Westminster Bible Companion: First and Second Corinthians NOW IN PRE-PUB
Westminster Bible Companion: First and Second Corinthians
The final volume for this great series is finally available... Lets get it under contract ASAP.
-Dan
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Done. Thanks for posting.
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Done and BUMP!
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Below is a review picked up off of GoodReads. She gave it 5 stars and offers some of her favourite quotes.
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What Christians do must be shaped by what God has done for us. Our living should be a response to the life of Christ within.
This bible study is based on the bible alone. Scripture alone is what I appreciated as I went thru both books. Given a short scripture reading followed by the context of what was written was refreshing. I love that when a bible study is done that way. It is not based on the culture, but just the opposite. In doing so, it is reflection for all generations that gives hope. Being true to scripture also gives the reader an appreciation for the work of Christ and how Christ used the Apostle Paul in building up the church. The warnings for the church and reason behind the warnings. Despite popular belief, Paul was a very humble man, humbled by the work of Christ that he desires to pass on to the church of Christ. The strength of unity in the body of Christ. The unity based on the work of Christ and not for unity sake.
Some of my favorite quotes are as follows.- The church does not belong to its members, its mentors, or its missionaries. The more surely we know this, the more truly we shall serve. As so often in Scripture, this thought should give God's people both humility and confidence. Confidence comes form belonging to God, in Christ. Humility is needed, because nothing apart from God can give us true security or status.
- We cannot fulfill that calling if we hide away from people whose lifestyles offend.
- Paul did not want Christians to use an unreliable judicial system against each other.
- Our bodies are a venue for the Spirit to occupy. So a Christian's body is sacred space and is not to be treated carelessly or casually.
- Christian life is lived in relationship. Love binds Christians to God, and this same love for God connects us to each other.
- For we know in our living that forgives, the mending of damaged relationships, is neither easy nor cheap. Someone has to bridge the gap, handle the tension, and bear the pain if there is to be true reconciliation. God has done this for the world at the cross of Jesus.
The Corinthians was a body of believers that struggled with the same struggles that we do. Relationships and living Godly lives that separate us from the rest of the non believing world. We do not always get it right, but we have Jesus that did get it right for us. Our striving should be resting in his work.
A Special Thank You to Westminister John Knox Press and Netgalley for the ARC and the opportunity to post an honest review.0 -
Review from http://www.reform-magazine.co.uk/ :
Commentary on Corinthians
First and Second Corinthians
John Proctor
Westminster John Knox Press
£15This book is part of The Westminster Bible Companion Series, which is intended to help lay people “read the Bible more clearly and intelligently” and thus address the issues of daily life and be helped in their teaching ministry. Many of us look to books like this one for help as we prepare to lead worship, Bible study or take time for personal devotion.
As a lay preacher, I look to commentaries to, amongst other things: Give me facts about the context of the book and its writer and/or audience, provide themes and greater understanding of words or phrases, and provide pointers to aid my own reflections on the links with the 21st Century world in which we live and minister.
In John Proctor’s commentary, the introduction, with its information about Corinth in the First Century – its geography, social, religious and cultural context – is all one could hope for. The introduction to Second Corinthians draws the distinction between the two books. All of this is written in an easy and accessible style. By the end of the introductions, I was drawn into the story, ready and eager to read on and discover what the letters contain and how they might speak to us today.
The relatively short reflections relating to passages of varying length contain impressive amounts of information, e.g. the background to specific names, the shades of meaning of Greek words and theories relating to particular customs of the time. There are comments on Paul’s use of language and writing style to make his point. Mr Proctor suggests that Paul’s tone ranges from direct to challenging to personal and even to, on occasion, ironic. Again the writing is clear, dealing with the complex thinking of the letters but always making the important links with our world today.
This book certainly fulfills the series’ promise and would be an excellent place to start learning more about the letters to the Corinthians and what they say to us in our context. I am delighted to be able to add the book to my bookshelf as an additional resource in preparations for leading worship.
Val Morrison is a lay preacher and church elder serving in Doncaster. She is a former moderator of the United Reformed Church General Assembly.
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BUMP. Looks like this has stalled a bit. Not sure why Logos doesn't just automatically complete commentary series, especially when there is only one volume left.
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That would make sense... but FL have their PP sytem they like to stick too.... they have tried a PreOrder system for 2 new fortress works.... if that is successful who knows maybe they can revise some items in PP. A whole lot of people just want access to a book asap, if they cannot buy it in FL they will go buy it in amazon. I have little doubt FL looses a significant number of sales to amazon each month, and i think it is only going to get worse unless something changes, which might be why they are exploring other options.
-dan
PS:I bet if an email announcing the availability of this volume was sent out to all owners of the current set we could get this under contract in few weeks.... a set missing one volume is frustrating when the volume has been out for a couple years.
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I've been in for awhile.
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Well may only have been available for a couple months but I honestly thought it would have gone green fast... I remember a few years back hearing a complain about a perceived lack of 1 Corinthians commentaries and one would guess that most owners of the set would want to complete it. Now of course it is not an overly technical commentary but i have found much benefit from the use of the WBC For me it easily makes it into my top 5 series...
-dan
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I would be helpful if Faithlife would advertise it more. It could be that people don't know it's there if they're not on the Forums or don't check the store for new pre-pubs on a regular basis. I didn't receive an email or a notification on the Logos homepage that this was available, I just happened to see your post in the Forums.
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That's why I am bumping it, for the occasional forum user who might catch it, There is no ideal answers ads in the program can be a double edged sword and I have mine turned off, also many don't like emails.
-dans
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BUMP
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It is definitely making progress but at this rate we will be lucky to see it under contract by summer which would mean likely seeing it shipping late fall... oh well bit by bit it's a coming.
-Dan
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Bump!
Westminster Bible Companion: First and Second Corinthians
New month, still not under contract....
-dan
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Dan Francis said:
We had enough to get the rest of this fine series made, I find it my favourite devotional style commentary. But more than a devotional work it does offer great insights of contemporary scholarship. Here are a couple of samples of other volumes in the series for anyone not owning the set but wanting to take a chance on this yet to be developed volume to give you a sense of the series and what you can expect.
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This identity as aliens and exiles is formed from two ingredients: the way the Christians view themselves and the way society perceives them. The two are not unrelated, as the writer will show.
The place to begin, says verse 11, is with one’s own integrity. Interestingly, this is also the beginning point for James (4:1). That all have inner struggles is a common acknowledgment. Jewish theology called it the battle between two spirits within us, the spirit of good and the spirit of evil. Paul referred to it sometimes as flesh versus spirit (Gal. 5:16–17) and sometimes the law of God versus the law in one’s members (Rom. 7:22–23). Our text sees the struggle as between flesh and soul. Two cautions are in order: One, “flesh” in such contexts is not the equivalent of “body,” as though the physical body were by its nature evil and a source of evil. Not so. The body is God’s creation, and forms of spirituality that deny or seek to escape the body contradict both creation and incarnation; that is, God has come to us in a physical body, Jesus of Nazareth. While the human body is sometimes referred to as the flesh in a physical sense, in the ethical vocabulary of the New Testament, including 1 Peter 2:11, “flesh” refers to the human ego in pursuit of gratification and in that pursuit placing greater value on created things than on the Creator. This indulgence may be of the body, the mind, or even of the spirit. To regard one’s own pleasures as primary, whatever they are and whether or not they are socially or even religiously approved, is to live according to the flesh. The spirit or soul seeks the mind of God and the good of others.
The second caution is that the search for integrity, the conquest of the desires of the flesh, is not an end in itself. One could spend a lifetime tinkering with one’s soul—more time alone, more retreats, more self-judgment, more self-improvement, more searching for one’s center—and at the end have no record of self-denial in the quest for the other’s good, no risky investment in altering the oppressive conditions under which others live, no voice raised in the public forum of conflicting values. Religious self-centeredness is seeking to save one’s life and that, even if it is called spirituality, is finally fatal. Recall Jesus’ recital of the final judgment (Matt. 25:31–46). Those who are invited to spend eternity in the joy of the Lord are totally surprised. Such are the saints: They are self-forgetful.
Perhaps for this reason the author of our text moves quickly to matters social and political. The call is for conduct that, even in the face of verbal abuse, is so favorably impressive that one’s attackers will praise God on the day of God’s visitation (the nrsv translates as “when he comes to judge” a word that refers to official oversight or superintending, often translated “being a bishop”). This is to say, let your life among your neighbors and in the community be such as to turn their minds toward the God who inspires and informs your behavior. This is a difficulty of some magnitude. We know the source of this instruction: “Let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven” (Matt. 5:16), but that makes its implementation no easier. What is demanded is not simply good works but such activity carried out in a manner and with an attitude that prompts the critical observer to praise not the doer but God. Some think that to expect evangelistic effectiveness from Christian conduct is naive. Perhaps so, but Christian history bears many examples of the persuasiveness of the benevolent and forgiving life, just as it does of the failure of the witness of churches that are satisfied with self-serving programs.
We cannot know exactly what is involved in doing honorable (good) works and as a result being maligned for doing evil works (v. 12). It could be simply explained as another case of misinterpreting every act and word of those who are hated or viewed with suspicion. Or perhaps we have a case of guilt by misidentification. There were many religious groups in Asia Minor, some of which were politically subversive. For example, “benefit clubs” were organizations of poor people who banded together to help each other, but on occasion civil disobedience and violence against local governments erupted. Some other cults, such as the Bacchae, held nocturnal orgies in worshiping the god of pleasure. Quite possibly local citizens heard of the Christian groups and concluded, “Another one of those troublesome religions.” We do know that there were charges that Christians met secretly and practiced incest and cannibalism, accusations most likely stemming from distorted interpretations of love feasts and the Eucharist. Even so, we must not idealize the early church. At the beginning of the second century, the governor of Bithynia and Pontus, when investigating “Christian clubs,” found more who admitted to once having been Christian than he did those who were presently committed to the faith. And most likely, then as now, there were enough in the churches engaged in unacceptable behavior to bring down criticism on the entire assembly.
nrsv New Revised Standard Version
Fred B. Craddock, First and Second Peter and Jude, ed. Patrick D. Miller and David L. Bartlett, Westminster Bible Companion (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1995), 41–43.
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DO NOT LOVE THE WORLD
1 John 2:15–17
2:15–17 After the tightly organized message of encouragement in 2:12–14, the reader next encounters this much more loosely structured warning. The Christian readers may have conquered the evil one, but they still need to be admonished about the seduction of the world that is ruled by the evil one (1 John 5:19). It is not a harsh admonition, but it reminds us once again of 1 John’s way of seeing everything in terms of stark oppositions: one can love God or one can love the world; but no one can love both. The reasons for this are spelled out in terms of absolute contrast between God and the world, with no room allowed for middle ground.
The contrast between God and the world in 1 John may be the sharpest in the entire New Testament. As in the Gospel of John, 1 John can present the world both as the object of God’s love and salvation (1 John 2:2; 4:9, 14; see John 3:16–17; 6:33, 51; 12:46–47), and as fundamentally opposed to God and to the Christ sent to save it, and to those who believe in him (1 John 3:1, 13; 4:4–5; 5:4–5, 19; in the Gospel of John, see, for example, 8:23; 15:18–19; 16:8–11, 33; 17:9–16, 25). This understanding of the world reflects a distinct set of ideas: that God created the world and sent Christ to save the human world specifically; but that the human world rejected him as its redeemer. It is the human world—not the natural creation as such—that is understood as maintaining an organized opposition to God, one that results in hatred and oppression among human beings. Much of this is simply presupposed in 1 John, rather than being set out as thoroughly as it is in the Fourth Gospel. From the texts in 1 John alone it would be easy to get the impression that the created world in its essence is opposed to God, an idea closer to the thinking of ancient gnosticism.
It is not simply “the world”—the whole human system opposed to God—that the readers are warned not to love, but “the things in the world.” Before we can jump to the conclusion that this refers to the created objects in the world as such, the author specifies what he means by “all that is in the world.” The three phrases that he uses to do this are not as clear as we might wish; but they all speak of “desire” or “pride,” that is, of human responses to things in the world, not of the things themselves. We are warned against loving, not the created objects, but our own desire for them. This desire and pride do not come from God, the Creator of the objects, but from the world, the human system of self-centeredness that always seeks its own gratification rather than the glory of its Creator. In the words of Thomas Merton, “Instead of worshipping God through His creation we are always trying to worship ourselves by means of creatures.”
This seems to be the general sense of the passage; but we can be more specific about the three phrases in verse 16. They speak of desire or pride that derives from the flesh, the eyes, and riches, respectively. “The desire of the flesh” does not mean desire for the flesh, but desire that originates in the flesh. The latter term flesh can also have a variety of meanings. It can mean the human body, but that is not really its sense here; nor does it refer specifically to sexuality in this context. Unlike other passages in the Gospel and letters of John, it also does not mean human nature as such, in contrast to the divine (compare 1 John 4:2 and 2 John 7). Rather, as in many other New Testament contexts, it means something similar to “the world,” although on a more individual level rather than a universal one. It means the force in human nature that drives us to center on ourselves and our own wants, rather than on the needs of others or the will of God. We find similar references to the “desires of the flesh” in Galatians 5:16, 24; Ephesians 2:3; 1 Peter 2:11 (similarly, “worldly passions” in Titus 2:12), and in other ancient moral writers, Christian, Jewish, and pagan. “The desire of the eyes” is a more difficult expression, not really paralleled anywhere else. Perhaps it means desire as stimulated by the senses, in contrast to desire originating inwardly (“the flesh”). “The pride in riches” is clearer. The word translated “riches” (originally meaning “life,” and then “means of living”; a different word is used for eternal life) also occurs in 3:17, where the nrsv renders it “goods.” The danger here is no doubt also the same as it is there, that material possessions loom so large for us that they make us arrogant (whether we feel arrogant or not!) and cut us off from people in need.
Unlike the other New Testament passages noted above, 1 John does not speak of multiple “desires” but of “desire” itself. The thought is similar to James 4:1–4. The self-centered desire that “comes not from the Father” makes us friends with the world, which in this sense means friends only of ourselves. We want what we want: this slogan is used to sell us cars, clothes, food, and appliances. It works very well, too, because the culture of the “developed nations” today has no sense of anything that ought to restrain or oppose personal and corporate desire. “I want it” is considered an automatic justification for anything we acquire (sometimes dressed up as “I deserve it,” which may or may not be true). Hence we have an entire industry (television) that exists for no other reason than to increase “the desire of the eyes.” Jesus’ teaching that “You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matt. 6:24) is likely to be met with a blank stare from those who have never heard that there is any God but mammon. Speaking the Christian message of self-giving rather than self-enhancement, of love rather than desire, of God rather than ourselves, has become like whistling into a very loud wind, a hurricane of advertising, entertainment, and political marketing. Who will hear it? How can we shout it loudly enough? We get some unwanted help from ecological disasters, which suggest that the created world will not bear what the human world wants to load onto it. But in the end the message can best be promoted by putting it into action in our own lives—which is what 1 John calls for. Perhaps the church needs more Amish and fewer marketeers.
The either-or choice of values that 1 John offers us is expressed most sharply by the question, “Whom do you love?” Or, as Jesus phrased it, “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matt. 6:21). If those who love the world do not have the love of God in themselves, this need not mean that they are blasphemers or blatantly hostile to religion. Our author insists that the love of God cannot be separated from love for our brothers and sisters (2:5–6, 9–11; 3:16–17; 4:7–21). Those who love the world, that is, who love their own desires, lose sight of a love that extends beyond themselves, reaching up to the God who made and redeemed them and out to the other people who need them. The teaching of our culture is, “If only I had that, I would be what I long to be.” The teaching of 1 John, of Jesus, of Paul, and of a multitude of heroes and heroines of the Christian faith, is, “If only I gave that away, I would be what I was made to be.” For “the world and its desire are passing away” (2:17). They have no permanence, despite their evident solidity. It is not so much that they are transient by nature as that they belong to the “darkness,” to the lack of love that is also passing away as the light of the new era brought in by Jesus Christ prevails (2:8). What will last is what is in accord with the will of God; and that will, as 1 John never tires of saying, is love.
nrsv New Revised Standard Version
David Rensberger, The Epistles of John, ed. Patrick D. Miller and David L. Bartlett, Westminster Bible Companion (Louisville, KY; London; Leiden: Westminster John Knox Press, 2001), 32–35.
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Please consider completing you WBC or if you are not an owner of the set possibly add this one off to your library if it is half as good as the series is on whole i don't think you will be disappointed. And remember as always if you really don't like it you can return it within 30 days.
-dan
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Bump still need a lot more orders. Sad that the final volume of this series is having such a hard time getting made.
Dan
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BUMP. Come on Logos, just go ahead and complete this series. These commentaries are pretty short.
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I am not sure if Bob Pritchett had anything to do with the NBBC upgrade series going under development or not but it went from lower than this volume to under development. Hopefully this one can do the same and Faithlife will have the complete WBCompanion series to offer.
-dan
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Under development now...
https://www.logos.com/product/136787/westminster-bible-companion-first-and-second-corinthians
So time to get in on the PrePub price. This will be my last posting to the thread.
-dan
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YAY!
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Thanks Dan for your persistence in highlighting this title.
Dan Francis said:Under development now...
https://www.logos.com/product/136787/westminster-bible-companion-first-and-second-corinthians
So time to get in on the PrePub price. This will be my last posting to the thread.
-dan
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Today is the day!!!!!
Ships 8/25/2017 Westminster Bible Companion: First and Second Corinthians 0
