What Does John Tell Us about Idolatry | Steve Bryan

Lecture Title - Reading John Among Rivals, Old and New The Gospel of John cuts across the grain of secular culture in much the same way as it entered into the ancient world—as a text that sets out a striking claim about the presence of the invisible God in the material world. We understand what John is and who it was for by considering how the Gospel works as Scriptural reasoning tailored for those inclined to regard the act of directing worship to a human being as blasphemous. We understand how John still speaks by communicating the Gospel as narrative reasoning tailored for those inclined to regard the act of directing worship to a human being as absurd. Steven M. Bryan (PhD University of Cambridge) is Professor of New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He is the author of Jesus and Israel’s Traditions of Judgement and Restoration (Cambridge University Press, 2005) and Cultural Identity and the Purposes of God: A Biblical Theology of Ethnicity, Nationality, and Race (Crossway, 2022). The Henry Center for Theological Understanding provides theological resources that help bridge the gap between the academy and the church. It houses a cluster of initiatives, each of which is aimed at applying practical Christian wisdom to important kingdom issues—for the good of the church, for the soul of the theological academy, for the sake of the world, and ultimately for the glory of God. The HCTU seeks to ground each of these initiatives in Scripture, and it pursues these goals collaboratively, in order to train a new generation of wise interpreters of the Word—lay persons and scholars alike—for the sake of tomorrow’s church, academy, and world. Visit the HCTU website: https://henrycenter.tiu.edu/ Subscribe to the HCTU Newsletter: https://bit.ly/326pRL5 Connect with us!https://twitter.com/henry_centerhttps://www.facebook.com/henrycenter/https://www.instagram.com/thehenrycenter/https://www.linkedin.com/company/thehenrycenter