Hi Council Tree,
If you’ve ever read the final book of the Bible, Revelation, you know it is…well…different. Yet, I have a strong sense, that I believe is from God, that spending the next year in this different book is right where the Living God would have us.
It was a book written under different circumstances, in a different genre, that is inviting people to live differently. Ultimately, the Spirit will lead you in different ways as together we give ourselves to this book, but it is my hope that our sacred network will together:
Better understand our world and the role our church plays in it.
Further its practice of more faithfully reading and interpreting scripture.
More deeply receive the Good News that we can live differently as Jesus did.
As it is a different book, I thought for this sermon series some of you would like to explore some of the resources that have been helpful to me. It goes without saying (but I’ll say it anyway), that just like about every book I’ve read, each of these authors make wonderful contributions but also bring perspectives that I may not align with. So, this short bibliography* is offered as input for this journey, not as dogma.
Shorter and more accessible books on Revelation.
Revelations for the Rest of Us: A Prophetic call to follow Jesus as a dissident disciple McKnight, Scott
Breaking the Code: Understanding the book of Revelation Metzger, Bruce.
Reversed Thunder: The Revelation of John and the Praying imagination Peterson, Eugene
Revelation: For everyone Wright, N.T.
A little longer and little thicker books on Revelation.
The Revelation of Saint John (Blacks New Testament Commentary) Caird, C.B.
Eternity Now! Encountering the Jesus of Revelation Hiett, Peter
Discipleship on the Edge: An expository journey through the book of Revelation Johnson, Darrell
Revelation (Augsburg Commentary on the New Testament) Krodel, Gerhard
The Book of Revelation (The New International Commentary on the New Testament) Mounce, R
American Apocalypse: A History of Modern Evangelicalism Sutton, Matthew Avery
One helpful work on more faithfully reading scripture.
The Bible Made Impossible: Why Biblicism is not a truly Evangelical reading of scripture Smith, Christian
We’ll start on Kick Off weekend, September 10th .
Pastor Bert
*Church I've found it so helpful to hear from a variety of perspectives when studing the Bible, and uniquely I have not been able to find any quality references that come from females or people of color on Revelation. Should you know of some you recommend, please let me know, thank you!
Sermon audio can be found here.
