Biblical Studies Carnival

Biblical Studies Carnival 150

/ J.K. / 5 Comments

Welcome to the August 2018 Biblical Studies Carnival.

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Y’all ready to get weird? Or at least a little different, depending on your perspective; that’s the question we ask every Labor Day Weekend here in Atlanta. A smaller crowd than last year when Mrs. MMT and I were downtown in the center of it all, but around 700,000 will be in town this weekend, mostly for DragonCon and the Chic-fil-a Kick off GamRelated imagee (that’s how you get pictures like these), but also for things like another minor football game, a Lynyrd Skynyrd Concert, and LudaFamDay.

So it makes sense then, that it is the same weekend in which I host a Biblical Studies Carnival (my first hosting was Labor Day Weekend two years ago). Most of the people who are involved in the Carnivals are academics, pastors/theologians, and a few prolific writers with at least some education. I am none of those things. By day, I’m a City Planner, but by night, well…, actually, I sleep, but sometimes I try to write about Theology or the Bible, and mostly review books. I recently started a series on Thessalonians if you want to check it out. Especially since the nomination of Trump, I’ve become too caught up in the contrast between political christianity and those Christians who actually read the Bible. So, with the scholars being busy this month due to school being back in session, I’ve added a Politics section.

Well, that’s probably enough ado, let’s get to it.

Old Testament
Want to learn to sing the Hebrew Bible? Bob’s got you covered – check out Psalm 111.

Jim asks us to remember Calvin’s thoughts on Psalm 14:1.

Henry posts what he calls a slightly poetic version of Isaiah 10:1-4a.

New Testament
Phil started a series on Sermon on the Mount. I particularly enjoyed his thoughts on Jesus and the Law, which is something I’ve been interested in.

Jarrett shares some thoughts on the Mystery of the Gospel.

Scott starts a series on Revelation. I like the title of his intro ‘Not Your Father’s Book of Revelation’. My father doesn’t read the Bible, but his generation is certainly the one that emphasized Dispensationalism to my generation, which is moving away from this reading. Additionally, one of the things that moved me away from this reading was discussing with my grandfather, who likewise did not read Revelation this way.

Hal responds to Session’s use of Romans 13.

Rod has ‘Greek for a Week’ cover of Philemon 19, 20, 21, & 22.

Ian discusses why Jesus came to bring division and a sword.

Theology
Brandon asks whether Origen was Athanasian or Arian.

Bernard discusses the trouble with faith.

Tim asks how should we respond to the leading of the spirit.

Jeffery has thoughts on whether God has a plan for my life.

Other
Rob is trying to put together a survey on public domain commentaries. It is an interesting project, and if you’d like to help he is looking for volunteers.

William has a review of a Mesopotamian Prayer.

Nijay has a free open-textbook on Intermediate Biblical Greek.

Christoph has some thoughts on mastering Koine Greek.

Michael asks us if it is a waste of time for seminary students and pastors to learn languages.

David asks about sin in the church.

Book Review
Phil reviews Reading Mark in Context.

RJS finishes posting reviews of The Lost World of Scripture.

Micheal has a quick review of Jesus Followers in the Roman Empire. He also has a great quote regarding a rapture from Gene Green, writing in his commentary on Thessalonians (which was my favorite commentary to consult).

Jim reviews Approaching the Study of Theology.

Jason reviews the Complete Hebrew-Greek Bible.

Politics
Jim points out the irony of Evangelical idolatry.

In beautiful irony, Fox News once showed a pictured of NFL players protesting, except they weren’t, they were kneeling in prayer. Pro football will be back next week and we’ll once again be subjected to endless debate about kneeling during the Anthem. Of course, there is a long history of prayer in football, many people I know learned the Lord’s Prayer from sports. However, we’ll listen as many ‘Evangelicals’ get angry over people kneeling when they ‘aren’t supposed to.’

Check out John’s comments on the White House dinner with Evangelicals.

D.G. reminds us that once Evangelicals didn’t even support Giuliani.

Millennials might not follow the Moral Majority playbook. Anecdotally, I’ve seen this to be the case.

Roger Olsen responds to the question, ‘Is Trump Our Cyrus.’ Remember, when the title of an article ends in a question mark, the answer is almost always no.

George surveys Religion vs. Party.

Excurses
As an American, I thought this was posted in the future. Richard has an interesting look into what he calls a ‘dialogue between biblical scholarship and Religious Education.’

Phil’s book is on sale.

Kevin DeYoung shares a few things he’s learned while working on his PhD.

This book cover made me wonder if anyone has ever seen Karl Barth and Warren Buffet in the same room.

Image result for karl barthImage result for warren buffett

 

That’s it for this month. Hope you enjoyed, even if it was a little different than usual. As a pretend theologian (my occupational hazard is my occupation’s just not around), I’m somewhat like a medieval monk – I like to read, write, and drink beer. Now that I’m down reading and writing for the month, only one thing left to do. Thanks for playing along.

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If you are interested in hosting or know someone who might be interested please contact Phil. Contact info from his post last month –

I am borderline desperate for the rest of the year!  Please contact me via email (plong42@gmail.com), twitter direct message (@plong42) or comment here in this carnival. Whether you are a relatively new blogger or you have hosted a carnival in the past, do not hesitate to contact me. October, November and December are open as of July 1. It is not too early to volunteer for a 2019 carnival.

Borderline is clearly an understatement if I’m hosting again, but  it goes legit again the next month with Jim. Like I said earlier, the carnival is mostly hosted by scholars and students, but there are a few pastors and at least one completely pretend internet theologian that has hosted in the past. If you are interested, hit up Phil and get some more info.

*All pictures, except my beer, stolen from google image search/reddit. Please @ me if they are yours and you want attribution or removal.

Biblical Studies Carnival 149 is Up

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Looks like we are going mostly by numbers now, but Karen Keen has the July 2018 Carnival up.

If you are interested in hosting or know someone who might be interested please contact Phil. Contact info from his post today –

I am borderline desperate for the rest of the year!  Please contact me via email (plong42@gmail.com), twitter direct message (@plong42) or comment here in this carnival. Whether you are a relatively new blogger or you have hosted a carnival in the past, do not hesitate to contact me. October, November and December are open as of July 1. It is not too early to volunteer for a 2019 carnival.

He’s clearly past desperate as I will be hosting next month, but goes legit again the following month with Jim. The carnival is mostly hosted by scholars and students, but there a few pastors and at least on completely pretend internet theologian that has hosted in the past. If you are interested, hit up Phil and get some more info.

Top post of the first half of 2018

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I noticed many other bloggers do something like top post/most read of X year or the more prolific ones do a top of the month, or even week. I always kind of wondered how they knew, and that’s when I discovered the depth of the stats pages blogging platforms provide. I brought this up to Mrs. MMT and she thought it was stupid…that I didn’t know this was a thing. To be fair, she is an accredited PR professional, and my desire in life is to be a monk, but with sex, and fishing, and college football. Wait, where was I?

So I dug into my stats, and up until a few months ago, my most viewed overall (and winning by far and away for most views the day it was posted) was the time almost two years ago that I hosted the 2016 August Biblical Studies Carnival. That has since been passed by what is also my most read post of 2018 so far. My top five most read of 2018:

  1. Book Review: Sapiens
  2. Book Review: The Imperfect Disciple
  3. Book Review: Disciplines of a Godly Man
  4. Book Review: Spiritual Disciplines of the Christian Life
  5. Tie – 10 Year Anniversary; Book Review: Four Views on Hell; Book Review: Darkness is My Only Companion

Why these posts? I have a few ideas, we’ll start from the bottom. Interestingly, Darkness is the only book review to make the list that I actually posted this year, so it’s probably there just due to recency. Similarly, Anniversary was post two weeks ago, and probably brought more of my Twits than book reviews due to the pictures of me and the Monday Morning Wife. Not sure about Four Views, other than Hell is weird and people have questions about it. Feels pretty cool that people found me from that.

My guess is that Imperfect, and the two disciplines books were popular searches due to Lent. I’ve already stated, I don’t know how to do Lent, but I do have two thoughts to help. First, you are probably looking up Lent because of fasting. I’ve heard nothing better than this Theocast podcast on fasting. Their idea that it isn’t necessarily about giving up food (Protestant view), but more about reclaiming time is fascinating. Second, if you are deciding which book to read, I can help. Imperfect is not about spiritual disciplines, but is still awesome and you should read it, and I’ve already written a post about why you should read Godly Man over Christian Life (though, if you are a woman, it’s still a better book).

So, this brings us to Sapiens. Why? Well, my stats pages tell me the terms searched that led people here, and basically, it was people searching for a ‘Christian review’ of the book. I was shocked/proud to find out that if you google this, I’ll be one of the top 5 or so (it changes) links shown. That’s really cool, but people were probably disappointed in what they found. I didn’t write a ‘Christian’ review in the sense people were probably searching. I mean, I am a Christian and I did review the book, but I think what people were look for was a Christian response. So, as a man of the people, I plan to write a Christian response to this book based solely on my guess what people were actually questioning (off the top of my head, it’s evolution).

Two final thoughts – I do Advanced Review Copy book reviews for a few publishers, but of the six book reviews that have brought the most readers this year, only one (Imperfect, from Baker Books), was one of these. Second, the May 2018 Biblical Studies Carnival is up over at 5 Minute Bible.

That’s it, those are my top five as of June 1, 2018. I plan to do an end of the year post for the most read of 2018, so stay tuned I guess. Thanks everyone who reads or follows me and I apologize in advance to anyone who found my by accident. I’ll try to do better next time.

2018 is Here

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It is 2018 already, well, it is the 2nd now, but I was eating and watching football all day yesterday, so I didn’t post anything. Most importantly from yesterday, Georgia won and is heading to the National Championship game next Monday here in Atlanta.

I’ll have a few post later this week or next specifically about this site, but for now Phil has the December 2017 Biblical Studies Carnival up over at his Reading Acts and my buddy David has his annual book ranking up over at his This Mortal Life.

Finally, I’ve posted a few times over the past couple of years about receiving hand me down books from my mom’s dad’s dad, who was a Church of Christ preacher, but yesterday I stopped by my other Granddad’s house. He and my grandmother are moving to assisted living/memory care tomorrow and he wanted to grab a few of his books. Along with a full volume of Matthew Henry’s commentary, I also noticed this.

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On the left is The New Bible Commentary Revised edition. This commentary was published in the 50’s and revised and republished in the 70’s. It was revised, I believe, again in the 90’s and then totally revamped in the ’21st Century Edition’ in 2008, which is the one on the right (my copy). My granddad is an avid reader and taught Sunday School for something like 60 years, which he took seriously enough to buy multiple commentaries. It was cool to see I had chosen on of the same ones he used for decades, but more than 40 years after he purchased his.

 

May Biblical Studies Carnival

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Jeff Carter has the Carnival up, though he is calling it Biblioblog Carnival. Maybe the name changed. Try searching biblioblog if you are having trouble finding it, or just click the link above. When I searched Biblical Studies Carnival, I only came up with Zwinglius Dedivivus’s post. I may have to check in with the godfather of the carnival to see if things have changed. Anyway, enjoy.