Category: Deeper Waters Podcast

Deeper Waters Podcast 4/23/2016: Jackson Wu

What’s coming up on the Deeper Waters Podcast? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

My wife is a big fan of oriental stuff. She loves nearly everything that is Japanese, aside from the food. It’s my dream that one day I’ll get to take her to Japan. We can love so much about a culture in the Far East, but have we ever wondered what it would be like if we had to share the Gospel with them? These people might be just like us in their biology and such, but their culture is radically different.

For that matter, could the culture of the Bible be radically different? Could it be that when we present the Gospel, we’re presenting it in a Western package? Could that be causing distortions in evangelism? How can we communicate one Gospel in many cultures?

For that, I’m pleased to have on my show the man who wrote One Gospel For All Nations, Dr. Jackson Wu. Who is he?

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Jackson has served Chinese pastors for over a decade. Presently, he is an associate professor International Chinese Theological Seminary, where he teaches theology and missiology. Previously, Jackson was a church planter, English teacher, and youth minister.

During his youth, he grew up in the southern United States. Brought up in a non-religious family, he became a Christ follower at age 15. Jackson attended Texas A&M University, where he studied applied mathematics with a minor emphasis in economics. He also earned a Master of Arts in Philosophy from Texas A&M, writing his thesis on the theology undergirding the thought of Soren Kierkegaard. Later, he gained his MDiv from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and a PhD from Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary.

He published his first book in the Evangelical Missiological Society dissertation series. It is titled Saving God’s Face: A Chinese Contextualization of Salvation through Honor and Shame. In 2015, William Carey Library published Jackson’s second book, One Gospel for All Nations: A Practical Approach to Biblical Contextualization. In a forthcoming book with IVP, he will explore how honor-shame influence our understanding of Paul’s letter to the Romans. His articles have appeared in both missiological and theological journals. A few selected titles include “Paul Writes to the Greek First and also to the Jew”, “There are No Church Planting Movements in the Bible”, and “Why has the Church Lost Face?”

Jackson is particularly concerned about theological contextualization. By understanding how the Bible uses honor and shame, he wants to equip the church to contextualize the gospel in a way that is both biblically faithful and culturally meaningful.

He consistently writes on his blog jacksonwu.org. He is a regular blogger for Training Leaders International, and has guest written for Scot McKnight, Ed Stetzer, and the Missio blog. He serves on the steering committee for the Asian-Asian-American Theology Consultation for the Evangelical Theological Society. His also offers Chinese resources for free at wu-rong.org. People can follow him on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

We’ll be discussing how people in the Far East see the Gospel and how the Gospel that brings us good news in America and the West can bring good news to those in the Far East. We will discuss cultural differences that can be barriers to evangelism. We’ll also discuss what it means to save God’s face. Are we embarrassing God or what?

I hope you’ll be listening!

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Deeper Waters Podcast 4/16/2016: Richard Bauckham

What’s coming up Saturday on the Deeper Waters Podcast? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

How did we get the story of Jesus? How has it come to us? Bart Ehrman has recently written Jesus Before The Gospels, a book that I have reviewed as well. Still, there are a lot of questions that you would like to have a real scholar interact with. What about oral tradition? What about eyewitness testimony? What about the claims that Papias got some things wrong? Is there any scholar who has worked on oral tradition and Papias and eyewitness testimony and could respond to Ehrman and his claims?

Why yes there is. One of the leading ones is Richard Bauckham, and he’s my guest this Saturday on the Deeper Waters Podcast. Who is he?

Bauckham

And in his own words:

I am a biblical scholar and theologian. My academic work and publications have ranged over many areas of these subjects, including the theology of Jürgen Moltmann, Christology (both New Testament and systematic), eschatology, the New Testament books of Revelation, James, 2 Peter and Jude, Jewish and Christian apocalyptic literature, the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, the New Testament Apocrypha, the relatives of Jesus, the early Jerusalem church, the Bible and contemporary issues, and biblical and theological approaches to environmental issues. In recent years much of my work has focused on Jesus and the Gospels. Probably my best known books are Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony (2006), God Crucified: Monotheism and Christology in the New Testament (1998), The Theology of the Book of Revelation (1993) and Bible and Ecology(2010). As well as technical scholarship and writing aimed at students and those with some theological background, I have also written accessible books for a wider readership, of which the best known is At the Cross: Meditations on People Who Were There (1999), which I wrote with Trevor Hart. A recent book is Jesus: A Very Short Introduction (2011), published in Oxford University Press’s Very Short Introduction series, and providing a historical account of Jesus for the general reader. Various of my books have appeared in translation in Italian, Japanese, Chinese, Russian, Korean, Spanish, Portuguese, French and Farsi.

Until 2007 I was Professor of New Testament Studies at the University of St Andrews, Scotland. I retired early in order to concentrate on research and writing, and moved to Cambridge. For more information about me, see my Short CV. On this site, you will find complete lists of my publications. You can find out about my forthcoming books. You can read unpublished papers, lectures and sermons. You can find out about the More Old Testament Pseudepigrapha project (directed by myself and James Davila).

You can also read some of my poetry, and two story books written for children (adults also enjoy them) about the MacBears of Bearloch.

We’ll be discussing Bauckham’s book Jesus and the Eyewitnesses as well as discussing Ehrman’s book. This is an interview I have been looking forward to for a long time and I hope you will be listening as well. Be watching for the next episode of the Deeper Waters Podcast!

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Deeper Waters Podcast 4/9/2016: Ron Sandison

What’s coming up on the Deeper Waters Podcast? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

April is Autism Awareness Month and I prefer to do a shout out to those on the spectrum, like my wife and I, when that time comes. This year is no exception. My thanks goes to Stephen Bedard for the inspiration this year as I saw that he had interviewed a professor at a Seminary who is on the spectrum. I immediately went about contacting this professor and arranging an interview for the show so this Saturday, I will be talking with Ron Sandison. Who is he?

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Ron Sandison works full time in the medical field and is a professor of theology at Destiny School of Ministry. He is an advisory board member of Autism Society Faith Initiative of Autism Society of American. Sandison has a Master of Divinity from Oral Roberts University and is the author of A Parent’s Guide to Autism: Practical Advice. Biblical Wisdom published by Charisma House. He has memorized over 10,000 Scriptures including 22 complete books of the New Testament and over 5,000 quotes.

Ron has published articles in Autism Speaks, Autism Society of America, Autism File Magazine, Autism Parenting Magazine, Not Alone, the Mighty, the Detroit News, the Oakland Press, and many more. He frequently guest speaks at colleges, conferences, autism centers, and churches. Ron and his wife, Kristen, reside in Rochester Hills, MI, with a baby daughter, Makayla Marie born on March 20, 2016. You can contact Ron at his website http://www.spectruminclusion.com or email him at sandison456@hotmail.com

 

All of this gives us a lot that we can talk about. Something I always want to ask my fellow Aspies on the spectrum who are also married is how that happened. After all, most of us are just terrified of talking to people. I understand that it’s hard enough to talk to someone of the opposite sex without Aspergers so it is even harder with Aspergers. I know in my case, having a mutual friend helped and we began our relationship with internet communication.

Ron has more than that. He’s also got a daughter so what is it like being a parent on the spectrum? It is often thought that Aspies don’t make the best parents. True, he has limited experience at this point, but what does he think about this? What challenges does he face?

Then of course, we can talk about being a professor at a Seminary. Does he have any benefits from his Aspergers that help him with the job? Does he have any negatives that can make the job more difficult? Is having Aspergers an important part of his interaction with students?

Finally, we can talk about his spiritual life as well. Sometimes it is hard for us to relate to ordinary people. How much harder is it to relate to divine persons? How do you worship God to the best of your ability as an Aspie? Can it be difficult to do Christian disciplines like prayer? What advice would be given to fellow Aspies? What overall would be said to parents or other people related to Aspies?

I hope you’ll be joining me this Saturday for this!

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Deeper Waters Podcast 3/26/2016: Gary Habermas

What’s coming up the day before Easter? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

This Easter, churches will have their usual overflow of people who have come to church to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus. Many will celebrate it, but few will think about it. It’s a shame because the resurrection is not just any event. It’s the most important event of all and if it happened, it is definitely world changing. On the other hand, if it didn’t happen, that is also, unfortunately, world changing. Everything stands or falls on the resurrection.

This Easter then, I decided to see if a good friend of mine would be willing to come back to the show to talk about the resurrection. He was more than willing to. In fact, he told me he was going to study this topic just in preparation for being on my show. That’s so nice. This Saturday, I will be again interviewing none other than Gary Habermas. Who is he?

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Gary Habermas (Ph.D., Michigan State University) is Distinguished Research Professor and Chair of the Department of Philosophy at Liberty University. He has published 40 books, half of them on the subject of Jesus’ resurrection, plus more than seventy chapters or articles in other books, plus over 100 articles for journals and other publications. He has also taught courses at about 15 other graduate schools.

Gary Habermas is considered the leading authority on the resurrection and he is also the personal mentor of Mike Licona, who he wrote The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus with. He has written more on this topic quite likely than any one else out there and for those interested, he is currently writing a massive magnum opus on it. His Ph.D. was done the topic as well.

Not only that, for those who are doubters, Habermas is the guy to go to for you as well. Habermas has done extensive work on the topic of doubt and helping Christians who find doubt so troublesome. This isn’t just doubt of “Is Christianity true?” but also the doubts that Christians can have about their relationship with God. “Did I really say the right words?” “Am I really a Christian?” “How do I know I’m not just fooling myself into thinking I’m a Christian.”

Habermas will be my guest for a two-hour interview so expect me to go everywhere I can with the resurrection and try to ask the hardest questions that I can about it. After all, there are a lot of attacks on this one and indeed, there should be. This is the point where Christianity stands or falls and this is where our defense needs to be the toughest. I tell Christians to not marry their Christianity to anything else except the resurrection of Jesus. That is where it stands or falls.

Please be watching your podcast feed for the latest episode of the Deeper Waters Podcast. I hope you have a wonderful Easter Sunday celebrating the resurrection of Jesus. He is risen! He is risen indeed!

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Deeper Waters Podcast 3/12/2016: Matthew Peeples

What’s coming up on the Deeper Waters Podcast? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Okay. Looks like the Deeper Waters Podcast is about to return again full throttle. We missed the 20th due to our moving and on the 27th, Allie’s grandmother and aunt were in town so I decided to focus on that special time with family. Then last week, I was about to do an interview, but I was in too much pain with a toothache. (Bad news on my part, I need three root canals.) This Saturday I count on things being different. Earlier this week, I recorded and interview with Pastor Matthew Peeples. Who’s that?

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Rev. Matt Peeples is the Lead/Founding Pastor of The Point in Knoxville, TN. He is passionate about connecting the disconnected, training the next generation of church planters, and preaching the gospel. He routinely does national speaking engagements on the following topics: outreach, technology, and social media.

Many of you have heard me speak about the church Allie and I attended in Knoxville. It was indeed an awesome church and I only use the past tense because we’re not getting to experience it and not because the awesomeness has changed. In fact, the biggest thing holding us back in Knoxville for the longest time was The Point.

I’d been wanting to have my pastor come on for awhile to talk about his experience and how it relates to apologetics. You see, at The Point, apologetics was not really formally mentioned from the pulpit, but it was regularly done. In fact, it was done every service. The pastor (We had interns who would speak some also) would regularly give a Bible-focused message and people were encouraged to text in their questions during their service and at the end the speaker would come out and address them. That still goes on to this day. In fact, it is often my favorite part of the service.

We also ask why we should even be planting churches. Even here in Atlanta you drive down a little ways and you can see a church. It’s almost like churches are breeding like rabbits. Why do we need to be planting more?

Pastor Matt also talks about the places that he has gone to in order to share the Gospel. He talks about how church services have been held at a bar numerous times before and how The Point will often have a presence at events like Brewfest, where people gather to drink and celebrate beer. (Doesn’t hurt that the Point is a Lutheran church and for many Lutherans, beer is practically a sacrament.)

Pastor Matt is the kind of pastor that I wish more pastors were like. I found myself edified by being at The Point and even today people from The Point are still regularly checking on us and seeing how we’re doing. I thoroughly enjoyed getting to do this interview and I hope that many pastors out there will listen and realize that there is a way you can draw people into the church and use apologetics at the same time and still have a message for everyone in the audience. Be listening to the next episode!

In Christ,
Nick Peters

 

Deeper Waters Podcast 2/13/2016: Mark Antonacci

What’s coming up on the Deeper Waters Podcast? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

The resurrection of Jesus is the central fact of the Christian faith and the rock on which everything else stands. If the resurrection is not true, then in agreement with Paul, we are above all men to be pitied. There is a lot about the resurrection of Jesus that as it were remains shrouded in mystery for some of us and one object that can remain shrouded in mystery is, well, the shroud itself.

That is, the Shroud of Turin.

This is a relic that caused a stir when it was discovered and to this day, it is still disputed. Most of us would no doubt consider it something remarkable and even those who are its critics do not have a way in mind yet that someone was able to make the image on their with all the ins and outs that it possesses. You might make an image that looks similar, but not one that has all the features that the Shroud of Turin has.

I prefer looking at different arguments for the resurrection, but I find the Shroud intriguing. What got me to get this book was a conversation with Gary Habermas when he told me about this book that he was reading about the Shroud of Turin. I decided to contact the author and see if he would be willing to come on and talk about the book. That author is Mark Antonacci and he is coming on to discuss his book Test The Shroud.

Going through, it is hard to imagine a book on the Shroud of Turin being more exhaustive in its scope. I can hardly think of a single topic about the Shroud that is not covered. For those who are concerned about the Carbon 14 dating test, yes, that is covered. For those who are concerned about the history of the Shroud, yes. That is covered. Antonacci has really left no stone uncovered in this massive work.

Hopefully also, we’ll be able to get the language in it to be more amenable to the layman as often he does speak in strong scientific terms that I will frankly admit I was getting lost in. Perhaps that is unavoidable, but when he spoke about the topics that I am familiar with being a student of the New Testament, I found that I was right there with him. If I could recommend at this point in time one book for someone curious about the nature of the Shroud of Turin, I would recommend this one.

We’ll be having Mark Antonacci be our guest and I do intend to try to ask the hard questions about the Shroud for all who are skeptical of it. At this point, I personally lean towards it being the real deal because there is just so much unexplainable about it, but it is not something I make an argument out of because I have not studied it that in-depth. I am thankful for people like Mark Antonacci who have and I hope you will be here for the next episode of the Deeper Waters Podcast.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Deeper Waters Podcast 2/6/2016: Chris Tilling

What’s coming up this Saturday on the Deeper Waters Podcast? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

“Who do you say the Son of Man is?” It’s a question straight from the Gospels and while it was answered nearly 2,000 years ago, that answer is still being discussed today. Hasn’t Christianity been influenced by Hellenistic ideas? Wasn’t the concept of Jesus as a God-man a rather late idea? Would it make any sense to someone who was Jewish to say that a man was participating in the divine identity?

About a couple of years ago I did a roundtable discussion with Michael Bird, Charles Hill, and Chris Tilling on the book How God Became Jesus. One of those guys has decided to come back and that’s Chris Tilling. We’re going to be talking about his book Paul’s Divine Christology. So who is Chris Tilling?

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Dr Chris Tilling is Tutor and Senior Lecturer in New Testament Studies at St Mellitus College. He is also a visiting Lecturer in Theology at King’s College London. Chris co-authored How God Became Jesus (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 2014) with Michael Bird (ed.), Craig Evans, Simon Gathercole, and Charles Hill. He is also the editor of Beyond Old and New Perspectives on Paul (Eugene, Or: Cascade, 2014). Chris’s first book, the critically acclaimed Paul’s Divine Christology (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012), is now republished with multiple endorsements and a new Foreword, by Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2015). Chris has also published numerous articles on topics relating to the Apostle Paul, “Christology”, “justification”, the “historical Jesus” and the theology of Hans Küng.

There have been many writers in the area of early high Christology and Tilling takes a view that is unique and one could say revolutionary. It is a classic example of how so many of us have missed the forest for the trees and it fits in to Second Temple Judaism like a hand fits into a glove. We will be discussing this new idea on the show and what it means for Christians.

The benefit of the idea is that it’s easy to connect it to the Jewish culture and not only that, it relies on the Jewish culture. Consider looking at how Israel and YHWH have their relationship in the Old Testament. Do we have any sort of parallel in the New Testament? Indeed we do and it’s one that we point to often. We have the relationship of Christ and the church, and yet how many of us have really considered using that to show an early high Christology? Tilling argues that this fits in in that Paul consistently puts the Christ-relation up in a central place in his writings showing that Jesus does indeed fit into an early high Christology.

If you are interested in the topic of Christology, and frankly why on Earth should you not be, then I hope that you will be joining me for this episode of the Deeper Waters Podcast. Dr. Tilling is a very enjoyable person to interact with. At the same time, he takes his Christology incredibly seriously. You won’t want to miss this episode!

In Christ,

Nick Peters

Deeper Waters Podcast 1/30/2016: Daniel Rodger

What’s coming up on the next episode of the Deeper Waters Podcast? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

January is the month that I prefer to tackle the topic of the evil of abortion. As I had said on the last episode, when the Canaanites sacrificed their children, while it was certainly a wicked act, one could say they did it for the good of the harvest and in the long run the community as a whole. When we do it today, we sacrifice our children at the altar of convenience. This isn’t something that’s going away any time soon and the recent debacle involving Planned Parenthood is an example of that. We in America are seeing this all go on and many of us have hopes that we can change our society to remove this evil.

But how do things look across the pond?

To discuss that, I decided to interview someone from over there. My guest this next Saturday will be Daniel Rodger. Who is he?
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According to his bio:

I work in the NHS and have an undergraduate degree in Religious Studies & History and a Masters degree in Ethics. I also work as a prolife apologist for Life Training Institute here in the UK, and also run the UK Apologetics Facebook group and tweet @failedatheist.

He also wanted me to mention that he loves being a cultural agitator. Yeah. I think we’re going to get along well.

How are things in the UK when it comes to the topic of abortion. For instance, the UK is seen as a far more secular country than the US is. Also, the UK has a much more nationalized health care system. Does this make a difference? What are the political debates going on around the topic of abortion?

Of course, we’ll more generally discuss the case for the life of the unborn and why abortion is wrong and should be seen as wrong. We will ask the hard questions about the topic of abortion that are often raised by pro-abortion advocates and discuss issues of freedom and liberty. Again, things could be different across the pond in a country where the Constitution isn’t exactly being debated.

Naturally, I hope to discuss something that is going on here in America and that’s the Planned Parenthood issue. Recently, we have seen this surface again and Christians are debating if the indictment is a good thing or a bad thing. I’ve seen some see it as a huge miscarriage of justice. I’ve also seen some look at it and say that this means Planned Parenthood itself will have to go to trial and the world will get to see just how twisted that they are. Does Daniel Rodger have any opinions on this and what does he think of the concept of going undercover to collect information from Planned Parenthood anyway?

I hope you’ll be joining us on the next episode of the Deeper Waters Podcast and yes, we are working on getting the podcasts up on ITunes again. I suspect that it will be soon.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Changes For Deeper Waters

What’s happening at Deeper Waters? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

As many of you know, I spend a considerable amount of time in apologetics social media interactions. Mike Licona is expanding his social media outreach and as a part of that expansion, I will be assisting him. This will include responding to discussions in response to postings of his debates/lectures, etc Trust me. I have a few ideas for some things I’d like to consider and Mike and I are already discussing them. What else does this mean?

It means that Allie and I are moving.

On February 17th, we will be packing our bags and moving down to Atlanta. We already have an apartment complex waiting for us. It has a pool and a gym as well. Our apartment has a study for me and it also has a sunroom so I suspect I’ll be sitting there quite a bit when I want to get away from the computer and just reading my books or listening to a podcast. Allie is also hoping to help me get past my lifelong fear of the water eventually. That will take some time, but it is something we hope to see happening.

This means also that during that week, I do not plan on producing any blogs. I will be extremely busy after all. I also will not be doing a podcast that Saturday, but I hope to have things up and running again soon with the podcast. For those interested, we have also changed how we’re uploading the shows so we are actively working on getting the shows to go up on ITunes at this moment, but we have not stopped doing the podcast. Rest assured then that nothing will change with the podcast and I am going to be trying to get the best guests I can still.

We are also expecting a lot of good with Allie for this. There will be far better medical care in Atlanta and she will also be spending time at a horse farm seeing as she loves riding horses and it’s her dream to be able to ride again. I’m hoping the change will be really good for her. We’re also hoping more time with the immediate family close by will be good.

To get back to Mike and I, I’m also anticipating that we will be doing some apologetics events together and attending them as well, such as local Ratio Christi meetings and who knows where all it will end up? From an education perspective, as I am working on my Master’s, I’m hoping Mike will invest with me and the computer program that I will be using with the learning of Greek. Mike is quite the master at the language and I do want a teacher nearby so I can make sure I am not accidentally teaching myself nonsense that will be even harder to unlearn.

Please also do not stop donating to Risen Jesus if you are and do not stop donating to Deeper Waters. We both need your support. We are also working on getting a new domain name for Deeper Waters, including seeing if we can just buy DeeperWaters.com. Thank you all for your support and encouragement and please be praying for us in this endeavor.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Deeper Waters Podcast 1/23/2016: Lori Peters

What’s coming up on this episode of the Deeper Waters Podcast? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

First off, if you’re wondering where the new episodes are, we’re having server changes and hoping to update the web sites soon. Bear with us please. We have some work being done and hopefully you’ll see the Deeper Waters web site up in a way that you’ve never seen before. We’re even hoping to buy the domain name of Deeper Waters.

But for now let’s talk about the show that’s coming on this Saturday. It was after scheduling a few shows in January I remembered that I normally focus on abortion in January, so I will be returning to that. I decided also I wanted to get a woman’s voice on the matter. Enter my friend Lori Peters. (And as far as we know, there is no relation) Who is she?

LoriPeters

Lori Peters has a Bachelor of Science in  Biblical Studies from Liberty University and an MDiv in Apologetics from Luther Rice. She is a current PhD student in Theology and Apologetics at Liberty University with a research focus in bioethics.

One aspect we’ll be emphasizing in this episode is the personal side of this as to how to deal with women who are struggling with the choice of abortion or who have had an abortion and are dealing with regret and guilt from it. Lori has the experience of working with Crisis centers to help women in need. What does Lori personally think from a woman’s perspective about the issue of abortion?

After all, we are regularly told that abortion is the right of a woman and if you want women to be able to be fully equal in society, then there is no purpose in putting them in a position where they will have to care for a child. Should it not be their personal choice whether or not they want to care for the child? What does Lori as a woman think about the idea that her freedoms could be limited by having a baby?

What do you do also when you meet a woman who has an abortion and is struggling with forgiveness? How do you offer the grace that is needed without at the same time downplaying the sin? We want to make it clear that God forgives those who have an abortion, but at the same time we don’t want to downplay it as if it is no big deal. How do we do this?

Then, we could also ask what about the beliefs of those who wonder if they will ever see their children again. What are we to say to such a thing? Do we have any Biblical warrant any way to say yes or no? This is a central issue to many women who have had abortions and we want to be able to do all that we can to show them the love of Christ.

Please be joining me this Saturday for the next episode and be watching your podcast feed. Give it time and I will get them all up there.

In Christ,

Nick Peters