Hello and welcome to the scriptures a real podcast. This is the podcast where we talk about elements of the scriptures that have become real to us because we believe that helps us apply them to our lives better and we can draw more power out of them that way. I'm your host, Kerry Mealstein, and today we're having a special roundtable discussion, a discussion on Paul that we'll get into in just a second,

but I have two guests with me today. One of them is a returning guest, Dr. Gaye Stratharne,

who is a specialist in New Testament Studies, did her studies at Claremont graduate school, has been an

associate department chair in the Department of Ancient Scripture, the department I'm in, and is now

the associate dean in the College of Religious Education, the college that I'm in. But more than

that is just a great person, a great friend, and I think a profound scholar, she always has deep and thoughtful

things to say, no pressure gay. And then we have with us also, I think it's our first time

to hear from him, but I hope not our last Dr. Lincoln Blue Mel, who is also a close friend and

did his degree at the university of his PhD at the

University of Toronto. Also in, I think Greek and early Christianity, if I remember right,

you'll have to correct me if I'm wrong and is the head of our graduate program in religious

education. So welcome to both of you. Great to be here. Thanks, Carrie.

So maybe we can say, Lincoln, what else should we know about you? And then we'll give Gay a chance to talk. Well, I love digging in Egypt with you. And so if there are any, when we go to Egypt, I love there as long as some Greek or Coptic texts, it's, it's fantastic. So we'll do a lot for you can Coptic paparology and epigraphy.

It's fun to take Lincoln and we go to these storage magazines and people say, oh, you can read this and they give them things and it looks like Lincoln's in a candy story. He's just so happy looking at this stuff. So good. And Gay, what else did I leave out or should we know? Oh, I don't think you left out too much. It is graduate, Claremont Graduate University.

They changed the name halfway through.

I apologize.

And, yeah, I love the Bible. I love studying it. I have from a very, very young age.

And I believe the Bible to be the Word of God as far as it was translated correctly. So I'm happy to chat anything about the Bible, but

particularly Paul. So thanks for inviting them. You're welcome. And I guess our audience can

probably tell that Gay is from Australia Australia and Lincoln is from Canada.

So I am in the minority today as someone from the U.S.

So anyway, it's good.

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