Pauline theology, particularly of I Corinthians 12-14, references to these chapters unfortunately include only 63 references to this Corinthian segment in the festschrift. Of further import to Pentecostals are spiritual gifts in Romans 12 that is limited to three references. Among the collected essays, Romans 8 has five references, but Romans 8:26-27 has only one reference pertaining to these verses.

Evident from his sources used, Dr. Craig S. Keener is to be commended for his depth of research evident in his essay, “Prayer for the Spirit in Luke 11:1-13.” Keener is F.M. and Ada Professor of New Testament at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, KY (xii). The range of references he uses in the essay displays his depth of research and is but a small reflection of his monumental 4-volume-4600 plus page work, Acts: An Exegetical Commentary (2012). In his essay, Keener goes far beyond Biblical references. These include Deuterocanonical and Pseudepigraphical sources. In addition, Jewish writings comprise the Babylonian, Mishnah and Tosefta Tractates; Targums; Rabbahs; the Qumran Rule of the Community and Josephus. Christian writings encompass Polycarp, Justin Martyr and Chrysostom. Other ancient writings are by Philo, Homer and Seneca.

Essays by Keener, and the other 20 contributors honoring the Rev. Dr. Roger J. Stronstad, will provide for an upcoming generation and future generations of Pentecostal scholars a host of topics and motifs for further research and discussion.

Reviewed by Laurence M. Van Kleek

Publisher’s page: https://wipfandstock.com/reading-st-luke-s-text-and-theology-pentecostal-voices.html

Preview: https://books.google.com/books?id=cRK4DwAAQBAJ

“There is no end to the writing of books” says the Preacher of Ecclesiastes; the same can be said about the writing of books about preaching.

Every year countless books are published on the subject of preaching. The preacher who is in the market for fresh editions will face the exciting task of which ones to choose.

Realizing that her preaching skills need to be sharpened, the pastor wonders whether she should purchase one of the classics that she has never read or take a chance on a recently published edition.

A slim book that she should consider as she contemplates the great responsibility that she has with preaching the Word of God is Cornelius Plantinga Jr.’s Reading for Preaching, subtitled the preacher in conversation with storytellers, biographers, poets, and journalists.

Listed as one of the top ten best books for preachers for 2013 by Preaching Magazine, this a different type of a preaching book. http://www.preaching.com/resources/articles/11707451?page=10

Unlike the typical preaching text, there are no diagrams, outlines, or sermon illustrations. The reader will, however, come away with an insatiable urge to read and read some more.

Since reading is a very important part of the minister’s spiritual and intellectual growth and preachers are always looking for fresh new ideas for sermons and Bible studies, Plantinga advocates general reading to support ministry, believing that “a preacher is extremely likely to benefit from a program of general reading.”

To support his thesis, Plantinga mentions such diverse writers as Calvin, Nabokov, Orwell, Updike, and even Anne Lamott!

He also encourages a weekly visit to the website Arts and Letters Daily to “find out what the best journalists have been saying.”

Realizing the importance of wisdom needed in every area of preaching, Plantinga devotes three chapters on the subject—Whatever You Get, Get Wisdom; Wisdom on the Variousness of Life; and Wisdom on Sin and Grace.

Some notable pieces of advice from these chapters are:

“I recommend a reading program for preachers for lots of reasons, but chiefly because it will tend to make the preacher wise. It will give…substance” (73).

“God is great and God is good, but God is also elusive and unpredictable, and the preacher’s reading can help him see this.” (99).

“The wise preacher sticks with his reading program to become wise not only about the variousness of life, but also about some of the wonders within it. Naiveté is often the child of ignorance, but wonder is often the child of imagination” (102-103).

And from the interview listed above, “Reading wise writers is not recreation, it’s part of the preacher’s preparation to preach.”

This book is a page turner that reads like a novel; it leaves you hungry for more of the story. It will motive you to read and read some more. You will find yourself returning to it for motivation and inspiration.

Plantinga provides a selected reading list, which he states was chosen for “Imaginative Reading for Creative Preaching” Seminars which he hosted.

The list contains about 50 books and magazine articles of varying subjects—mostly secular—which will be appreciated by the reader. Book lovers, however, may be disappointed that the list is not longer.

Plantinga’s contribution is a welcome addition to any preacher’s library.

Reviewed by Larry Russi

Publisher’s page: http://www.eerdmans.com/Products/7077/reading-for-preaching.aspx

Preview: https://books.google.com/books/about/Reading_for_Preaching.html?id=TbC8AAAAQBAJ

Craig S. Keener speaks about his new book, Spirit Hermeneutics: Reading Scripture in Light of Pentecost, with Eerdman’s Publishing.

How do we hear the Spirit’s voice in Scripture? How do we move from exegesis to Spirit-guided application in our lives and communities? In Spirit Hermeneutics biblical scholar Craig Keener addresses these questions, carefully articulating a dynamic, experiential, Spirit-guided reading of Scripture.

Employing a narrative-theological approach to understand the Gospels, Pennington uses lively prose but maintains a rigorous scholarship governed by a great respect for Scripture. Pennington writes in the same historical and theological hues of Martin Hengel and Richard Bauckham, following the latter’s argument for apostolic eye-witness testimony closely. Eminently practical, Pennington writes so that “readers will be invited into the joy of studying the Gospels more deeply and more often” (258) and to lead readers to respond to the Gospel’s message of faith in Jesus Christ.

Pennington reconnects the church and the academy, erasing the disjuncture between Scripture and the people. Preaching and teaching the Gospels is not some addendum tacked onto Pennington’s hermeneutical project: “I take guidance and courage here from the model of Augustine, whose one-thousand-year best-selling textbook on hermeneutics has for its final climactic section, a lengthy discussion of how to preach” (219). For Pennington, the Gospels are Holy Scripture: a meal to be eaten and not an FDA report on the organic components of a foodstuff. Contra form-criticism, we should not be concerned with the Sitz im Leben [German, “sit in life,” life-setting] of a text but its Sitz im unserem Leben, that is, “our life-setting” (156).

The book breaks up into three sections: “Clearing the Ground, Digging Deep, and Laying a Good Foundation” (chaps. 1–8), “Building the House through Wise Reading” (chaps. 9–10), and “Living in the Gospels House” (chaps. 11–1). Pennington first traces the development of the word “gospel,” which initially referred to the kerygma [Greek proclamation], but then the notion of written document was added to it. Pennington roots the gospel message in the Old Testament, especially Isaiah 40–66, which points Gospels study in the right direction. Chaps. 1–2 do a good job of defining the Gospels and forging the relationship between genre and hermeneutics. Gospels are broadly subsumed under the Greek category of bioi [Greek “lives,” biographies] (22). Pennington follows Richard Burridge, who has established the Gospels as Graeco-Roman bioi. Yet bios is a flexible genre and will inevitably share characteristics with “moral philosophy, encomia … and historical works” (23).

Jonathan Pennington

Going beyond Burridge, Pennington opts for “bios plus” (25). He follows Loveday Alexander, who points out that the Old Testament is “much more deeply prone to ‘bio-structuring’ than is classical Greek” (26). Alexander says that it is the biblical tradition that provides the Gospel narratives their “rich ideological intertextuality with the biblical themes of covenant, kingdom, prophecy, and promise—all features hard to parallel in Greek biography” (26). Pennington then borrows from Adela Yarbro Collins, who also critiques Burridge but adds the categories of apocalyptic and eschatology to Gospel bioi (26). Pennington agrees with Collins’ labeling Mark an “eschatological historical monograph” (27). But he emphatically notes that the Gospels are even more. They do not—as Greek bioi—merely tell of a dead figure with emulation in mind but proclaim the resurrected Jesus who is present for the readers. “This is good news, not just a biography!” (31).

J. Ross Wagner, Reading the Sealed Book: Old Greek Isaiah and the Problem of Septuagint Hermeneutics (Baylor University Press/Mohr-Siebeck, 2014), 308 pages, ISBN 9781602589803.

Reading the Sealed Book aims to bring together the academic fields of Translation Studies and Biblical Studies to help us better understand the choices made by the translator(s) of Isaiah from Hebrew to Greek in the Septuagint Bible. The Septuagint is important for two reasons. Not only is it the earliest written translation of the Old Testament into any other language but, if New Testament quotations of the Old Testament are anything to go by, it was also the Bible of common use in the early days of the church. Understanding the translation choices made by the Septuagint translators therefore offers great potential to bring us closer to the approach to Scripture used by the early Church.

J. Ross Wagner’s argument is that we can apply approaches from Translation Studies to help us interpret these choices, including the translator’s reasons for making them. This would seem a promising approach, especially since most current discussion of Bible translation seems to be still entrenched in debates around types of “equivalence” and the well-worn “free” vs. “literal” debate, which have long been abandoned in Translation Studies. The precise approach adopted by Prof Wagner is Descriptive Translation Studies (DTS), which treats the translation as a text in its own right, only turning to the “assumed source text” (Toury 2012, p.99ff) when and if the particular research questions requires it. This means that it is possible within DTS to study translation choices without any reference to the source texts at all, since this could be done by comparing texts which present themselves as different translations of the same source text.

This is relevant for Wagner’s book not just because he claims to be using DTS in his study but because it suggests a shift in focus from the traditional arguments about accuracy towards understanding how the text was shaped by its community. This is where terms like “acceptability” (Wagner 2013, pp.227–234)[1] come into play, underlining that every translation is created for a person or group of people whose expectations will necessarily be taken into account by the translator. The Septuagint is no exception to this principle.

Wagner’s book follows a very simple structure, introducing the problem and historical background in the first chapter, before providing a clear exposition of the theories involved in the second. The third and fourth chapters are by far the longest and contain a close examination of the Septuagint version of Isaiah 1. Here, readers will find an exhaustive analysis of the translation choices made in this chapter and their possible rationales and effects. Unfortunately, this analysis bears much more resemblance to traditional source/target text comparisons than to what most researchers in Translation Studies would understand as DTS. It is perhaps no accident that it is in those places where the author does lean more towards what would traditionally be thought of as DTS (eg. pp. 216-217, 224-225) that the analysis provides some of the most thought-provoking details on how the translation would have been received by its first readers.

Richard Briggs offers a brief and accessible introduction to the Christian hermeneutical task of reading the Bible theologically. His experience as a teacher is evident throughout the work (he serves as Lecturer in Old Testament at Cranmer Hall, St. John’s College, Durham University, and he formerly taught New Testament). His concern is to demonstrate how Christians can “read the Bible wisely” and how they can “take scripture seriously” (p. 1). These concerns, according to Briggs, are deeper and broader than looking for the “right” interpretation of the Bible.

Briggs addresses his concern in three parts. Part One attends to the hermeneutical importance of context (historical, literary, and theological). Chapter 1 is a study of Luke 24 that serves to introduce the basic idea of biblical interpretation. Chapter 2 uses Luke 18 to show the importance of historical context. Luke 9:51 is the focus of Chapter 3, in which Briggs describes Scripture as a literary work. Utilizing a balanced and nuanced argument, Chapter 4 suggests eight reasons for reading the Old Testament as Christian Scripture. Then, as a way of demonstrating how to read the Old Testament, Chapter 5 provides an interpretation of the book of Isaiah.

These five chapters are short on theory and long on practice. The greatest strength of Part One lies in its use of Biblical examples to illustrate the hermeneutical task. However, many important hermeneutical concerns are omitted from the discussion because the bulk of the chapters consists of the interpretation of only a few biblical texts. Briggs is an engaging writer who expresses himself clearly, but he does not attempt to be comprehensive in his description of the hermeneutical process.

Part Two consists of three chapters that present Briggs’s view of Scripture. Chapter 6 examines 2 Tim. 3:16 and 2 Pet. 1:20-21 as a means of expounding on the inspiration of Scripture. For Briggs, the Bible is “filled with the spirit, or breath, of God” (p. 77), but it is also a book that comes to us through the human process of writing, transmission, and translation.

Editor Introduction: Postmodernism, The Church, and The Future  

Postmodernism, The Church, and The Future
A Pneuma Review discussion about how the church should respond to postmodernism

Suggestions for Further Reading

Ed Stetzer, “Writing on the Wall: The Future of the Church and Its Mission” Enrichment (Spring 2008), pages 36-41.

http://enrichmentjournal.ag.org/200802/200802_036_Writing.cfm  

Scot McKnight, “The Ironic Faith of Emergents: McLaren shows us not only where ‘post-evangelicals’ are going, but also how they get there.” Christianity Today (September 2008).

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/september/39.62.html  

Scot McKnight, “McLaren Emerging: In his last two books, Brian McLaren presents more clearly than ever his vision of the gospel” Christianity Today (September 2008).

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/september/38.59.html
 

Editor Introduction: Postmodernism, The Church, and The Future  

Postmodernism, The Church, and The Future
A Pneuma Review discussion about how the church should respond to postmodernism

Suggestions and Comments from Readers

Reader T.S. writes:

I thought this critique of postmodern thinking on today’s college campuses was insightful: “The postmodern idolatry is that all spiritual ways of life lead to the same place. Any local truth is a valid truth. In the postmodern mind, they’re all paths to being good and doing good.”

This was from an interview with James Choung, called “From Four Laws to Four Circles: James Choung has found a way to tell the old, old story to a new generation” Christianity Today (July 2008). http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/july/11.31.html

Here is another, older critique by Os Guinness warning of the dangers of becoming too-relevant. http://www.christianitytoday.com/outreach/articles/trustingculturalgospel.html

In another article by philosopher William Lane Craig he says, “The idea that we live in a postmodern culture is a myth. In fact, a postmodern culture is an impossibility; it would be utterly unlivable. People are not relativistic when it comes to matters of science, engineering, and technology; rather, they are relativistic and pluralistic in matters of religion and ethics. But, of course, that’s not postmodernism; that’s modernism! That’s just old-line verificationism, which held that anything you can’t prove with your five senses is a matter of personal taste. We live in a culture that remains deeply modernist” (in “God Is Not Dead Yet: How current philosophers argue for his existence,” Christianity Today, July 2008, emphasis his). Find this article online at:

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/july/13.22.html  

In the next issue (Winter 2009), Tony Richie wraps up our discussion with:

“Becoming All Things, Spoiling the Egyptians, and Occupying Culture till Christ’s Comes: Reflections on the Recent Postmodernism Conversation”  

Philip Jenkins, God’s Continent: Christianity, Islam, and Europe’s Religious Crisis (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007). ix + 340 pages, ISBN 0195313956.

The two books under review are part of what Jenkins calls “The Future of Christianity Trilogy,” which was begun with his The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity (Oxford University Press, 2002, with second expanded edition published in 2007). (For more on Jenkins’ overall project, see also the periodical review of his “Companions of Life: A Supple Faith” by Tony Richie in The Pneuma Review 10:3 [Summer 2007].) Between them, Jenkins extends the analysis of his initial volume, first by focusing on Bible-reading trends in especially Asia and Africa (although Latin America is not entirely absent), and then by exploring emerging trajectories of Christian-Muslim relations in the European continent. Together, these latter two books provide a kind of template for anticipating future global developments, although our author is much too nuanced and sophisticated in his prognostications for alarmists on any side, even as he is too riveting in his narration for those who might be otherwise complacent about the present and future of Christianity in its global contexts.

For example, Pneuma Review readers might almost be able to read New Faces of Christianity as an updated response to the questions posed in 1994 by Harvey Cox in his book Fire from Heaven: The Rise of Pentecostal Spirituality and the Reshaping of Religion in the Twenty-first Century (Addison-Wesley). There, Cox wondered if world pentecostalism would continue wedded to fundamentalism or if it might expand in other (especially more socially progressive) directions. Jenkins’ New Faces also begins with the question (the title of chapter 1), “Shall the fundamentalists win?” The rest of the volume provides a spectrum of responses to this query by discussing how southern Christians read and use the Bible, both Old and New Testaments, amidst existentially experienced realities like poverty, sickness, persecution and martyrdom, witchcraft practices, gender roles developments, economic crises, political turbulence, and other issues. And the verdict remains out: southern Christians are both more fundamentalist and less fundamentalist than anticipated, although in different (and perhaps surprising) respects.

Editor Introduction: Postmodernism, The Church, and The Future

Postmodernism, The Church, and The Future
A Pneuma Review discussion about how the church should respond to postmodernism

Suggestions for Further Reading

Tim Keel, “An Efficient Gospel?: The modern world was inclined toward reduction, efficiency, and things you can count” Leadership Journal (Winter 2008). http://www.christianitytoday.com/le/2008/001/3.19.html

Earl G. Creps, “Moving Target: Reframing Discipleship for Postmoderns” Enrichment (Winter 2008), pages 68-73.    http://enrichmentjournal.ag.org/200801/200801_068_MovTarget.cfm

TS says, “Christianity Today has a number of articles that seem to apply to this discussion. Here are a few I’ve seen.”

• J. Todd Billings, “What Makes a Church Missional?: Freedom from cultural captivity does not mean freedom from tradition” Christianity Today (March 2008). http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/march/16.56.html

• “You Have Heard It Said: Caputo’s What Would Jesus Deconstruct? sends us to take another look at Jesus” in February 2008 is a review by Bruce Ellis Benson. http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/februaryweb-only/107-12.0.html

• Richard J. Mouw, “An Open-Handed Gospel: We have to decide whether we have a stingy or a generous God” Christianity Today (April, 2008). http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/april/15.44.html

Hear Jamie Smith speaking at Northwest University for the 2006 Pentecostal Lectureship Series presenting his paper “Who’s Afraid of Postmodernism? Azusa Street as Postmodern Revival.” The lecture may be downloaded here: http://eagle.northwestu.edu/chapel_mp3/20060207e.mp3 [link unavailable as of October 23, 2014].

Another perspective in this conversation: see the review of Rob Bell, Velvet Elvis by Robert Huckleberry in this issue.