Hey, this is John at Bible Project and today Tim and I bring to you part two of our live conversation

in Dallas, Texas discussing how to read the letters of the New Testament.

Reading New Testament letters is like listening to one side of a film conversation.

This film conversation is going to make a lot more sense when we understand it's context.

What the people on the other side of the line are dealing with, thinking about day to day,

one important piece of context is how the Jesus movement was bringing together a multi-ethnic group of people

all to be united as one.

This multi-ethnic group is following a Jewish leader who saw himself filling Israel's story

so how can a movement that's been so centered around Israel's story become multi-ethnic?

And so what you're going to see, the apostles see themselves in the moment painted for us by the ending of the book of Isaiah.

They see themselves acting out the script of the last page of the Isaiah scroll and bringing in the nations as an offering

so that they can join the priesthood.

And it's not just the expansion of Israel, it's the realization of God's promise to Abraham all along.

He would be the father of a multitude of nations who will experience the blessings of the new creation.

When we see this theme emerge in all of the letters, something should pop out at us.

While we don't live in the same situation as for century Christians dealing with the things that they dealt with in particular,

we as Christians are still called to be united in love despite all of our differences.

And so it seems to me understanding how the letters fit in, this has immense potential, I think, for the followers of Jesus today.

Because this isn't just about theology and ethics, this is about getting people to elevate their allegiance to Jesus over their socio-economic, national, ethnic, gender boundary lines.

That's all ahead today on this episode. Thanks for joining us. Here we go.

All right. We are here. We are back.

So we're going. We are talking about how to read the New Testament letters.

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