Last week I concluded this term’s run of Theology Matters seminars at ChristChurch London. All this year we are looking at the gospels and the links for the sessions are all below, if you’d like to catch up. We will cover the final four sessions in the Autumn, looking at Jesus’ miracles and his death and resurrection.

In last week’s session we attempted something rather foolish – looking at Jesus’ teaching on the Temple and the Torah in 90 minutes! Chris Oldfield taught some great meaty content on Temple and Incarnation and barely scratched the surface. And I opened up a few thoughts on what it meant for Jesus to fulfil the Law.

But in case you want to dig deeper, here are a few recommendations for where to go to get into more depth:

Temple

On the subject of Temple, I would really recommend checking out G.K. Beale’s The Temple and the Church’s Mission which is a really brilliant book, looking at the expanding dwelling place of God, from Eden to Tabernacle to Temple to the entire renewed Earth.

It’s not always the easiest of books, but Beale has recently released a popularised version, God Dwells Among Us, which is much shorter and hopefully more accessible. I haven’t read it, but assuming the content is as good as the full version, I’m sure it would be worth checking out!

I preached a sermon a few years back on John 1: The Word Become Flesh, which picked up some of the ideas of incarnation and music, which Chris talked about on Sunday. And this talk looks at how Revelation 21-22 depicts the New Creation in terms of a renewed Temple.

Torah

On the subject of Law and how that affects Christians today, I would recommend Thomas Schreiner’s 40 Questions on Christians and Biblical Law.

Also worth checking out are commentaries on the Sermon on the Mount, for example by D.A. Carson and John Stott.

On top of that there’s a whole list of recommended reading on the gospels here. Enjoy!

Theology Matters: The Gospels

Here are the recordings and handouts for the sessions so far:

1. Context: What is the historical background of the gospels (Liam Thatcher)
2. Genre: What are gospels and how should we read them? (Liam Thatcher)
3. Purpose: Matthew and Mark (Liam Thatcher and Andy Tuck)
4. Purpose: Luke and John (Liam Thatcher)
5. The Big Story: Kingdom  (Liam Thatcher)
6. The Little Stories: Parables (Liam Thatcher)
7. Symbols: Monotheism and Election (Liam Thatcher and Andy Tuck)
8. Symbols: Temple and Torah (Chris Oldfield and Liam Thatcher)

Image: Torah by Lawrie Cate, used under CC BY 2.0