Mike Bird visited Trinity’s campus a few days ago, and it was a pleasure giving him a short tour of campus. He is one of the most quick-witted and least-boring people I’ve met. I like teasing people like that (this video is from Zondervan’s academic blog):

And there’s more where that came from here and here.

“Beginning with Moses” just posted the following article by Michael Bird: “A Theology of the Gospel: The Gospel as the Starting-Point and Integrating-Point for Biblical and Systematic Theology.”

Outline:

1. Introduction
2. Prolegomena: Setting out the Gospel
3. The Gospel in Biblical Theology
4. The Gospel as the Integrating-Point of Systematic Theology
5. The Gospel and Discipleship, Evangelism, and Ministry Formation
6. Conclusion

“It is not only the importance of the gospel to the Church’s witness that should lead us to be vigilant and uncompromizing about the integrity of the gospel, but the entire task of being theological communities rests on our capacity to construe, imbibe, digest, and apply with greater effect the gospel in our theological and ministerial formation. For the gospel is the beginning point for theological investigation, it is the link between the Old and New Testaments, the integrating theme for theological discourse, and proclamation of the gospel is the goal of theological instruction. In the end the scarlet thread running evangelical theology is a theologia evangelii, a theology of the gospel.”