- [Jon] Near the end of the Bible are 21 letters
from leaders of the early Jesus movement.
They were written to small church communities in cities
throughout the Roman world.
- [Tim] Now, writing letters took a lot of money
and effort in the ancient world,
and so each one was crafted carefully from beginning to end,
and that means we should read them
as one whole literary work.
- So let's talk about how to read New Testament letters
in their literary context.
Of all the early Christian leaders,
the apostle Paul wrote the most letters.
We have 13 in the New Testament.
I often imagine him alone in his study
writing long theological essays.
- [Tim] But Paul didn't work or write alone.
In fact, he often names people from his team
who helped him produce the letters.
- [Jon] Oh, right. Like Timothy or Silas.
- [Tim] Yeah, Paul was constantly
with his missionary teammates
on the road working out ideas
as they talked and debated and taught together.
And Paul would've collected speeches,
poems, and prayers in notebooks.
- [Jon] Like the ones he mentions
in his second letter to Timothy.
- [Tim] Right, and so Paul
would get the right teammates in a room
and start pulling together old and new material.
Then they would hire a professional scribe
and start creating drafts until they were satisfied
with how it worked together as one whole.
- [Jon] Then mail it off.
- [Tim] Yeah, the letter would be given
to a trusted teammate who would also be given instructions
on how to perform it before the recipients.
- [Jon] Perform it like read it aloud?
- [Tim] Yeah, most people back then didn't read.
And so Paul mentions this more than once in his letters
that they were designed to be heard,
which is why they often sound like written speeches.
- [Jon] So it's important for us to read and listen
to these letters from beginning to end too,
so we can appreciate how each part
contributes to the whole.
- [Tim] Exactly. Now, every culture
has its own practice for how to organize a letter,
and in the first century there was a standard format.
You have the opening, which names the author
and then the receiver,
then a prayer of thanks or a greeting,
then comes the body of the letter.
- [Jon] This part is the main reason
for writing in the first place.
What the receiver's supposed to know or do something about.
- [Tim] Right, and then comes the conclusion,
which could have greetings, travel plans,
a final request, or a prayer.
- [Jon] So it's helpful to see
how a New Testament letter breaks down into these parts.
- [Tim] Right, so let's take, for example,
Paul's letter to the Ephesians.
- [Jon] Okay, there's the opening
and then a long thanksgiving prayer to God.
- [Tim] And in the center of this opening prayer
Paul introduces the main idea of the whole letter.
It's about God's plan.
- [Jon] To unite together all things
in Heaven and Earth in Messiah Jesus.
But what does that mean?
- [Tim] Well, as we move into the body of the letter
Paul is going to repeat and unpack this rich idea.
- [Jon] Right, but in the body of the letter
it's easy to get lost
and lose track of what Paul's even talking about.
- [Tim] Totally, I mean, the letter to the Ephesians
has about 3,000 words.
- [Jon] And that one's short compared
to his other letters.
- [Tim] But remember Paul wrote these letters
to be heard aloud, and so he usually gives clues
to the progression of thought
with transition words like "therefore"
or "because of this" or "so then."
- [Jon] Okay, so the body of Ephesians
breaks down to a lot of paragraphs,
but they all begin with these transition words.
- [Tim] Right, and each paragraph
has its own main idea.
So the first one is about how the risen Jesus
is King of everything and everyone.
And as for you, that is non-Israelites,
you are now included in the new humanity God's creating.
Therefore, God's one new family
consists of people from all nations.
- [Jon] So God has unified a new humanity in Jesus.
That's the core idea here.
- [Tim] Right, and that theme unites all
of the paragraphs in chapters 1 through 3.
Then we come to chapter 4
and we get a really significant transition.
- [Jon] "Therefore."
- [Tim] Yeah, that transition word
is actually a hinge between the first
and second half of the letter.
God's unified a new humanity in Jesus.
- [Jon] Therefore what?
- [Tim] Great question.
Let's keep going and we'll summarize
the paragraphs of chapter 4.
God's one new humanity is really diverse,
so we must live together as God's new creation,
and that, therefore, requires that we learn how to love
and forgive each other because we are one.
- [Jon] This section is all about living in unity.
- [Tim] Right, and so you can see now
how all the parts of the letter
fit together into one flow of thought.
God's unified a new humanity in Jesus
therefore live in a way that fosters that unity.
- [Jon] Seeing it broken down like this
is really helpful, it's like a roadmap so I don't get lost.
- [Tim] Right, and you can read
every New Testament letter this way.
Break it down into smaller parts
to see the message of each paragraph.
- [Jon] And then trace repeated ideas
and transition words to see
how they all connect back together.
- [Tim] Then you'll see how the apostles
brilliantly combined all of the pieces
into a literary whole that spoke to Jesus' first followers
and can still speak to us today.