Joel Green – Conversion in Luke-Acts

Episode Summary:  How does brain relate to mind?  To spirit  or soul?  And what does all of this have to do with conversion and Scripture?  OnScript host Matthew Bates welcomes Joel B. Green as a guest.  Joel’s new book, Conversion in Luke-Acts, explores how our modern stories of “conversion” have been impacted by Cartesian dualism and by psychological studies that construct the individual along interior, subjective lines. Discover Luke’s radically different view of conversion. Along the way hear how Joel’s previous research work helped keep Matt on the path of Christian discipleship in the face of temptation some fifteen years ago.

Guest: Joel B. Green is Dean of the School of Theology and Professor of New Testament Interpretation at Fuller Theological Seminary.  Joel was previously a professor at Asbury Theological Seminary for eleven years.  Joel is the author of more than forty books including Why Salvation? (2013), Practicing Theological Interpretation (2011), Body, Soul, and Human Life (2008), Seized by Truth (2007) and The Gospel of Luke (1997).  Joel is also famous for his editorial work.  He is the editor of the New International Commentary on the New Testament series, the Two Horizons commentary series, Journal of Theological Interpretation, and Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels.

Book:  Joel B. Green, Conversion in Luke-Acts: Divine Action, Human Cognition, and the People of God (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2015). Repentance and conversion are key topics in New Testament interpretation and in Christian life. However, the study of conversion in early Christianity has been plagued by psychological assumptions alien to the world of the New Testament. Leading New Testament scholar Joel Green believes that careful attention to the narrative of Luke-Acts calls for significant rethinking about the nature of Christian conversion. Drawing on the cognitive sciences and examining key evidence in Luke-Acts, this book emphasizes the embodied nature of human life as it explores the life transformation signaled by the message of conversion, offering a new reading of a key aspect of New Testament theology.