New Video and News of the Week

Liberal Democracy for the Win! Is Marxist a Christian Sect? Clarity of Scripture Talk.

This Week in the World of Mike Bird

Recently, my wife Naomi and I spoke at the Jesus Club conference in Sydney a few weeks back where I was joined by people from Moore College (Archie Poulos), Louise Gosbell (Australian College of Theology), Josh Reid (Jesus Club), and in the audience was Kirk Paddison (Sydney Missionary and Bible College). Jesus Club is about ministry to people with intellectual disabilities, who are one of the most unreached people with the gospel!

A few months back, I had the pleasure of joining some truly awesome people at Singapore Bible College for a conference on Scripture and Preaching, which is now online, watch it here. Forget my lectures, listen to Easten Law and Jean K. Luah.

I also made a video celebrating the Highland Theological College’s 30th anniversary celebration. I taught at HTC from 2005-9, it was my first academic job, and my family and I have so many great memories of HTC, Dingwall, and Scotland.

Also, over at Word by Word from Logos, I wrote on Liberal Democracy & Jesus’s Command to Love Our Neighbors. I would like to argue that this double love command is not simply about private faith and local church life. Nor is it reducible to ethical bare minimums, like “Don’t be an evil murderer.” Instead, I claim that the double love command ought to serve as the basis for Christian political theology. More specifically, the double love command is why we should be more inclined to support the system of government known as liberal democracy.

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New Video

This video explores the clarity of Scripture, specifically, what it does and does not mean. It includes stating the rationale for the clarity of Scripture, why Scripture is not always clear, and what is the extent of the clarity of Scripture according to the Westminster Confession of Faith. Fuller version over at the Paideia Academy.

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News of the World this Week

1. Is Marxism a Christian Sect? There’s a great Quillette podcast where Jonathan Kay interviews Sean McMeekin about his To Overthrow the World: The Rise, Fall and Rise of Communism. It is a TERRIFIC interview! What is fascinating is how McMeekin treats Communism as a deviant Christian sect! This is why I set my students the question, “Is Luke a proto-Socialist?” Otherwise, see my posts A Christian Critique of Communism and Were the First Christians “Socialists”?

2. The Future of Gaza. On the conflict in Israel and Gaza, you MUST WATCH the Caspian Report on Israel’s plan for Gaza and listen to Preston Sprinkle’s interview with Dr. Autin Knuppe about Israel, Hezbollah, and Iran.

3. The New Testament in Color. I just listened to the latest episode of the OnScript podcast which featured an interview with Dr. Esau McCaulley and Dr. Amy Peeler about their book The New Testament in Color. I nearly crashed my car at: 23:03: "There's what's going on in Australia. God bless Michael Bird, they are doing something different down there."

4. N.T. Wright on the Israel-Palestine, Donald Trump, and Jesus in Politics. NTW is interviewed on Seen and Unseen with Justin Brierly about some difficult topics!