Finished

It’s over. Eight years. Eight years ago I decided I was going to blog through the New Testament. I had no idea how long it would take me. But I finished Monday, which is when I’m writing this too. I began scheduling posts early on so something would come up every day, but I didn’t have to write something that day if I had something else more pressing. I started at I Cor. 5 because that was where I was in my own reading when I decided to do this thing. I made it around. There are two posts scheduled yet to come up. 

I’m not sure why I decided to do this really. It seemed like a good idea at the time. Somewhat I viewed it as “practice.” A person goes to college and learns Biblical languages, studies the Bible in class with other students and professors who have forgotten more than you know, more than they can impart to you also, but then you get into the ministry and you are left coming up with a sermon every Sunday. Yeah, I still do that. I’ve recycled concepts but never a sermon. I remember I spent the first year of ministry reading through the Greek New Testament. I learned more. You are always learning, and sometimes you have to say goodbye to cherished notions and beliefs about what the text says as it corrects you. It was fun. I guess when I decided to blog the New Testament I thought this would help me learn too. It did. Very few things teach me better than writing.

I had time to do it. Or I thought I did. I didn’t know how much time it would take! Who knows how much time anyone has? But I did it.  I thought I would approach it like a series of concept papers for future sermons. Tackle the text, analyze it, find something devotional I could say concerning the text and how it might apply today. Somedays that was work. It got easier when I started reading Bo Giertz’s Commentaries before writing.

I don’t have the same amount of time anymore. I was determined I would finish. And I have put other things off that I want to do. I want to write more for Higher Things and 1517 now, do my art critic schtick. I want to translate more. Honestly, I’ve got more translated. Write not I have Two Volumes of Bo Giertz Sermons translated as well as “With My Own Eyes”. I need to get those published but the works are being held up by a Sasse Volume I have been editing and is at the publisher’s now. Then I have these commentaries to translate.

I’m just translating them now. I had been waiting for a friend who said he wanted to translate them 14 years ago. I’ve been translating them in prep for Sunday, and for Bible Studies. I’ve put a dent in them. They are better than anything I wrote. The world of English speaking Lutheranism needs them. English is just a more accessible language for the world of Lutheranism than Swedish. This is especially true where it is exploding in Africa and elsewhere.

As far as this blog goes, I don’t know what its future is. I won’t be posting every morning anymore. My sermons will still go up on Monday morning. Other than that I may put other things up from time to time.