{"id":1306,"date":"2010-12-23T12:46:05","date_gmt":"2010-12-23T12:46:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/2010\/12\/a-normal-christian-life--part-nine.html"},"modified":"2010-12-23T12:46:05","modified_gmt":"2010-12-23T12:46:05","slug":"a-normal-christian-life-part-nine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/12\/a-normal-christian-life-part-nine.html","title":{"rendered":"A Normal Christian Life—- Part Nine"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Thumbnail<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

It was, without
\nquestion, a shock to my system.  <\/span>My wife
\nand I moved to England for my doctoral work in 1977.   <\/span>I came as a person on the way to ‘full
\nordination’ in the United Methodist Church in America.   <\/span>Now the two churches I had been part of
\nsince birth, Wesley Memorial UMC in High Point, N.C. and Myers Park UMC in
\nCharlotte, N.C. were both large churches with very traditional liturgy.  <\/span>I had been raised a high church Methodist,
\nwho regularly partook of the creeds, the responsive readings, the Gloria Patri,
\nthe Doxology, the reading of several Scriptures, Holy Communion, the sermons,
\nthe prayers of the people,  <\/span>the offering,
\nand of course the singing including both congregation hymn singing and anthems
\netc. by the choir.  <\/span>I was used to robed
\nministers and liturgically rich services.  
\n<\/span>When I got to Durham England, I was nearly immediately put on the Durham
\nand  <\/span>Darlington circuits as
\npreacher,  <\/span>but what I found in these
\nvarious churches was a shock.   <\/span>Their
\nworship services consisted of the ‘hymn sandwich’  <\/span>as they put- 
\n<\/span>a hymn, and a prayer, and a hymn, and a Scripture, and a hymn and a
\nsermon, and a hymn, and an offering, and a hymn.  <\/span>Did I mention hymns!   <\/span>And we sang lots of verses of lots of hymns (often
\nto tunes I had never heard before, and some of which I never wish to hear
\nagain).    <\/span>I love and loved music, having
\nbeen a musician all my life, but this was like going to a song fest and hoping
\na worship service broke out.   <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I
\nasked my senior pastor at Elvet Methodist in Durham—- How come it’s like
\nthis?  <\/span>He explained in some detail that
\nMethodists in England had to define their ethos and identity over against the
\ndominant Church of England, as well as the highly liturgical Catholic Church.  <\/span>The result was very low-church Protestantism.  <\/span>I was even told ‘Don’t ask them to recite a
\ncreed’  <\/span>they will think you are a closet
\nAnglican or Catholic’.    <\/span>Wow.   <\/span>In America by contrast, where there was no
\nhigh church denomination dominating the religious landscape, Methodists didn’t
\nfeel they needed to denude the service of liturgy.   <\/span>They could just be themselves as Mr. Wesley
\nhad encouraged.  <\/span>Indeed, he had even
\nencouraged them for years to go to both the Methodist and the Anglican
\nservices.   <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

To
\nask what spiritual formation looks like for Methodist individuals depends on
\nwhere they are located, and what sort of Methodism they have experienced.   <\/span>Methodism in Singapore doesn’t look the same
\nas Methodism in India, or in Zimbabwe or in England, or in Estonia or in
\nAmerica.   <\/span>I know, because I’ve been to
\nall those places and many more where there are Methodists.   <\/span>Because of these varieties of Methodist
\npractices, we must concentrate in this second half of the book  <\/span>on things both the Bible and Mr. Wesley
\nsuggested all good Methodists should do to improve and grow their spiritual
\nlives.  <\/span>The right place to start is with
\nwhat Wesley says about ‘the Means of Grace’.  
\n<\/span>What are the means of grace for ordinary, normal Methodists? <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

WESLEY
\nON THE MEANS OF GRACE<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

            <\/span><\/span><\/b>One of the
\nquestions John Wesley regularly had to answer during the revival in the 18th<\/sup>
\ncentury is— since salvation comes through preaching the Gospel, do we have
\nany need of, and are there any ‘ordinances’ 
\n<\/span>we must follow?   <\/span> <\/span>By this question was meant, are there any
\nmeans of grace ordained by God that Christians are obliged to use and practice
\nin order to grow in Christ, or do they just need to keep listening to the
\npreacher, since preaching and hearing was how grace and the new birth came to
\npeople in the first place?   <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Before
\nwe answer that question, it is important to note that Wesley believed that
\npreaching the Word of God is indeed a means of grace.  <\/span>He would want to do nothing to minimize
\nthat.  <\/span> <\/span>To those worshiping at Bedside Baptist or
\nPosturpedic Presbyterian or St. Mattress Methodist, which is to say, staying at
\nhome in bed on Sunday, Wesley exhorted such lazy Christians that while they can
\ncome in contact with general revelation in all of creation, the one place they
\ncan most assuredly come in contact with the special revelation of the Gospel is
\nin church, or in revival meetings, and they dare not neglect the
\npreaching.   <\/span>But what of other means of
\ngrace?<\/span><\/p>\n

            <\/span>At the beginning of his famous sermon on ‘The Means of
\nGrace’ Wesley rightly cautions about the danger of mistaking ‘the means’  <\/span>for ‘the ends’.   <\/span>He warns that <\/span><\/p>\n

“Some began to mistake the means<\/i>
\nfor the end<\/i>, and to place religion rather in doing those outward works,
\nthan in a heart renewed after the image of God. They forgot that “the end
\nof” every “commandment is love, out of a pure heart,” with
\n“faith unfeigned;” the loving the Lord their God with all their
\nheart, and their neighbour as themselves; and the being purified from pride,
\nanger, and evil desire, by a “faith of the operation of God.” Others
\nseemed to imagine, that though religion did not principally consist in these outward
\nmeans, yet there was something in them wherewith God was well pleased:
\nsomething that would still make them acceptable in his sight, though they were
\nnot exact in the weightier matters of the law, in justice, mercy, and the love
\nof God.” <\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

What
\nWesley is warning against in this paragraph is mere formalism, a sort of faith
\nthat thinks, ‘if I just participate in the ordinances, if I just go to church,
\nif I just take the sacraments,  <\/span>I am a
\ngood Christian and will be saved’.  <\/span>That
\nwould be mistaking the means for the ends, which is of course the grace and
\nsalvation of God.   <\/span>John Wesley did not believe
\nthat even the sacrament of baptism automatically conveyed grace to the
\nrecipient regardless of his spiritual state, but he did firmly believe they did
\nso for those who were open to receiving the grace of God.  <\/span>Wesley warns not merely against mere
\nformalism, but also against those who think we need no forms or liturgy at all
\nto worship God.  <\/span>The abuse of the means
\nof grace does not rule out their proper use, was Wesley’s view.    <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

But
\nwhat exactly does Wesley mean by, and include in the ‘means of grace’?   <\/span>This may come as something of a surprise,
\neven to some Methodists today.   <\/span>First,
\nthe definition <\/b>Wesley insists on is
\nthis:  <\/span>“By “means of grace” I understand
\noutward signs, words, or actions, ordained of God, and appointed for this end,
\nto be the ordinary channels whereby he might convey to men, preventing,
\njustifying, or sanctifying grace.”   <\/span><\/b>He
\ndoes not deny there are other, extraordinary channels of grace, but here he is
\nreferring to the ordinary ones, the very ones that normal Christians have a
\nchance to encounter normally, even on a day by day basis. <\/span><\/p>\n

            <\/span>If you were expecting Wesley to suddenly break forth into
\na long harangue about baptism and the Lord’s Supper,  <\/span>you will be surprised to learn that the first
\nwords out of his mouth are “The chief of
\nthese means are prayer, whether in secret or with the great congregation;
\nsearching the Scriptures (which implies reading, hearing, and meditating
\nthereon); and receiving the Lord’s Supper, eating bread and drinking wine in
\nremembrance of Him: And these we believe to be ordained of God, as the ordinary
\nchannels of conveying his grace to the souls of men.”<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

            <\/span><\/span><\/b>In fact, Wesley
\nis not going to talk about baptism at all in this context!  <\/span>Why not? Because it is a one time and one
\ntime only ordinance per person, and almost every single person Wesley addressed
\nin England, whether churched or not, had at least be christened as an infant and
\nlisted in a church registry. If you have already been baptized, this cannot be
\na means of grace for you going forward or thereafter.  <\/span> <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Indeed,
\nthe Anglicans considered the whole country their parish, and you were on their
\ncontact lists even if you were an ardent Baptist.   <\/span>I never will forget how my wife and I
\nregularly got the Anglican parish letters and announcements in the mail, quite
\nunsolicited and sent to the caretakers house at Elvet Methodist Church.  <\/span>They were claiming us as part of their parish
\nflock, even if we only went to the Methodist Church.  <\/span>That’s the way it is when you have an
\nofficial State Church in various European countries.   <\/span>Wesley then is going to discuss ‘means of
\ngrace’ from the perspective of an audience for whom baptism could not or no
\nlonger be a means of grace in the future. <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span>Notice the three means of grace he expects his
\naudience to participate in regularly: 1) prayer both individual and collective
\nprayer;  <\/span>2) searching the Scriptures, or
\nas we might call it Bible study and devotional reading of the Bible, and
\nfinally; 3) ‘constant’ communion.  <\/span>Dealing
\nwith the three means of grace Wesley mentions in this sermon is going to take
\nsome time, so we will be treating all three in an introductory way here and prayer
\nin some detail in this chapter, and in subsequent chapters we will deal with
\nsearching the Scriptures and Communion in more detail.<\/span><\/p>\n

Lest
\nsomeone take a magical view of any of these three means he stresses once more, “Whosoever, therefore, imagines there is
\nany intrinsic power in any means whatsoever, does greatly err, not knowing the
\nScriptures, neither the power of God. We know that there is no inherent power
\nin the words that are spoken in prayer, in the letter of Scripture read, the
\nsound thereof heard, or the bread and wine received in the Lord’s Supper; but
\nthat it is God alone who is the Giver of every good gift, the Author of all
\ngrace; that the whole power is of him, whereby, through any of these, there is
\nany blessing conveyed to our soul. We know, likewise, that he is able to give
\nthe same grace, though there were no means on the face of the earth.”   <\/span><\/b> <\/span>Here of course Wesley is arguing against
\nCatholic theology in particular when it comes to the Lord’s Supper.  <\/span>The grace and power lies in God, not in the
\nelements or the activities in themselves.
\n<\/i> <\/span>Thus a magical view of what the
\n‘means’ can accomplish apart  <\/span>from a
\nreceptive heart, a heart of faith, is avoided. <\/span><\/p>\n

Furthermore,
\nWesley wants to stress that partaking in these means is not meritorious. It
\ndoes not earn one brownie points in heaven, much less earn one salvation or
\nyears off of purgatory.  <\/span>Wesley adds this,  <\/span>“The
\nuse of all means whatever will never atone for one sin; that it is the blood of
\nChrist alone, whereby any sinner can be reconciled to God; there being no other
\npropitiation for our sins, no other fountain for sin and uncleanness. Every believer
\nin Christ is deeply convinced that there is no merit but in Him; that there is
\nno merit in any of his own works; not in uttering the prayer, or searching the
\nScripture, or hearing the word of God, or eating of that bread and drinking of
\nthat cup. So that if no more be intended by the expression some have used,
\n“Christ is the only means of grace,” than this, — that He is the
\nonly meritorious cause of it, it cannot be gainsayed by any who know the grace
\nof God.”  <\/span><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

This
\nis a salutary warning even for us today, for the temptation is to believe that
\n‘if I just engage in these spiritual practices and this much prayer and this
\nmuch church attendance, God will have to reward me for this and bless me for
\nthis.’  <\/span>A modern sort of example of this
\nsort of misguided thinking is the ‘Prayer of Jabez’ sort of approach to things,
\nwhereby if one simply follows that prayer, God is somehow forced or compelled
\nto ‘enlarge one’s territory’ make one prosperous and so on.  <\/span>This sort of magical view, even of prayer is
\nbeing avoided by Wesley.  <\/span>You can pray
\nuntil you are blue in the face and with all sincerity, but if it is not God’s
\nwill to do X, Y, or Z that you are pleading for,  <\/span>it isn’t going to happen just because you
\nrecited some Biblical prayer with all your heart.   <\/span>That approach is what my old pastor called
\n‘rabbits foot religion’ and it is not the religion Wesley urges his Methodists
\nto practice to improve their Christian life.<\/span><\/p>\n

Wesley
\nis also writing against those truly low church Protestants who kept saying all
\nyou have to do is believe to be saved, so skip all this stuff about practicing
\nthe means of grace.  <\/span>Wesley’s answer
\nis— “If you say, “Believe, and
\nthou shalt be saved!” He answers, “True; but how shall I
\nbelieve?” You reply, “Wait upon God.” “Well; but how am I
\nto wait? In the means of grace, or out of them? Am I to wait for the grace of
\nGod which bringeth salvation, by using these means, or by laying them
\naside?”<\/b>  <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

That
\nphrase ‘wait actively’ is in fact a key phrase for understanding Wesley’s view
\nabout how Methodists should practice their religion and grow in grace.  <\/span>We should participate in the normal means of
\ngrace as often as we have time to do so, is Wesley’s basic view.  <\/span>Wesley first then provides several telling
\nexamples from the teaching of Jesus to make clear that we should always pray
\nand never give up praying.  <\/span>Indeed,
\nChrist commanded us to pray saying “”Ask,
\nand it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be
\nopened unto you: For everyone that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh
\nfindeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.” (Matt. 7:7, 8) Here
\nwe are in the plainest manner directed to ask, in order to, or as a means of,
\nreceiving; to seek, in order to find, the grace of God, the pearl of great
\nprice; and to knock, to continue asking and seeking, if we would enter into his
\nkingdom.” <\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

Here
\nit will be wise to pause for a moment and meditate on why we pray, both
\naccording to the Bible, and according to Wesley.  <\/span>Firstly we do not pray to inform God of
\nsomething he does not know.  <\/span>Anyone who
\nknows their Bible knows that God is all-seeing and all-knowing.  <\/span>Prayer then cannot be a matter of reminding a
\ndeity that is so old he has senior moments of something he forgot, or
\nbrowbeating a truculent and reluctant deity to do something he was otherwise
\nnot planning on doing.  <\/span>These sorts of
\nviews of prayer did characterize some ancient pagans, but not  <\/span>God’s people at their wisest and best. <\/span><\/p>\n

Why
\nthen pray besides the obvious fact that God has commanded it?  <\/span> <\/span>The
\nanswer is that God uses prayer to work out his will in the world, and through
\nprayer it is WE <\/b>who become informed
\nabout what we do not know or see, and we become God’s agents of redemption,
\nhealing, and hope in the world.  <\/span>But this
\nis not all, for what I have just been talking about is prayers of intercession
\nor petition.  <\/span>Of course there are other
\nsorts of prayers as well that God uses to shape our own spiritual lives—-
\nprayers of praise, and thanksgiving and prayers of repentance and
\nlamentation.  <\/span>And of course it also true
\nthat a function of prayer is to not merely better inform us about God’s will,
\nbut to actually draw us closer to God himself. 
\n<\/span>People who love each other wholeheartedly are always talking to one
\nanother.  <\/span>They are in ongoing living
\nrelationship and conversation with one another, and so it should be between us
\nand God. The question is— Are we listening to God when we pray, rather than
\njust talking all the time? <\/span><\/p>\n

Wesley
\nstresses that God responds to both corporate and private prayer. In regard to
\nthe latter, Wesley urges “A direction,
\nequally full and express, to wait for the blessings of God in private prayer,
\ntogether with a positive promise, that, by this means, we shall obtain the
\nrequest of our lips, he hath given us in those well-known words: “Enter
\ninto thy closet, and, when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is
\nin secret; and thy Father, which seeth in secret, shall reward thee
\nopenly.” (Matt. 6:6)<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

One
\nof the most interesting things Wesley goes on to point out, is that Jesus is
\nnot talking merely about the prayers of born again Christians here.  <\/span>Indeed, there were none <\/i>when Jesus said this!  <\/span>He
\nis simply talking about people asking in sincere trust for God’s help, and
\nJesus says clearly that God hears and responds to such prayers. Were this not
\nthe case, there would be no point for unbelievers to ever pray a sincere
\nprayer.  <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Sometime
\nago, a not very wise but very public TV minister was asked if God hears the
\nprayers of non-Christians, of say agnostics or Muslims or Jews or Hindus or Buddhists
\nand his curt answer was an emphatic no. 
\n<\/span>The problem with this is that Jesus himself says otherwise, so long as the prayer is directed to the
\nright deity, the God of the Bible.  <\/span><\/i>Wesley
\nmakes mincemeat of such a bad theology of prayer citing James 1.5 and 4.2
\nsaying, “The gross, blasphemous
\nabsurdity of supposing faith<\/i>, in this place, to be taken in the full
\nChristian meaning, appears hence: It is supposing the Holy Ghost to direct a
\nman who knows he has not faith (which is here termed wisdom<\/i>), to ask it
\nof God, with a positive promise that “it shall be given him;” and
\nthen immediately to subjoin, that it shall not be given him, unless he have it
\nbefore he asks for it!  <\/span>But who can bear
\nsuch a supposition?”<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It was, without question, a shock to my system.  My wife and I moved to England for my doctoral work in 1977.   I came as a person on the way to ‘full ordination’ in the United Methodist Church in America.   Now the two churches I had been part of since birth, Wesley Memorial UMC in…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":199,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1306","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nA Normal Christian Life- Part Nine - The Bible and Culture<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/12\/a-normal-christian-life-part-nine.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A Normal Christian Life- Part Nine - The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"It was, without question, a shock to my system.  My wife and I moved to England for my doctoral work in 1977.   I came as a person on the way to ‘full ordination’ in the United Methodist Church in America.   Now the two churches I had been part of since birth, Wesley Memorial UMC in…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/12\/a-normal-christian-life-part-nine.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-12-23T12:46:05+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/12\/Wesley-thumb-400x400-20279-thumb-400x400-20280.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Ben Witherington\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"A Normal Christian Life- Part Nine - The Bible and Culture","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/12\/a-normal-christian-life-part-nine.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"A Normal Christian Life- Part Nine - The Bible and Culture","og_description":"It was, without question, a shock to my system.  My wife and I moved to England for my doctoral work in 1977.   I came as a person on the way to ‘full ordination’ in the United Methodist Church in America.   Now the two churches I had been part of since birth, Wesley Memorial UMC in…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/12\/a-normal-christian-life-part-nine.html","og_site_name":"The Bible and Culture","article_published_time":"2010-12-23T12:46:05+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/12\/Wesley-thumb-400x400-20279-thumb-400x400-20280.jpg"}],"author":"Ben Witherington","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/12\/a-normal-christian-life-part-nine.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/12\/a-normal-christian-life-part-nine.html","name":"A Normal Christian Life- Part Nine - The Bible and Culture","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/12\/a-normal-christian-life-part-nine.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/12\/a-normal-christian-life-part-nine.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/12\/Wesley-thumb-400x400-20279-thumb-400x400-20280.jpg","datePublished":"2010-12-23T12:46:05+00:00","dateModified":"2010-12-23T12:46:05+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/d1fd6c7893819eabc624db38ecfd8426"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/12\/a-normal-christian-life-part-nine.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/12\/a-normal-christian-life-part-nine.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/12\/a-normal-christian-life-part-nine.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/12\/Wesley-thumb-400x400-20279-thumb-400x400-20280.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/12\/Wesley-thumb-400x400-20279-thumb-400x400-20280.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/12\/a-normal-christian-life-part-nine.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"A Normal Christian Life—- Part Nine"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/","name":"The Bible and Culture","description":"All Things Biblical and Christian","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/d1fd6c7893819eabc624db38ecfd8426","name":"Ben Witherington","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/75e\/75ec11e1916a2008bc4cc638a0a0de2fx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/75e\/75ec11e1916a2008bc4cc638a0a0de2fx96.jpg","caption":"Ben Witherington"},"description":"Bible scholar Ben Witherington is Amos Professor of New Testament for Doctoral Studies at Asbury Theological Seminary and on the doctoral faculty at St. Andrews University in Scotland. A graduate of UNC, Chapel Hill, he went on to receive the M.Div. degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. from the University of Durham in England. He is now considered one of the top evangelical scholars in the world, and is an elected member of the prestigious SNTS, a society dedicated to New Testament studies. Witherington has also taught at Ashland Theological Seminary, Vanderbilt University, Duke Divinity School and Gordon-Conwell. A popular lecturer, Witherington has presented seminars for churches, colleges and biblical meetings not only in the United States but also in England, Estonia, Russia, Europe, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Australia. He has also led tours to Italy, Greece, Turkey, Israel, Jordan, and Egypt. Witherington has written over thirty books, including The Jesus Quest and The Paul Quest, both of which were selected as top biblical studies works by Christianity Today. He also writes for many church and scholarly publications, and is a frequent contributor to the Beliefnet website. Along with many interviews on radio networks across the country, Witherington has been seen on the History Channel, NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, The Discovery Channel, A&E, and the PAX Network.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/author\/bwitherington"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1306","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/199"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1306"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1306\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}