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Note, it's 8:00 p.m. NOT 8:00 a.m. Melbourne time.

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8:00 pm in Melbourne will be very early Thursday morning in North America, not afternoon. 5:00 am for me near Toronto.

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Hey Mike. I am a small town pastor, and have been for over two decades. I am currently working on starting to write a couple of books that I think might be helpful to the church. I was wondering if you might have some advice, from your experience, for a new writer, especially in the realm of biblical studies and theology.

I really appreciate all your work, you've been such a blessing to me and the kingdom!

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Some scholars, like Zwieg (1997) suggest there is textual evidence that the earliest Christians believed the resurrection and ascension were the same event, on the same day, being separated further and further apart by later authors, with the most extreme separation by the author of Luke-Acts. The clear separation is not found in the genuine Pauline texts. If this is true, the post resurrection appearances are all theophanies. What do you make of this?

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Questions for Mike:

1. Can my family (wife and three kids) come and live with your family (or near) and I work for you doing research to further the kingdom?

2. Can you summarize your views on the relationship between Christus Victor and penal substitution? To what extent is death, as the consequence of sin, punishment (as in God inflicts it) versus just the natural consequence of separation from the life-giving God? In other words, did Jesus receive our punishment because God has, wants, or needs to punish sin, or was his death substitutionary in another way (like he bore the consequences of our sin so we might avoid them and receive life)?

3. Proclaiming, anticipating, and willingly allowing God to bring about his kingdom in and through Christians is a major aim of our discipleship to Christ. That is so much more than just telling people to repent and be baptized to be saved from hell although obviously sharing the Good News of Jesus includes that. But from an eschatological standpoint, what happens to those who do not follow Christ either because they have not heard of him or because the proclamation of the gospel that they have heard is so distorted by party politics, hatred, and personality cults that it is completely understandable why they might reject the caricature of Christ that is presented?

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founding

I have not seen many - or even any - evangelical theological and/or ethical analyses of the Israel vs. Hamas/Hezbollah/Iranian conflict. What do you recommend?

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