Testing Tradition

Note: This is the first of a two-part series.  You can read part two here . [24] And he said to those who stood by, ‘Take the mina from him, and give it to the one who has the ten minas.’ [25] And they said to him, ‘Lord, he has ten minas!’ [26] ‘I tell you that to everyone who has, more will be given, but from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away. But as for these enemies of mine, who did not want me to reign over them, bring them here and slaughter them before me.’ Luke 19:24–27 I recently finished going through Luke's gospel afresh for advent this year.  And, upon this reading, the Holy Spirit was impressing on me the inescapable socioeconomic implications of the gospel as a thread that—more than any of the other three gospel accounts—Luke in particular highlights throughout the gospel account in his name. A few passages in Luke's text opened up to me like never before.  And what I'd like to do in this post is walk through Luke 19 in particular, offe

Note: This is the second of a two-part series.  You can read part one  here  and part three here .   Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you really are unleavened. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. 1 Corinthians 5:7 In part 1 of this series , I raised the issue of how the wrath of God relates to the cross of Jesus Christ.  I suggested that, contrary to popular evangelical tradition, perhaps the cross of Jesus Christ is actually not purposed to satisfy the wrath of God. What I intend to do in this post is to be less suggestive and more assertive .  I want to  assert that the cross of Jesus Christ was never intended to satisfy the wrath of God. Rather, from the very beginning, it would be more accurate to say that the cross of Jesus Christ was intended to absorb the wrath of Satan (Revelation 12:12), God's adversary, and in so doing, to destroy (Hebrews 2:14, 1 John 3:8) that ancient serpent. In building any New Testament theology of the cros