Lecture 1: Feb 25

Jesus and the Jews

The Quandary of Israel in God’s Plan of Salvation

Speaker: Mateen Elass

The apostle Paul spills three chapters’ worth of ink (Romans 9-11) wrestling over why the majority of the Jews of his day were rejecting their own Messiah. If God had truly chosen them, and sent them His promised Messiah, why weren’t they responding? If God couldn’t save the people to whom He originally promised salvation, how could Christians trust that God’s promises in Jesus would hold firm for them? Join us to discover how Paul sees the faithfulness of God ultimately being fulfilled with one redeemed people (Jews and Gentiles) gathered by His predestined and electing purposes. 

Lecture 2: Mar 4

Hebrews and Hellenists

Forging Unity in the Early Church

Speaker: Tim McConnell  

Throughout Paul’s letters and in the book of Acts we see evidence of an enormous challenge facing the early church: how do we build unity as one body in Christ when we are different people? The people of God, the Jews, had built their lives on self-distinctiveness from other communities. They were a solo race, a people unto themselves. The Jesus event cracked that people open. This unity was not forged in ethereal places of theological imagination; it was forged in the fires of persecution and pogrom under the violence of Rome. 

Lecture 3: Mar 11

Whose Story Is the Bible? 

Speaker: Jeff McCrory

Paul reads Jesus as the main character for one Bible, one People, and one Promise. This encourages us that the key to the story of Scripture and to our stories lies in the whole Bible story from Genesis to Revelation.

Lecture 4: Mar 18 

A Christian Witness to Jews 

Speaker: Jim Edwards