This book provides a guide for the purpose of seeing Gods single plan of creation and redemption in the Bible. It is designed and written for pastors and laity, and arises out of Jacksons many years of teaching and re-teaching this story. It is a serious presentation of the biblical storyline, reinforced with much detail. Standing behind this study is solid scholarship that validates and authenticates the authors approach to Scripture. In our fragmented world, this book will give the serious reader an integrated picture of the God of Scripture and the human family he created and saved through his Son, Jesus Christ.
C. Hassell Bullock, Ph.D.
Franklin S. Dyrness Professor of Biblical Studies Emeritus
Wheaton College
The Biblical Metanarrative fills a gap in biblical education, namely that of giving the big picture from a Christian, kingdom-centered point of view. It helps keep one from getting bogged down in the details and forgetting the big story to which the details contribute. While of course there will be new editions from time to time and scholars will debate this or that detail of the work, the story as a whole will not change. I warmly welcome this work.
Peter H. Davids, Ph.D.
Visiting Professor in Christianity, Houston Baptist University
In The Biblical Metanarrative, Bill chronicles the Biblical storyline from Genesis to Revelationa story that continues to unfold, and we are invited to join! It is an especially valuable tool for those working in cross-cultural settings.
Mark Fields, Ph.D.
Director of Global and Intercultural Ministry
Vineyard USA
Bill Jackson teaches with a balance of pastoral insight and theological wisdom. He always seems to keep us interested with insights and biblical knowledge that brings comments like, I didnt know that! It makes me think his tag is correct and Nothing is going to stop Gods message.
Gary Sweeten, Ph.D.
Psychologist
Founder of Life Way and Life Systems Ministries
This needs to be in every church in America.
Joseph P. Murphy, Ph.D.
Anglican Priest
Bill Jacksons teaching on the storyline of the Bible has equipped several generations of leadership at our church to live with the confidence that nothing will stop the advance of Gods kingdom. The real prize in this book is the gift of hope.
Jamie Wilson, D.Min.
Vineyard Regional Leader
Southern California
I have experienced this material at least a dozen times and I have taken something new away from it every time. It never gets old. Jax metanarrative insights have changed my understanding of scripture and history. I see it as so foundational to everything I do that when I started a young adult ministry at my church, I began with this study.
Robbie Hunt
College Professor
In the Bible, God gave us 66 books but one storyline. In The Biblical Metanarrative, Bill Jackson traces Gods story of redemption from Genesis through Revelation. In these pages you will discover the thread of Gods redemptive work throughout biblical history and where you fit into his plan.
Dave Veerman
Author, Speaker
Senior Editor of The Life Application Study Bible
Bill Jacksons teaching and research into the overview of Scripture has transformed the way I read the Bible and the way I preach and teach. I now see the fuller picture of Gods unfolding relationship with His creation. Jax has given voice to the understanding that we are living in the already and the not yet.
Shawn C. Branch
National Director, Threshold Ministries
Canada
The assumption of biblical theology is that
the biblical narrative does have
a connecting integrated unity
despite its great diversity.
Derek Morphew
And the things you have heard me say
in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable people who will also be qualified to teach others.
2 Timothy 2.2
The Biblical Metanarrative:
One God | One Plan | One Story
B ill J ackson
radicalmiddlepress
The Biblical Metanarrative: One God | One Plan | One Story
Copyright 2013 by Bill Jackson. All Rights Reserved Worldwide.
Version 2.0
Published by
radicalmiddlepress
http://www.radicalmiddle.net
Corona, CA 92880
ISBN: 978-1-935959-49-6
All rights reserved solely by the author. The author guarantees all contents are original and do not infringe upon the legal rights of any other person or work. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means mechanical or electronic, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from author except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.
Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version, NIV. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com
Cover Design by Kathie Dillon and Harmon Press
Photo from iStock Photo
Contents
Figures
Dedications
I would like to dedicate this book to two men who have had a profound influence on my life as authentic models of the kind of man I have always prayed to be. Its one thing to read about it in Scripture; it is quite another to see it lived out before your eyes.
When I was a high school freshman, I got a phone call from Dave Veerman, the director of our local Campus Life Club. Dave invited me to a Harvest party and even came and picked me up. I was from a divorced home and Dave was the first Christian male that had ever paid personal attention to me. That one phone call changed the entire trajectory of my life. Dave and his wife, Gail, taught me about Jesus Christ and love and marriage. They also gave me my life-long passion to share my faith. Dave also gave me the first Bible that I could actually read, the Good News for Modern Man translation of the New Testament. From that moment on, I found not only my love for the Word of God but my lifes calling, to teach the Word of God in season and out of season. It is, therefore, an incredible honor to have had Daves company, Livingstone Corporation, oversee the professional development of this work for the first publication.
I would also like to dedicate The Biblical Metanarrative to Dr. Gordon Fee. He taught me the skills of exegesis at Gordon-Conwell Seminary and gave me the tools for a lifetime of expositional preaching. He and his wife, Maudine, also took Betsy and me in and made us a part of their family, a bond that exists to this day. From Gordon, I learned the difference between preaching and teaching. Preaching was when professor Fee took off his glasses and things got much louder; all else was teaching. Two of his lectures changed my life. The first was the kingdom as already/not yet lesson from Life of Jesus. Everyone else left the lecture hall that day, but I couldnt move as I realized that from that moment on, things could never be the same. This insight into the worldview of the New Testament laid the foundation for meeting John Wimber in Boston in 1982 and gave us our life-long career as pastors in the Vineyard. The second was his final lecture in New Testament Survey on the filling of the Holy Spirit. He told us, I dont care if you call it baptism, filling, empowered, or zapped. Just have it. This freed me up to fully embrace both the evangelical and charismatic sides of my heritage. Years later, the Doc, along with Maudine, laid hands on me to bless the teaching gift that has rested on my life ever since my first attempts to tell my friends what I was learning from Good News for Modern Man, thus connecting the dots between the two most important men in my life.
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