The Letter to the Hebrews with Amy Peeler

To hear the podcast (20 min.) click here.

Amy Peeler has been with us before on The Stone Chapel Podcasts.  Her first podcast has two parts and she talked about her book Women and the Gender of God.

There is a link in the show notes below to find those two podcasts.  She joins David Capes today on the podcast to discuss her new commentary on the letter to the Hebrews.

Who Is Amy Peeler?

Amy Peeler is the Kenneth T. Wessner Chair of Biblical Studies at Wheaton College. The former holder of that chair was Dr. Doug Moo. 

She earned her PhD at Princeton Theological Seminary and today is ordained as a priest in the Anglican Church.  She serves as associate rector of St. Mark’s Episcopal church in Geneva, IL.

The Letter to the Hebrews

For all practical purposes the letter to the Hebrews is one of the most complicated and robust of biblical books. 

It has attracted Dr. Peeler’s attention since grad school.  She loves it, first, because of its heavy engagement with the Scriptures of Israel.  She also loves it as a historian because of the way you can see Greek influences in the book.

We call it a letter today.  It also has the overtones of a sermon and deep encouragement to a community under stress.

The commentary is part of a new series on Spiritual Formation.  For Dr. Peeler the essential questions are: (1) who is God as revealed in Hebrews? (2) how are we to live in the light of this revelation? (3) how does reading this book change your life? 

Joshua Jipp, professor at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Chicago, said on social media that this is his all time favorite commentary.  High praise, indeed! 

So if you want to know more about the letter to the Hebrews, listen to this podcast first.  Then find Dr. Peeler’s book.

Resources

For a link to Part 1 of her earlier podcast click here.

Part 2 can be found by clicking here.

For a link to her book, Hebrews in the Series Commentary for Christian Formation (Eerdmans 2024), click here.

For a link to her book, Women and the Gender of God (Eerdmans 2022), click here.  

Want more Stone Chapel Podcasts on some great topics? Just click here.

You can get information on upcoming lectures at Lanier Theological Library by clicking here

The Lord Roars from Zion with Danny Carroll

Danny Carroll Rodas, Wheaton College

To hear the podcast (20 minutes) click here.

Danny Carroll is an expert in the Hebrew Prophets.  He’s thought deeply and written significantly about them for years. 

In this podcast he discusses his new book, The Lord Roars: Recovering the Prophetic Voice for Today.

Danny Carroll Rodas is an Old Testament ethicist who serves as the Scripture Press Ministries Professor of Biblical Studies and Pedagogy at Wheaton College and Graduate School in Wheaton.

He has been to the Lanier Theological Library on a couple of occasions, most recently to give a lecture in Spanish to members of our community. You can watch the lecture here.

In today’s podcast Dr. Carroll R. discusses the work of three Old Tesatament prophets: Isaiah, Amos, and Micah. He does an artful job explaining the history, culture, and poetry behind these prophets whose oracles were recorded a brief time after they were delivered.  

The words of the Lord came to Hebrew prophets in their day but they continue to speak in ours. 

Among other things, the Hebrew prophets were cultural critics in their time and can be in ours when our values and practices violate the decent and reasonable laws of God. 

Questions emerge today about immigration, the environment, and our polarized rhetoric and politics.  Does God have anything to say on these challenging topics.

Here is what Dennis Edwards of North Park Theological Seminary said about the book:

“Perhaps some of us employ the adjective prophetic hastily or uncritically, but many more of us are reluctant to heed the words of prophets–even the prophets identified in the Bible. Carroll demonstrates why and how biblical prophets speak to a myriad of social issues, including many that we presently face. His rigorous exegesis, historical analysis, and cultural awareness converge to give Bible readers a better understanding of Scripture’s prophetic tradition and how it applies right now.”

Danny joined us on the podcast a few months ago to discuss the Bible and immigration. Click here to listen to the podcast.

To hear the podcast (20 minutes) click here.

Reckoning with Race–Vince Bacote

Dr. Vincent Bacote, Wheaton College

Dr. Vince Bacote, Associate Professor of Theology and Director of the Center for Applied Christian Ethics at Wheaton College, joins David Capes to talk about his new book, Reckoning with Race and Performing the Good News: In Search of a Better Evangelical Theology (Brill, 2020).  Dr. Bacote is interested in rehabilitating the evangelical movement when it comes to how racial minorities fit into its life.  For too long the good news, while central to evangelical theology and life, has not always been good for minorities.  The polarization now in the west is due in large part because majorities and minorities are speaking past each another rather than finding a place at the table for one another.  According to Bacote, theology and ethics belong together and are not separate spheres of life and thought.  After discussing the meaning of “racism” and “critical race theory,” Bacote offers concrete proposals for what serious Christians and a thoughtful church can do next.  To learn more about Dr. Vince Bacote and his work, go to his website http://www.vincentbacote.com.

To hear the podcast (22 minutes) click here.

The Stone Chapel is a podcast of the friends and staff of the Lanier Theological Library in Houston, Texas.  It is hosted by Dr. David Capes, Senior Research Fellow at the library and former faculty member at Houston Baptist University and Wheaton College.  The purpose of the podcast is to bring to our audience great conversations from the world’s leading experts in theology, biblical studies, archaeology, Church history, the Dead Sea Scrolls, ethics, ministry, and a host of other topics close to the mission of the library.

The Lanier Theological Library is a magnet for scholars, church leaders and influencers.  For the last ten years, it has welcomed hundreds of academics and church leaders from across the globe for public lectures, study, panel discussions, consultations, and encouragement.

These podcasts as well as the Lanier library and the Stone Chapel are generously underwritten by Mark and Becky Lanier and the Lanier Theological Library Foundation.  If you have questions or comments, please be in touch: Email david.capes@lanierlibrary.org