Simply Jesus, by NT Wright

He tries to articulate his vision of who Jesus was and is, what he was all about according to the Gospels, and what Jesus significance is and was.

The Roman Storm The Jewish Storm The Hurricane God

Brought Pax Roma

Is the collision of Jewish hopes and dreams, the Roman imperial conquest of the world, and the great wind of God in Jesus having come to rescue humanity (and Israel) from their plight

Was building expectation of a new exodus that would usher in the judgment of the Gentiles and the re-instatement of the honor and power of Israel and her God

The coming of Jesus himself -"as he came to Jerusalem he was embodying, incarnating, the return of Israel's God to his people in power and glory" (p. 38). -The coming of Jesus with the promise of YHWH that he would rule as king again, solely, over his people and his creation.

It was a story about a wicked tyrant, a special leader, the victory of God, rescue by sacrifice, new vocation, the presence of God, and a promised land. -Jesus fits quite well into this when he starts a new campaign: "He was the one in whose presence, work, and teaching Israel's God was indeed becoming king" (85). -This help the people recognize the truth behind the messianic secret

God was coming in a special and unpredictable way. -Israel had tried out the militaristic/violent way of being messiah - it didn't work (see chapter 9). -Jesus was engaged in battle, but not with Romans or Greek. It was a cosmic war, a "clash of kingdoms" (p. 125).

Love. To defeat "the tyrant" (death), a death was necessary to exhaust death itself of power. The substituted life of the loving other-centered, innocent one had the capacity to turn the tides of the cosmic war, indeed to win it. But this would require not just Jesus' death, but also his resurrection. Resurrection does not simply bring Jesus back to life, but establish the new age.

"humans are to be God's image-bearers, that is, they are to reflect his sovereign rule into the world. Humans are the vital ingredients in God's kingdom project" (p. 212). God calls the Church "to be the means through which Jesus continues to work and to teach, to establish his sovereign rule on earth as in heaven" (p. 220).

Heaven isn't the distant paradise of our final salvation. By proclaiming that Jesus is enthroned now in heaven somehow means he is present everywhere on earth (p. 196) "Heaven is God's space, God's dimension of present reality, so that to think of Jesus 'returning' is actually...to think of him presently invisible, but one day reappearing" (p. 202).

All Christians must come to terms with "who Jesus actually was: what he did, what he said, and what he meant." He calls this "the question that any grown-up Christian faith must address" (3) Wright goes on to argue that churches can be part of the problem: "We have reduced the kingdom of God to private piety, the victory of the cross to comfort for the conscience, and Easter itself to a happy, escapist ending after a sad, dark tale" (5). Need for a new vision of Jesus.

For Jesus, both the political and the personal dimensions were parts of what Jesus considered "religious." When studying the gospel one is forced to wrestle with "who is this man?" (pg9) 1.Jesus' world is a strange/foreign world to us 2. Jesus' God seems strange to us, what Jesus said didn't fit with conventional theology of his day (Pg. 10) Jesus did not meet the expectations of what that society though they were going to get; they got what they needed, not what they wanted 3.Jesus spoke and acted as if he was in charge (Pg 11) Again expectations vs reality

Western Christian myth and the new classic modernist myth. Classic Myth - Superman version of Jesus "High pressure system of conservative Christianity" (pg.17) New Classic Modernist Myth - To treat Jesus as a political activist and a mere mortal Most of the public discussion about Jesus is between those who believe in one myth or the other, reducing the conversation to a yes or no answer to the question "Did it all happen or didn't it?"

Wright begins to tie in Old Testament stories to Jesus of Nazareth, e.g., the Exodus, Babylon, King David, and so forth, claiming that they are integral parts of Jesus's story

The components of the perfect storm of Jesus's time: the power of Rome, Israel's history as God's chosen people, and the promise of God's becoming king. Any of these components on their own could arguably be enough to make Jesus's arrival on earth appropriate, but God choose to coverage these three things. Many Bible passages describe what it will look like when God becomes king.

Who Jesus was; the second part is about what Jesus did that caused people to believe He was God's Messiah as opposed to the many who came and went claiming to be the One. In His short public career, everywhere Jesus went there was a crowd; He was known for being the cause of a party and celebration wherever He went, and the reason was that He was always healing people of all kinds of diseases (Matt. 4:23). , Wright points out the three elements in play related to the miraculous in today's world: 1) the western wind of skepticism related to the miraculous; 2) the high pressure system of conservatism argues back that of course, you would expect miracles if there is a "supernatural" God and Jesus is His Son; and finally 3) the hurricane of the complexity of understanding the world in which Jesus lived asking "what do we actually know about these things within first-century history anyway?" When Jesus began his public ministry, he announced that God was now in charge. Wright compares it to when a sports club announces a new coach after a period of poor management. The effect is, "Everything's going to change now! This is an announcement about something that's happened because of which everything will be different. . . . Once the new coach has been announced, the players had better do what he says. Then, and only then, things will work out properly" (60).

When Jesus announced that God was in charge, he was, in effect, starting the campaign for God's becoming king. Rather than ushering in God's kingdom through violence and battles, Jesus did so through healings and celebrations. Just like we need to understand the story of Exodus to fully understand God's rescuing his people, so we also need to understand the Babylonian exile and the role forgiveness plays there. "Exile was seen, throughout the ancient scriptures, as the punishment for Israel's sin. . . . But if that is so, then forgiveness must mean that exile is now over" and that "forgiveness is part of the overall message that Israel's God is in fact king" (73)

Jesus's parables . . . tell us in their form alone, but also in their repeated and increasingly direct content, that the purposes of heaven are indeed coming true on earth, but that the people who in theory have been longing for that to happen are turning their backs on it now that it is actually knocking on their door." (96) Jesus teaches that when God becomes king, hearts will be transformed

The kingdom can be both present and future. The four men he profiles help explain this tension.

"The line between good and evil is clear at the level of God, on the one hand, and the satan, on the other. It is much, much less clear as it passes through human beings, individually and collectively" (123).

Jesus as God incarnate, the temple is an "incarnational" symbol, Jesus behaved as if he were the Temple, in person (133) Earth and Heaven are interconnected. To align heaven and earth was to bring earth under the same kind of total God-ruled kingdom as heaven. This is precisely why Jesus is so unique and so uniquely suited to be the messiah. He embodies the place where heaven and earth meet. -Jesus' agenda was not to plan a retreat from earth to heaven, but rather a desire that "God's kingdom would come on earth as in heaven" (so the Lord's prayer, see p. 148).

Wright points out in Isaiah, Daniel, and Zechariah, each predict something about Jesus and his Vocation.

Gods judgement and Jesus's sacrifice on the cross are related, he had to let the evil of the first world die with him in order to resurrect a new world. "Jesus fitted a not ready-made category" -Jesus giving up his life on the cross as a sacrifice for love is too simple -It is a symbol of vindication of his mission Initiation of the kingdom -Gods kingdom as a reality -Sin thorugh Satan have entered the human condition Jesus takes on the deaths of humanity -Justify or redeem someone (eg a slave) he is basically a slave to god in taking the sins from humanity as a way of paying god for humanity

Jesus, after his resurrection, is the prototype of the new creation -Jesus is not a ghost -You can touch him -Not bound by the traditional laws of physics -Easter about prototype -Ascension about enthronement

Wright explains four positions people can take as they face the question of what it looks like for Jesus to be ruling the world today

The first part discusses the myriad of influences that were impacting on first-century Palestine when Jesus was embarking on His earthly ministry. Wright discusses how the influence of the Roman Empire clashed with the hopes of the Jewish people creating the complex web of circumstances into which Jesus was born. The second part of the book is concerned with, amongst other things, the Kingdom of God (a phrase Jesus used a lot) and what that really means. In Wright's view, it means a world where because of Jesus, God is now in charge in a way He wasn't previously. Part three (which is only a single chapter) discusses what it means for Jesus to be ruler of the world in the present day.

"a story that purports to be some sense historical and that encapsulates and reinforces the strongly held belief of the community that tells it" (pg 18)