Word: christ
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...what will they take away from this unusual dovetailing of Christ narratives? It's always dangerous to predict religious behavior, but it seems likely that before traveling into the uplifting realms of Easter Sunday, they will spend a little more time in the dire valley of Good Friday. When the Roman Catholics among them hear the priest recite the verse from Isaiah--"He was wounded for our transgressions ... by his stripes we are healed"--they may remember that it was with those words that Gibson commenced his reimagining of the scourging of Jesus. When many Lutherans engage in the meditative...
...oddly enough, in many churches the issue of why Christ died is inert, if ever-present. One reason is that any deviation beyond the rote "He gave his life for us" quickly plunges into metaphysical formulations for which all but religious scholars lack the basic vocabulary. "Most people don't live in the theological nuances, including clergy," says Dr. Philip Blackwell of Chicago's First United Methodist Church. And even if we did, says Jack Graham, pastor of the Prestonwood Baptist megachurch in Plano, Texas, a full understanding might still elude us. "There are many mysteries of atonement that...
...debating the topic as if it were an election issue or celebrity trial. And back in Geneva, the issue continues to fascinate the Bible students and their church's associate rector, Tony Welty. "The question is," says Welty, "O.K., if this really happened, why did it happen? Why did Christ die? And if he really did die, then, my God, what does that mean for me? I'm a person living in the 21st century. Is this something I need to be taking more seriously...
...word's original English meaning of unity is evident in its three syllables: at-one-ment.) By around A.D. 57, when the Apostle Paul wrote the New Testament book Romans, it was clear that Christians would want to reconfigure reconciliation around the life, death and Resurrection of Christ...
Some modern atonement theorists maintain that only one answer--theirs--flows inevitably from Scripture. But more agree with Chicago Theological Seminary's Theodore Jennings Jr. "The New Testament is just all over the map" on the question of why Christ died, he says. Its writers "are all persuaded that something really drastic, fundamental and dramatic has happened, and they're pulling together all kinds of ways to understand that...