As always, Doug, we are so grateful for your encouragement! There's so much more to explore, not only on this channel but also at www.admirato.org. We’d love for you to take our free courses! --NTW Online Team
We are grateful for the family of God, which extends across the world. We are together in one Lord, one faith, one baptism. We have one God and father of all, who is over all, through all and in all. --NTW Online Team
"O death, where is thy sting?" is found in 1 Corinthians 15:55, authored by the Apostle Paul. Job, the oldest book of the Bible, says he would see his maker face to face - "For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God." The end and heaven and hell are mentioned in the old testament. Its just they didnt have a complete understanding like we got in the New Testament. Paul "to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord" and "id rather depart and be with the lord but it is more needful for you that i remain here with you"
I loved this. Death IS the enemy, not a gateway to a better state. I have always wondered how tha old testament in particular does not speak of Dearg as a good thing. And the is the whole Bible theme of the paths which lead to life and to death. Not the same paths.
Thank you for talking about Death with a capital 'D' and putting it into biblical context. Yes, Death is the enemy and or so it seems to me, all we have said about it are our attempts to get to grips with the heartache Death creates. For me, there's only one way to get to grips with that heartache is to look it in the face, accept it for what it is - inimical - and work to overcome it by love because Love is stronger than Death.
Thank you for your encouragement! We're grateful for our donors and ministry partners who make our TH-cam channel accessible for all. --NTW Online Team
That was an interesting take. I know I will die, but I refuse to live my life in fear. By the same token, I don't want to squander the gift of life and treat it as some sort of cosmic way station. If it were, it would serve no purpose, and that would land you in the same camp as the nihilists. Death does hurt, it's okay to acknowledge that.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts, well said. Acknowledging the pain keeps us connected with God's heart, it keeps us meaningfully engaged in life and our work in it. --NTW Online Team
( Isaiah 44:8) " Don''t fear, neither be afraid. Haven''t I declared it to you long ago, and shown it? You are my witnesses. Is there a God besides me? Indeed, there is not. I don''t know any other Rock." I wonder sometime, when we think about God, whom we read in scriptures, God who can do all things, all knowing and loving and merciful. But is it only in theory and fantasy or in real life. The psalmist has shouted in one of his praises " Oh see and taste that the Lord is good" And we believe God is our rock of salvation. Salvation from all the power of darkness and corruption. Yes salvation from the last enemy, Death. Saint Paul in his epistle to corinthians has assured those who love God, " O Death where is thy power and thy poison" God has destroyed it by raising His Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ. God has shown His all power and Love, through this act of Love. Praise be to God, whose love for us is beyond we can imagine. Amen.
I have to disagree with Mr. Wright’s interpretation of “on that day you eat a it, you shall surely die”. It is the spiritual death that this signifies, not physical death.
He's ignorant of most of the Bible, example "O death, where is thy sting?" is found in 1 Corinthians 15:55, authored by the Apostle Paul, and furthermore he doesnt believe the authors of the Bible were inspired so he makes everything 'symbolic'. Ever learning, never able to come to the truth
Brother Wright, you speak the truth about death and resurrection from the ‘state’ of being dead. Death is the opposite of life. The dead have no consciousness. Jesus compared death to sleep (Lazarus). A sleep without dreams and without a body. We are momentarily no longer there. But if all goes well, your name is then in the book of life. In the resurrection, dead people come back. On Earth. In Heaven, there are no resurrections. Even Jesus' resurrection was on Earth. He had a body of bones and flesh and they fed him fish. 40 days later he went to Heaven but he comes back. I understood the order of resurrections like this: First Jesus, that has already happened. Then just before he returns those who belong to him (the believers in him and in his Father) and then during Judgment Day the rest of those who died. Below some texts that deal with it: For the living are conscious that they will die; but as for the dead, they are conscious of nothing at all Ecclesiastes 9:5 He that conquers will thus be arrayed in white outer garments; and I will by no means blot out his name from the book of life, but I will make acknowledgment of his name before my Father and before his angels. Revelation 3:5 Your dead ones will live. A corpse of mine-they will rise up. Awake and cry out joyfully, YOU residents in the dust! For your dew is as the dew of mallows, and the earth itself will let even those impotent in death drop [in birth]. Isaiah 26:19 Most truly I say to YOU, He that hears my word and believes him that sent me has everlasting life, and he does not come into judgment but has passed over from death to life. John 5:24
I love this teaching, and NT in general, but disagree with his closing point. We can be at peace with death AND be people of life. Our love can extend to even our enemies.
I didn't feel there was much hope in this one , as there are other verses were there is hope... for the billions of people who fear death. Didn't Paul say, it is better for me to depart to be with Christ ? ( and not decay in a grave for 2ooo years.) And also Jesus telling us of the story of Abraham and a Lazarus that was with him in paradise ... Then there is Jesus promise to the thief on the cross ... Ive heard Tom Wright in lectures where he does reassure people that death isn't the nail in the coffin .. Surely we don't go from having a relationship with the Lord and experience His presence in our lifetime to no relationship ?
David, Prof Wright confirmed the glorious new reality that when we are baptised and raised with Christ we have moved from death to life. Death, the cruel, nasty enemy, does not have the last word! We have the sure promise of resurrection bodies when Jesus finally defeats death on the last day (1 Cor 15:25-26).
So we don't really understand what happens to a believer between our physical death and Jesus' return? We know death has been defeated and He will take care of us?
I wonder what the mood was like at funerals Bishop Wright conducted? Humour aside, this is the stuff of nightmares. The texts of the early Church are replete with metaphors, symbols and myths, all of which were legitimate attempts to explain the meaning of Jesus. The Church Fathers did us a great service by keeping all of these side by side for us to appreciate - more literature than for any other ancient movement. The Church Fathers understood the importance of symbolism for finite humanity to access the transcendent, which no single symbol can possibly do. Wright’s exposition reflects just one model - that which was normalised in the Western Church post-Anselm, replete with legalistic interpretations of atonement. It is a constant source of puzzlement to me that modern evangelicalism should be so obsessed with the one interpretation of death as the punishment for original sin and Jesus’ role as the ransom paid to a God whose primary attribute is justice. The Eastern Church isn’t so obsessed, appreciating metaphors such as exemplar, teacher, victor, and exchange (among others), alongside some of the models that are more difficult to process outside of an ancient worldview. They had a much richer understanding of the meaning of Jesus that included, but went beyond, the cross. And surely, this is the one powerful insight that Bonhoeffer gives us. Our understanding of the world post-Enlightenment has irreversibly changed. And so the problem with Wright’s exposition is that he not only (legitimately) studies the myths of a world with a different structure to ours, he actually lives in it. We do not. The challenge for the modern Church, if its message is to be at all relevant today, is to address the meaningfulness of symbol and the radical impact of the person of Jesus upon our understanding of what it means to be human - in the likeness of God. Not frightening, threatening, or addressing one preferred model that appeals to human weakness or fear. But hopefulness in an optimistic world we know so much more about, and where “because I live, you also will live….you will know that I am in My Father, and you are in Me, and I am in you.”
I appreciate your concerns. But honestly, I think you are responding to a narrow Evangelism rather than to NT's ideas. You appear to know your traditions and its polemics fairly well. But not everything is a nail, Mr. Hammer. 😂
@@bertbranson5057 I’m not entirely sure what the argument is here, other than a claim that I don’t understand Wright’s “larger” picture. And indeed there is one, I suppose. Which is that Wright agrees with the central argument of Schweitzer regarding the Jewish eschatological context of the message of Jesus, and messianic expectation. At least Schweitzer followed this through to its logical conclusion, even if he could not bring himself to abandon his liberal Protestant faith. It is not about knowing “traditions and polemics”, but maintaining a critical approach to the interpretation of ancient texts, especially when there is an interface with modern faith. I agree that the eschatology is present in the New Testament, but I remain to be convinced that there was a strong pre-Markan form. There is little evidence of it in the Q tradition, for example. And we now know a great deal more about the Hellenistic cultural milieu of Galilee in the time of Jesus. Life and ideas were much more diverse than portrayed here. And at the interface, if modern faith is rooted in a pre-Enlightenment worldview, we do run the risk of becoming completely irrelevant, as Bonhoeffer warned us so cogently. In short, I have no question regarding Wright’s ability as a New Testament scholar, my question is about the narrowness of his interpretation, and willingness to make this the basis of a faith for the 21st Century.
When theologians talk about life after death they mean in thr short term.Imagine living a googolplex of years and that's only the beginning! Immortality is the enemy not death.
These brief topical lessons are of immense importance and are greatly appreciated. ✔️
As always, Doug, we are so grateful for your encouragement! There's so much more to explore, not only on this channel but also at www.admirato.org. We’d love for you to take our free courses!
--NTW Online Team
Thank you, greetings from St.Petersburg, Russia
Greetings from Canada. We stand firmly together in the faith that once and for all was delivered to the saints. ✔️
We are grateful for the family of God, which extends across the world. We are together in one Lord, one faith, one baptism. We have one God and father of all, who is over all, through all and in all.
--NTW Online Team
"O death, where is thy sting?" is found in 1 Corinthians 15:55, authored by the Apostle Paul. Job, the oldest book of the Bible, says he would see his maker face to face - "For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God." The end and heaven and hell are mentioned in the old testament. Its just they didnt have a complete understanding like we got in the New Testament. Paul "to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord" and "id rather depart and be with the lord but it is more needful for you that i remain here with you"
The Spirit within me wells up with hope as I listen to your words. Thank you.
We are so grateful for the hope we share! Thank you for sharing your reflections.
--NTW Online Team
Wow!
Amazing!
Thank you N.T Wright
We appreciate your encouragement! We're glad you're here.
--NTW Online Team
I loved this. Death IS the enemy, not a gateway to a better state. I have always wondered how tha old testament in particular does not speak of Dearg as a good thing. And the is the whole Bible theme of the paths which lead to life and to death. Not the same paths.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts. It's great to have a place to think and reflect on matters like these.
--NTW Online Team
Thank you for talking about Death with a capital 'D' and putting it into biblical context. Yes, Death is the enemy and or so it seems to me, all we have said about it are our attempts to get to grips with the heartache Death creates. For me, there's only one way to get to grips with that heartache is to look it in the face, accept it for what it is - inimical - and work to overcome it by love because Love is stronger than Death.
Beautifully said, Vivian. Thank you!
--NTW Online Team
Indeed , LOVE LIVES ON . the everlasting building material , of The Kingdom of God . . The land of Beulah , the City of MORE , and more and more ,
It is finished yet it has just begun.
I know who you are, and I approve this comment of yours. And, EVERYTHING else you say, as well.
Always an encouragement.
Wow-so much said in such a short time. I need to watch and listen again!
We're grateful you're here learning with us, thank you for your support!
--NTW Online Team
just WOW! I could listen to NT ALL DAY EVERY DAY for the rest of my life. Thank you SO MUCH!!!
Thank you for your encouragement! We're grateful for our donors and ministry partners who make our TH-cam channel accessible for all.
--NTW Online Team
A beautiful expression of a wonderful truth. Many thanks Tom.
So nice to hear, thank you!
--NTW Online Team
This is so good, and bringing hope and encouragement. Thank you
Great message of hope for the ultimate overthrow of death.
Thank you for sharing this ❤ it is encouraging and enlightening
We are always grateful for your encouragement. Thank you!
--NTW Online Team
Thanks a lot, greetings from Bolivia!
Greetings to you in Bolivia! We're grateful you are here with us, together in the Lord.
--NTW Online Team
Listening to this eye opening teaching makes Paul's epistle to the the church in Corinth talking about the sting of death being taken away.
We are so grateful to have a community where we can reflect meaningfully like this. Thank you for sharing your thoughts.
--NTW Online Team
Wow! This is so enriching and liberating!
We're encouraged to hear this! Thank you for sharing.
--NTW Online Team
Thanks for adding actual captions for the Deaf ❤
So much for death losing its sting.
Amen!
A project? So many people talk about the after life with such certainty. How?
That was an interesting take. I know I will die, but I refuse to live my life in fear. By the same token, I don't want to squander the gift of life and treat it as some sort of cosmic way station. If it were, it would serve no purpose, and that would land you in the same camp as the nihilists. Death does hurt, it's okay to acknowledge that.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts, well said. Acknowledging the pain keeps us connected with God's heart, it keeps us meaningfully engaged in life and our work in it.
--NTW Online Team
( Isaiah 44:8) " Don''t fear, neither be afraid. Haven''t I declared it to you long ago, and shown it? You are my witnesses. Is there a God besides me? Indeed, there is not. I don''t know any other Rock."
I wonder sometime, when we think about God, whom we read in scriptures, God who can do all things, all knowing and loving and merciful. But is it only in theory and fantasy or in real life.
The psalmist has shouted in one of his praises
" Oh see and taste that the Lord is good"
And we believe God is our rock of salvation. Salvation from all the power of darkness and corruption. Yes salvation from the last enemy, Death.
Saint Paul in his epistle to corinthians has assured those who love God,
" O Death where is thy power and thy poison"
God has destroyed it by raising His Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ. God has shown His all power and Love, through this act of Love.
Praise be to God, whose love for us is beyond we can imagine. Amen.
I have to disagree with Mr. Wright’s interpretation of “on that day you eat a it, you shall surely die”. It is the spiritual death that this signifies, not physical death.
He's ignorant of most of the Bible, example "O death, where is thy sting?" is found in 1 Corinthians 15:55, authored by the Apostle Paul, and furthermore he doesnt believe the authors of the Bible were inspired so he makes everything 'symbolic'. Ever learning, never able to come to the truth
Brother Wright, you speak the truth about death and resurrection from the ‘state’ of being dead. Death is the opposite of life. The dead have no consciousness. Jesus compared death to sleep (Lazarus). A sleep without dreams and without a body. We are momentarily no longer there. But if all goes well, your name is then in the book of life.
In the resurrection, dead people come back. On Earth. In Heaven, there are no resurrections. Even Jesus' resurrection was on Earth. He had a body of bones and flesh and they fed him fish. 40 days later he went to Heaven but he comes back. I understood the order of resurrections like this: First Jesus, that has already happened. Then just before he returns those who belong to him (the believers in him and in his Father) and then during Judgment Day the rest of those who died.
Below some texts that deal with it:
For the living are conscious that they will die;
but as for the dead, they are conscious of nothing at all
Ecclesiastes 9:5
He that conquers will thus be arrayed in white outer garments;
and I will by no means blot out his name from the book of life,
but I will make acknowledgment of his name before my Father and before his angels.
Revelation 3:5
Your dead ones will live. A corpse of mine-they will rise up.
Awake and cry out joyfully, YOU residents in the dust!
For your dew is as the dew of mallows, and the earth itself
will let even those impotent in death drop [in birth].
Isaiah 26:19
Most truly I say to YOU,
He that hears my word and believes him that sent me
has everlasting life, and he does not come into judgment
but has passed over from death to life.
John 5:24
I love this teaching, and NT in general, but disagree with his closing point. We can be at peace with death AND be people of life. Our love can extend to even our enemies.
"O death, where is thy sting?" is found in 1 Corinthians 15:55
I didn't feel there was much hope in this one , as there are other verses were there is hope... for the billions of people who fear death. Didn't Paul say, it is better for me to depart to be with Christ ? ( and not decay in a grave for 2ooo years.) And also Jesus telling us of the story of Abraham and a Lazarus that was with him in paradise ... Then there is Jesus promise to the thief on the cross ... Ive heard Tom Wright in lectures where he does reassure people that death isn't the nail in the coffin ..
Surely we don't go from having a relationship with the Lord and experience His presence in our lifetime to no relationship ?
David, Prof Wright confirmed the glorious new reality that when we are baptised and raised with Christ we have moved from death to life.
Death, the cruel, nasty enemy, does not have the last word! We have the sure promise of resurrection bodies when Jesus finally defeats death on the last day (1 Cor 15:25-26).
So we don't really understand what happens to a believer between our physical death and Jesus' return? We know death has been defeated and He will take care of us?
Paul said 'to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord'. He also said 'oh death where is they sting?'.
I wonder what the mood was like at funerals Bishop Wright conducted? Humour aside, this is the stuff of nightmares. The texts of the early Church are replete with metaphors, symbols and myths, all of which were legitimate attempts to explain the meaning of Jesus. The Church Fathers did us a great service by keeping all of these side by side for us to appreciate - more literature than for any other ancient movement. The Church Fathers understood the importance of symbolism for finite humanity to access the transcendent, which no single symbol can possibly do. Wright’s exposition reflects just one model - that which was normalised in the Western Church post-Anselm, replete with legalistic interpretations of atonement. It is a constant source of puzzlement to me that modern evangelicalism should be so obsessed with the one interpretation of death as the punishment for original sin and Jesus’ role as the ransom paid to a God whose primary attribute is justice. The Eastern Church isn’t so obsessed, appreciating metaphors such as exemplar, teacher, victor, and exchange (among others), alongside some of the models that are more difficult to process outside of an ancient worldview. They had a much richer understanding of the meaning of Jesus that included, but went beyond, the cross. And surely, this is the one powerful insight that Bonhoeffer gives us. Our understanding of the world post-Enlightenment has irreversibly changed. And so the problem with Wright’s exposition is that he not only (legitimately) studies the myths of a world with a different structure to ours, he actually lives in it. We do not. The challenge for the modern Church, if its message is to be at all relevant today, is to address the meaningfulness of symbol and the radical impact of the person of Jesus upon our understanding of what it means to be human - in the likeness of God. Not frightening, threatening, or addressing one preferred model that appeals to human weakness or fear. But hopefulness in an optimistic world we know so much more about, and where “because I live, you also will live….you will know that I am in My Father, and you are in Me, and I am in you.”
I appreciate your concerns. But honestly, I think you are responding to a narrow Evangelism rather than to NT's ideas. You appear to know your traditions and its polemics fairly well. But not everything is a nail, Mr. Hammer. 😂
@@bertbranson5057 I’m not entirely sure what the argument is here, other than a claim that I don’t understand Wright’s “larger” picture. And indeed there is one, I suppose. Which is that Wright agrees with the central argument of Schweitzer regarding the Jewish eschatological context of the message of Jesus, and messianic expectation. At least Schweitzer followed this through to its logical conclusion, even if he could not bring himself to abandon his liberal Protestant faith. It is not about knowing “traditions and polemics”, but maintaining a critical approach to the interpretation of ancient texts, especially when there is an interface with modern faith. I agree that the eschatology is present in the New Testament, but I remain to be convinced that there was a strong pre-Markan form. There is little evidence of it in the Q tradition, for example. And we now know a great deal more about the Hellenistic cultural milieu of Galilee in the time of Jesus. Life and ideas were much more diverse than portrayed here. And at the interface, if modern faith is rooted in a pre-Enlightenment worldview, we do run the risk of becoming completely irrelevant, as Bonhoeffer warned us so cogently. In short, I have no question regarding Wright’s ability as a New Testament scholar, my question is about the narrowness of his interpretation, and willingness to make this the basis of a faith for the 21st Century.
Not in vain the god of death is the enemy.
When theologians talk about life after death they mean in thr short term.Imagine living a googolplex of years and that's only the beginning! Immortality
is the enemy not death.