Peter & John’s Gospel Education
This comes from N.T. Wright’s Acts for Everyone Part One, but it reads like a paragraph out of a novel. A historically-true, gospel-centered, heart-thumping novel that reflects the kind of “education” a seminary grad can only pray for and aspire to.
Peter and John had a secret–a secret that enabled them to run rings round the book-learning of the authorities. They had been with Jesus. They had been with him night and day. They had seen and heard him pray. They knew how he read the scriptures, in his fresh, creative way, drawing out their inner message and finding his own vocation in the middle of it.
Now that he had died and had then been astonishingly raised, and had then been exalted into the heavenly realm, all Peter and John had to do to explain what they were about was to develop the lines of thought they had heard him use over and over again.
This didn’t just give them “boldness” in the sense of courage to stand up and say what they thought. Sometimes people can be bold even when they’re muddled. It gave them something more: a clarity, a sharp edge, a definite point at which to stand. And the authorities knew it.
April 19th, 2008 at 1:11 pm
Excellent passage. Thanks for sharing it. I need to bone up on my Wright ASAP.
April 20th, 2008 at 12:00 am
Interesting, though the gospels reveal the disciples had no clue what Christ talked about until the Spirit came upon them–a fact that John repeats himself over and over throughout his testimony.
Thankfully, the same Spirit who rested on them to give clarity and courage comes to us if we ask.
April 21st, 2008 at 6:02 pm
@ Ryan, you’re more than welcome. I had a friend who kept telling me to read N.T. Wright. Took me a couple years to take his advice, unfortunately–but as a scholar and writer, Wright is a rare gift to the church.
@ Benjamin, good point.The disciples must have had the amazing experience of the Spirit “reinterpreting” everything they had heard and experienced when they were with Jesus. With inspired hindsight, those days must have come alive! It’s a relief we have the same Spirit, if not the same internship experience, huh?
April 21st, 2008 at 10:02 pm
Aye, I wonder what a Jesus walking tour would do to us. Yet, similarly, isn’t that the beauty we are given? A spiritual walk that takes us into greater movements of faith?? “Blessed are those who don’t see and believe” and all that good stuff.
Ever read anything by Richard Wurmbrand and the Voice of the Martyrs? An interesting parallel study (esp. for church planters) would be the Underground Church and the Acts Church. Wurmbrand said, “I’ve only found truly joyful Christians in the Bible, in the Underground Church, and in prison.”
Blessings.