modified 7/6/2019
I have just returned from the excellent 2017 regional meeting for the midwest chapter of the Evangelical Theological Society. This year's theme, which dovetailed nicely with last year's theme, was "Evil and the Suffering of God," with excellent and thought-provoking presentations by Dr. Andrew J. Schmutzer (Moody Bible Institute), Dr. Paul K. Moser (Loyola University), and Dr. Marc Cortez (Wheaton College).
The best line of the conference was by Dr. Schmutzer: "Apparently God is allowed to do things in Scripture that he's not allowed to do in systematic theology!" [in reference to the lamenting of God in Scripture]
For the first time, I had the privilege of participating as a judge in the student paper competition (for the undergrad side). Kudos to Kory Eastvold of Lincoln Christian University for winning the prize for undergrad students with his paper on "'What, Then, Shall We say': The Interpretation of Romans 4:1."
My own paper (attended by a grand total of 8 or so 😄 ) was entitled, "First Peter's Identity Theology and the Community of Faith: Tracing the Trajectory from Social Scientific Criticism to Biblical Theology and on to Theological Ethics."
The most helpful paper that I attended (besides the plenary addresses), in my opinion, was by David Wenkel (Moody Bible), "Eliciting an Intellectual Faith: The Paradox of High Christology in Hebrews 1:1-14." Wenkel explored the role of "paradox" within the logical argumentation of Hebrews. However, I also especially benefited from Dane Ortlund (from Crossway Books), "The Role of Teaching in Marks' Gospel" (a neglected topic since everybody always focuses on Mark as the "action" Gospel).
Also appreciated (with cordial disagreement in some cases 😄) was my friend Tim Miller's paper on "Reformed Theodicy: John Calvin on the Problem of Evil" (Tim teaches at Detroit Theological Seminary) and Tim's student, Jonathan Moreno, "A Good God in a Wicked World: Considering the Problem of Evil" (congrats to Jonathan for placing in the student paper competition for the grad level!)
As always, I appreciate the privilege of presenting a paper and pondering other papers and the challenging plenary addresses (most of us presenting papers are "minor leaguers," but the plenary speakers are the major leaguers, and they always challenge me to think!)
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