Monday, March 14, 2011

The Law, Love, and Immigration from a Biblical Perspective

Friend of the Loving the Stranger blog, Matthew Soerens and author of Welcoming the Stranger: Justice, Compassion & Truth in the Immigration Debate begins a blog series on Romans 13 today at Undocumented.tv. Check out the first in the series: Further Thoughts on Romans 13--Part 1.

I just finished teaching a class on hermeneutics for Seminario Bíblico de las Américas. Hermeneutics is the art and science of interpretation. In our class we were able to clarify the meaning of many passages of scripture by looking a the context of the passage--the historical and cultural context from which the text was written, the intent of the author, the immediate context of specific passage, the context of the book, the testament and the meta-narrative of the whole Bible. We asked questions about how this passage fits with the redemptive purpose of the entirety of scripture. To understand Romans 13:1-5 we also need to understand Romans 12. We need to understand the church's relationship to the Roman government at the time of the crucifixion of Jesus, and Acts 5, and in AD 90 when the Apostle John wrote of his Revelation of Jesus Christ. We also need to consider the narrative of Shiphrah and Puah, Hebrew midwives named in Exodus chapter one. Always check the context to avoid a misinformed pretext.

Check out Matt's series this week at Undocumented.tv.

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