Simply Good News | NT Wright | Talks at Google 

Wright is very very, and I mean very, pro Jewish. His book on Paul is fantastic tho.

Part 1...... The Gospel accounts are very clear about the focus of Christ’s message. Yet the gospel of the Kingdom of God is nearly absent from Christianity today. By Erik Jones The myriad of churches that make up Christianity profess that their religion is based on Jesus Christ. Nearly all claim Him as their founder and say that their teachings are based on what He said and did 2,000 years ago. But, sadly, there are many doctrines where mainstream Christianity ignores or actually rejects the teachings of Jesus Christ. This month’s column makes a bold assertion: Mainstream Christianity does not teach the same message that Jesus Christ brought when He walked the earth 2,000 years ago. Jesus had a central message that formed the basis for His entire ministry and teachings. He pinpointed this central message in the heart of His most famous sermon-the Sermon on the Mount. He made a statement about what should be the highest priority for His followers: “But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you” (Matthew 6:33, emphasis added). Jesus Christ’s words are clear-the Kingdom of God is to be the No. 1 focus and emphasis in the lives of His followers. In fact, it was the core of His gospel message. Christ’s gospel was not just about Himself Gospel is a common word in the Christian world. Some think of it in connection with a genre of religious music, but most understand that it describes a message. It literally means a message of good news. Most churches include the word gospel in their mission statements. Typically, the gospel is described as the gospel of Jesus Christ, and it is seen as the message of His life, death and resurrection. (You can see this by doing a Google search of the mission statements of different denominations of Christianity.) But was this the central message that Jesus actually taught? Was His message only about Himself? A study of the Gospel accounts of Christ’s life pinpoints exactly what His message-His gospel-was all about! Notice Mark 1:14: “Now after John was put in prison, Jesus came to Galilee preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God.” That statement is pretty plain-Jesus preached the gospel about the Kingdom of God! There are many scriptures that reinforce this fact. For example, Matthew 9:35 says, “Then Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom.” At one point in His ministry, Jesus was about to leave an area where He had been preaching for some time. The people of that area tried to persuade Him not to go ( Now when it was day, He departed and went into a deserted place. And the crowd sought Him and came to Him, and tried to keep Him from leaving them; Luke 4:42). Jesus’ response was, “I must preach the kingdom of God to the other cities also, because for this purpose I have been sent” (verse 43). Let that sink in. Jesus Christ said that one of His primary purposes for coming to earth was to preach about the Kingdom of God! That was His gospel. That was His message. That was His purpose. That is what drove Him. When we understand that the thrust of Christ’s message centered on the Kingdom of God, we understand better why He made the statement in Matthew 6:33: “Seek first the kingdom of God.” He tells us to seek first the Kingdom because the Kingdom of God was His primary message. This message is about the literal establishment of the Kingdom of God on earth at the second coming of Jesus Christ. See our infographic on page 29 to learn more details about what the Kingdom of God is. But where is that message in mainstream Christianity today? Part 2..... Jesus Christ’s words are clear-the Kingdom of God is to be the No. 1 focus and emphasis in the lives of His followers. In fact, it was the core of His gospel message. Christianity lost Christ’s message After Christ was resurrected and ascended to heaven, He founded a Church. The purpose of that Church-that called-out group of people-was to carry on the work He did while on earth. Christ commissioned His Church to go into the entire world and preach the same message that He preached while He was on earth (Matthew 24:14; 28:19-20; Mark 16:15; Acts 1:3-8). The Bible shows that the early Church faithfully followed Christ’s directive and preached the gospel of the Kingdom of God (Acts 8:12; 14:22; 19:8; 20:25; 28:23, 31). The members of the early Church also put their focus on the coming Kingdom (Colossians 4:11; 2 Thessalonians 1:5). But as the first century progressed, the intense focus on the Kingdom began to wane as false beliefs began to creep into Christianity. The apostle Paul wrote that he perceived Christians in his time were “turning away” from the true gospel to “a different gospel” (Galatians 1:6). In what was likely his final letter, Paul gave multiple warnings about his fear that people were abandoning true doctrines and being led astray into false teachings (2 Timothy 2:14-18; 3:13-14; 4:1-3, 14-15). Other apostles wrote similar warnings (2 Peter 2:1; 2 John 1:7; Jude 1:4). The understanding of the true gospel and the focus on the Kingdom of God were minimized and lost over the centuries after the end of the New Testament era. A key factor in this was Emperor Constantine’s acceptance of a popular form of Christianity and its subsequent adoption as the official religion of the Roman Empire. Historian Justo Gonzalez writes: “Since the time of Constantine, and due in part to the work of Eusebius and of many others of similar theological orientation, there was a tendency to set aside or to postpone the hope of the early church, that its Lord would return in the clouds to establish a Kingdom of peace and justice. … Eusebius, although more articulate than most, was simply expressing the common feeling among Christians, for whom the advent of Constantine and of the peace he brought about was the final triumph of Christianity over its enemies” (The Story of Christianity, Vol. 1, pp. 134-135). This idea was also promoted by the theologian Augustine of Hippo in his highly influential book The City of God: “Therefore the Church even now is the kingdom of Christ, and the kingdom of heaven” (Book XX, Chapter 9). This belief became known as amillenialism and is a dominant belief (in different forms) in mainstream Christianity today. After the true biblical teaching of the Kingdom of God was removed, the gospel message was changed from the message about the Kingdom to a message primarily about Jesus Christ. In other words, Christianity kept the name of Jesus Christ, but abandoned His message. Jesus was very clear that professing His name but ignoring His teachings is false worship (Luke 6:46). Preaching the true gospel today The true gospel is not a minor issue. As we have already read, Jesus connected a belief in the true gospel to repentance (Mark 1:15), and the apostle Paul warned that preaching a different gospel brings a curse (Galatians 1:8-9). Believing the true gospel is vital to your salvation! The true gospel is the message of good news about the coming Kingdom of God. It is a message of hope-for this entire world and for you and your family. It is the message that God is building a family that will soon rule the entire earth, bringing peace and happiness. The established Christian churches have lost that true gospel message. I disagree with the kingdom being for later.......IT IS AVAILABLE NOW... Scripture clearly states that Jesus came announcing the kingdom at the inception of His ministry(it is at hand, now right here, He brought it with Him.... With Love, William Allen

Same.

Opposite

I’m listening to as much of his stuff as I can because I believe he’s a false prophet

Dig into his lengthy four volume set!!

@@joebuck4496 Thank you. Would you please tell me the name?

Great comment

Hahaha

He has an almost unique ability to be both a scholar and somebody who sets your heart on fire while speaking. A blessed combination!

Nicholas If God is really God, he can come in any way he wants, including as a man, such as Yeshua.

Indeed Jesus' resurrection does change everything.

Yes he does change everything. That is what the good news does.

Воскресение Иисуса меняет души верующих, послушных Христу

Amen

offcenterconcepthaus Doing a "Dawkins" maybe?

;-) In retrospect, Dawkins' writing "The God Delusion" was the literary equivalent of the Almighty making him eat grass for seven years.

It's called a Strawman Argument (or fallacy, respectively). You build up a fake man to tear down.

+Antonio Perez "Many object to the evils of religion, but if God doesnt exist, what is evil? what does evil refer to? "Simply evil is the word we use to define something that is intentionally wrong or harmful, each person has a subjective view of this however as populations (communities, states, etc) we can make a generalised objective definition of that which the majority deems immoral or wrong."They are just subjective ilusions of human construct, without God man is just beset with delusions of moral grandeur."Yes evil and good are human constructs, descriptors of how general society find behaviours and actions of sentient life. As without providing any proof of God or any deity whatsoever, your assertion stands as a completely pointless statement. It is a non sequitur, your premise does not in any way support your conclusion. If it did however, we can deduce by just taking the moral standards of modern society, and then comparing them with the moral decrees laid down in the old testament, your statement would show there is no God. If however our moral standards were the same as those, laid out in the doctrines of yours, or any religion; we could deduce this religion was morally well ahead of it's time and perhaps this could even be used as reasoning for belief in a deity. However this is not the case."Morality becomes an individual prefrence or a colective choice, just as people prefer chocolate over vanilla, as Michael Ruse said: "The man who says it is morally acceptable to rape little children is just as mistaken as the man who says 2 + 2 = 5"Excellent point. So if your doctrine has a morally good god commending rape then it is as wrong as saying 2+2=5, right? So verses like Isaiah 13:16 and Zechariah 14:2 as just two examples would lead you under your same logic to conclude the doctrine is immoral."Where does the atheist base right and wrong?"Same place as the religious, common consensus. Is killing your first born child good or evil, moral or immoral? What about if you burn them on a pyre? Stone them at the front gates of the city for disobedience?If your doctrine states that God commands something that is obviously immoral or wrong, whether subjectively in your opinion, or objectively in the general opinion of humanity; do you ignore all the rest of humanity and carry on following the ridiculous, archaic and thoroughly immoral and evil doctrine? "And if there is no base, the argument from evil against God is useless it is like cutting of the branch you are sitting on."No, your logic here is just plain faulty, when someone uses the argument from evil they use it to show how an omnibenevolent being cannot possibly exist. Someone using this argument to show that this supposed property of the deity cannot be reconciled with reality, does in no way remove their grounding or understanding of right or wrong, they no more cut away that reality. What they show is the deity as claimed by the bible cannot logically exist within our reality.

PVP Ast “Yes evil and good are human constructs, descriptors of how general society find behaviours and actions of sentient life.” My whole comment was about the consequences of good and evil being mere human constructs. If they are human constructs, they don’t matter objectively. They are subjective and depend on human opinion, we could create a whole new set of moral standarts. Where murder and rape and right, and self interest and self preservation are the only right, after all things we consider immoral happen all the time in the animal kingdom, why think our set of morals are any better, by what authority? “We can deduce by just taking the moral standards of modern society, and then comparing them with the moral decrees laid down in the old testament, your statement would show there is no God.” False, it would show that God is not all good, or all loving and perhaps not all powerful. As a few greek philosophers pointed out. But I never said morals come from the Old Testament. If morals are a human construct they a merely our own opinion on the matter. So really to say the acts in the old testament are wrong, is just to say one does not like what they did. Moral law would either be relative, or a mere social contract, this is wrong because we all got together and said it was wrong, but of course we could all get together again and say it is right. Morality based upon society fails at a fundamental level. To say morality is a human construct is just an elegant way of making an assertion. - “Why is this wrong?” - “Well its wrong because we say its wrong” “If however our moral standards were the same as those, laid out in the doctrines of yours, or any religion; we could deduce this religion was morally well ahead of it's time and perhaps this could even be used as reasoning for belief in a deity.” Now I never claimed that morality comes from the scriptures. If that were the case then God would not be supreme at all, he would have to submit himself to what the text says. Rather the Christian claim is that moral values and duties are founded on the very nature of God himself. A thing is not good, because the bible says its good. And a thing is not good because God says its good (That would make it arbitrary), rather morals are good because God is good. It is his very nature. He is the summum bonum, the greatest good. Excellent point. So if your doctrine has a morally good god commending rape then it is as wrong as saying 2+2=5, right? So verses like Isaiah 13:16 and Zechariah 14:2 as just two examples would lead you under your same logic to conclude the doctrine is immoral Yes I would agree, and I am amused when people take these so called “proof verses” and toss them around, out of their context. Its silly, a layman just does not have the authority to judge and critique a theory of quantum physics, or cosmology. Isaiah 13 and Zechariah 14 are prophesies about the destructions of the nations mentioned, and future events that these prophets lay out in these texts, things that will happen to those people as punishment for their evil, that other nations would do to them. And its very easy to say Aja! God promotes rape! Really? I would say. Where in the passage does it say “Rape is good.” The text isn’t a reflection in the ethics of rape it’s a prophesy of future events, describing things that will happen. John will be murdered. That is not to say, it is good to murder. The argument from evil against God does not work, morality simply has no objective grounds on which to judge a thing as wrong or right, and its use amongst philosophers is ever more decreasing, thanks in part to Alvin Plantinga.

Antonio Perez "My whole comment was about the consequences of good and evil being mere human constructs. If they are human constructs, they don’t matter objectively. They are subjective and depend on human opinion, we could create a whole new set of moral standarts." Yes, I understood your point absolutely, try reading some history. You are completely correct, morals are subjective, they change over time. Objectively however, societies have morals and they change over time. Objectivity is a problem for the religious, understand the word, look it up and read the synonyms I would suggest. "Where murder and rape and right, and self interest and self preservation are the only right, after all things we consider immoral happen all the time in the animal kingdom, why think our set of morals are any better, by what authority?" Laws and morals are social constructs, your comment comes from someone who is so wrapped up in his own societal microcosm that I'm surprised you have any knowledge of the animal kingdom. Social animals, especially primates have very similar "moral" or instinctual rules within their groups. The laws and moral standards are meted out by the authority, or the group. Just as our morals and laws have been developed, initially handed out by strong leader figures and eventually by the general opinion of the society. E.g. Blood sacrifice, Slavery, womens rights, gay rights. "False, it would show that God is not all good, or all loving and perhaps not all powerful. As a few greek philosophers pointed out. But I never said morals come from the Old Testament." Firstly when I referenced God with the capital G, I am talking about a specific deity. Yahwei (or El or Allah, whatever you wish to call the god of Abraham) the doctrines depicting and inventing this deity do describe him as all powerful and all good. "If morals are a human construct they a merely our own opinion on the matter. So really to say the acts in the old testament are wrong, is just to say one does not like what they did." Yes, do you realise you have just agreed with me and admitted the "objective authority" for morals are human constructs? You do realise that don't you? Please say you understand how logic works, even if you fail to employ it correctly. "Isaiah 13 and Zechariah 14 are prophesies about the destructions of the nations mentioned, and future events that these prophets lay out in these texts, things that will happen to those people as punishment for their evil, that other nations would do to them. And its very easy to say Aja! God promotes rape! Really? I would say. Where in the passage does it say “Rape is good.” The text isn’t a reflection in the ethics of rape it’s a prophesy of future events, describing things that will happen. " Point taken, yes supposed divinely inspired prophecy, saying specifically God himself will raise an army Isaiah 13:4 destroy a people "with cruelty and wrath" Isaiah 13:9 and then goes on to describe it in an objectively evil and repugnant way, are just fables right. prophecies never fulfilled and never to be fulfilled. I do get it, do you understand that when I point out these doctrines are supposedly divinely inspired and therefore indicative of the nature of the deity written about, show a lack of morals which just about every society on earth can objectively state are immoral. That is where your "objective morality" is sourced from. I should need not go into blood sacrifice, misogynistic laws, rape, murder etc. However if you wish to engage in just how wrong you are about the morality found in your doctrine, allow me to break you of your misconceptions. "John will be murdered. That is not to say, it is good to murder. " Dead right, however "Yahweh will raise an army to slaughter, enslave and rape", says the nature of Yahweh condones slaughter, rape and slavery. See how it works? "The argument from evil against God does not work, morality simply has no objective grounds on which to judge a thing as wrong or right, and its use amongst philosophers is ever more decreasing, thanks in part to Alvin Plantinga. " I also find the argument from objective morality to support the notion of a non-existent deity doesn't work. The argument from evil is flawed, it assumes a deity. Any deity that is claimed (by the following cult members) as omni-benevolent and omni-potent have to answer the argument from evil. I wont claim to know what you believe, but if you are a Christian and you are picking and choosing what you believe from your own doctrine you best be willing to justify every interpretation. As far as I'm concerned the Bible, Torah and Qu'ran are full of provable inaccuracies, immorality and fabrications, if you are fooled it doesn't make you a bad or even a stupid person, it just makes you easy led and deceived like approximately 4.1 billion others. We are all gullible in some ways after all, you have just chosen to waste your life on this deception.

***** "The argument against god from the existence of evil has far more emotional weight than it does logical. Less anthropocentric understandings of time and causality get rid of the logical problems it presents..." Oh really? Do tell, make sure you define whatever deity you are apologizing for, because if I see the common 'free will' bullshit, when referencing an entity supposedly synonymous with good and all powerful, you know I'm going to shut you down on the logical incongruity therein. So if the entity you profess to believe in has properties at odds with it's very existence, that entity does not exist. If you claim a deity (Christianity and Islam) that has omni-benevolence omnipotence and omniscience, then obviously you have to account for evil as manufactured, supported and preordained by such a deity. "There's a reason that anytime you see a theist philosopher debate against Harris or Hitchens or what have you that the atheist is always bringing up evil, and the theist is always bringing up metaphysics, and the two just dance around each other." You haven't seen a lot of Hitchens' or Harris' debates then. Debate topics have a lot to do with the subjects and arguments brought up in them. Theists will invariably talk metaphysics as whenever the going gets tough, just make some shit up. " Both perspectives have their stomping grounds wherein they are persuasive and respectively each have their fields in which they are unpersuasive." Nonsense, even in philosophy there is that which can be proved to be true and that which can be asserted as true, without proof. When I say a being with omnibenevolence and omnipotence cannot exist in our reality, this is a testable claim. That is the problem of evil: making claim that a deity, that is all powerful and the creating force cannot abide it(evil), yet knows in advance how it shall be brought into being and arranges it to be so.

***** firstly, sorry I didn't reply to this if it was directed at me. Try replying using the reply button and then the person you direct your comment to knows, this is like a discussion you started with your workmate at work and have ended on the bus (they don't take) home. OK that being said I appreciate you have replied to me and can infer this from your previous reply to me directly. Allow me to be a little cutting here, it's tongue in cheek, but still valid. When you say "I've seen most of Hitchen's and Harris' debate (I'm sure there's a couple out there in the dark corners of the internet I've not stumbled across yet though). " I have got to call bullshit, I have watched hundreds of hours of debates with either or both these guys participating and I haven't seen everything. I disagree with your statement "If you watch them debate any theistic philosopher then you're basically signing up to watch the atheist talk about evil and fundamentalist readings of the bible for an hour and a half while the theist talks about the ontological argument and causal necessity for an hour and a half." although valid for some of their debates you have over generalised and that unfortunately would make you either ignorant or a liar, I try not to jump to assuming malicious intent, so would just encourage to watch more, perhaps the titles of the videos and debate topics can guide you to find debates with these gentlemen that do not fall into such a category. "The rhetorical position of the atheist is far more appealing to the culture, that much is obvious (of course, so is Trump's candidacy somehow or another)." Did you in all honesty analogize Trumps candidacy and atheism? do you honestly believe that atheism holds any position of rhetoric in regards to the existence of god(s)? No these are not rhetorical questions before you gloss over them. Either you are straw-manning a phantom rhetorical position not presented, or you are being entirely dishonest here. "Your mindset (the little of it I can gather from your reply) is exactly that which I was intending to critique as overly narrow and unimaginative to deal with ethics, logic, and metaphysics at the level this debate ought to be taking part." Nice generalised assertion again. So allow me to paraphrase: you are saying my attitudes and thoughts when regarding theism, evil, morals and the metaphysical are too restricted to understand the topic. Utter nonsense. With regard to ethics and logic, while not holding a degree in philosophy I am educated to a second year tertiary level, that's considerably better than most people. Please quote what I have commented that leads you to believe the nonsense above regarding ethics and logic. In regards to metaphysics, you may be right, I am pretty dismissive of anyone turning to any unprovable source with no evidence as the backbone of their argument. If you don't know it, don't assert it and in the case of metaphysics that's any assertion on the topic at all. Just a reminder, hit "reply" so I see your post is to me.

I felt the same. There’s no Gospel until we see our corruption in the mirror of the Law

i didn't get the sense he slinked away, he said essentially "i'm referring to rebellion in a much broader sense, your question is a great one but beyond the scope of this talk, and we can chat after if you like."

He resisted giving a quick answer to a complex question with a lot of back story. Jesus often did not directly answer the question, he asked a question or told a story.

He didn't "slink away"! He kept the program from getting completely derailed by a very specific issue w/ a complex answer upon which Christians themselves disagree. One could do a whole series of talks addressing same-sex attraction & relationships in the Bible. I know, because I have done them myself. You (& the woman asking the question) want pat answers (so you both know whether or not to dismiss what he says based on your litmus test?), but one thing that wisdom ISN'T, is quick & easy. You want fast food, while wisdom is like a slow cooker or one of those food preparations that takes days, weeks, or even months.

I noticed that incomplete sentence in the description, too! LOL I agree that Wright is a brilliant man. I only just discovered him this year just before Easter! IDK how he wasn't on my radar sooner.

@@DonnaBrooks yeah, a powerhouse. Tons of youtube content. Our Mens study worked through “After You Believe” which was substantive and motivating. His take on what Heaven will be and how we are, now and in that time to come, to function as God’s stewards of good… 👍🏻

Did he though? Is that time stamp correct?

@@marendse6561 Listen from 12:47

_He said that Holy Spirit is just a force._ To be fair, he doesn't here say the Holy Spirit is ONLY a force.

Look for all the other things he said. Doesn't jump into conclusions so fast ;)

He's saying that "wrath" is essentially the natural order of things; Decay, failure, pride in excess, and on. Believing leads to salvation, at which point the person who the is saved (by believing in the Gospel) enters a new mode of being. This new mode of being is, in fact, the unity between heaven and earth, aka, the Church (not the buildings, but the humans themselves). At this point the believer is under a supernatural order, no longer the natural order, which is still under wrath. This isn't God saying he wants to punish people who don't believe: Paul (formerly Saul) didn't believe, and God didn't smite him down with wrath. Actually, God loved Saul as he loves us all, and from this Saul changed (his name became Paul) and wrote more than half of the New Testament after first having a career in leading armies persecuting Christians. The will of God towards unbelievers is clear: Love them and be ever-waiting for them to come to Him. But those that don't inevitably remain under the natural order of the world, which is suffering, pain, wrath. Yes, it is God's wrath, but He gives us a way out from under it. God, unlike all of us, is justified in being wrathful at humans destroying his world and themselves. But in His love he provides a way to reconcile us back to Him. That's what that verse is about.

@@stephenhall7493 Excellent comment. Hello from 2023 :-)

I think that's exactly what some christians would say about you.

depends what you mean by 'soon' or 'quickly'. The universe is how many billion years old? :-)

God's understanding of time is a little different than ours

What about the contributions that believers in those 'doubtful claims' have made toward the well-being of humanity. It's called Western Civilization and has its basis in the judeo-christian vision.

When you say waiting for 2,000 years, you realise you're referring to the time when God walked among us? The Planet is counting time around the coming of Christ :-)

To add to your comment John Linden, many people (including Christians) don't understand that much of the bible is not literal, especially Revelations. Even Jesus taught the people in parables. NT Wright gives an understanding of the bible through understanding idioms of the ancient times, metaphors and more. The message of the gospel isn't that Christ is returning, but that He has reconciled all people to him, bringing heaven to earth, enabling us to love our neighbor as our self. That is the true test of the gospel. Jesus said Love the Lord your God with all your heart and your neighbor as yourself. I conclude that this is the true message of Christ, Love!

*****, "scored you points with Jesus"? Another Arminian... -.-

*****, who are you talking to?

laugh? was someone telling a joke? i must of missed it, you see my hair isnt naturally black.... I dye it. I call it Artificial intelligence 👾lol

hahaha....are you Actually serious? dang that was my best joke.....always makes people laugh even if i know there just really laughing at me but still their laughing maybe i mis read the tone f your sentence you dont laugh much do you?..... Was this not a rhetorical question or statement?

What precisely is preposterous about it?

Ian Sun I am also disappointed he avoided the question (perhaps he did not know the background behind it), but that doesn't mean he had nothing to say. Applying the principle of wisdom, it might be perfectly clear that treating a minority group of people as subhuman is not the purpose of the law, and some fears/taboos may be ungrounded, unhelpful and even become socially disruptive, EVEN IF prohibiting those activities seemed grounded in the past - and the past that we read about in the Bible is not exempt.

Ian Sun He avoided the question because it was largely off topic, and in addition, he's wise enough not to argue a position he doesn't have. Look up NT Wright: On Homosexual Marriage. He discusses his position on that issue on screen for you, and I think you'll understand his rather humble reasons for not going about that issue directly. And he didn't say as clearly what he meant here as he's said elsewhere. He is human, after all. He was discussing rebellion against God's ways for humanity, not rebelling against what are probably societal norms from the past that are changing. There's a difference.

+Ian Sun He didn't flip flop. He admirably stated flat out that he wasn't going to deal with an issue that was off topic and brought up out of obvious hostility.

+K C attempt at humor?

+K C I don't want to make unwarranted assumptions.....you would think that google employees would be too smart to believe in the nonsense of evolution?

+K C I love a great joke. please share.

Thank about all the idiots who have believed in God- Augustine, Pascal, Faraday, Newton, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky.

@@kennethisbell4037 I will thank them.