Now and Not Yet (Ulrich): Theology and Mission in Ezra-Nehemiah / January 01, 2021

Requires Accordance 11.2 or above.

For various reasons, the books of Ezra and Nehemiah have suffered comparative neglect in Old Testament scholarship. However, as Dean Ulrich demonstrates, Ezra–Nehemiah as a literary unit is part of the Christian Bible that tells God’s grand story of saving activity. It focuses not so much on how to be an effective leader but on how to be a godly participant in God’s story. God may be concerned about human conduct, but the moral imperatives appear in the larger context of God’s acts and promises. However exemplary Ezra and Nehemiah the men may be, Ezra–Nehemiah has an interest in how God’s people contribute to building the new (and New) Jerusalem—God’s redeemed community that is bigger than any single person. Mission—that is, participation in God’s purpose for his world—factors into the message of these books.

In this NSBT volume, Ulrich views Ezra–Nehemiah as the record of the beginning of a new work of God among his people after the exile. This new work, which led eventually to the first coming of Jesus, enables God’s people to be restored presently (‘now’) in their relationship with God. Such restoration involves a combination of hope in God’s promises (‘not yet’) and obedience to his instruction concerned with mission.

About the Series:
Addressing key issues in biblical theology, the works comprised by New Studies in Biblical Theology are creative attempts to help Christians better understand their Bibles. The NSBT series is edited by D. A. Carson, aiming to simultaneously instruct and to edify, to interact with current scholarship and to point the way ahead.

New Studies in Biblical Theology volumes focus on three areas:

• the nature and status of biblical theology, including its relationship to other disciplines
• the articulation and exposition of the structure of thought from a particular biblical writer or text
• the delineation of a biblical theme across the biblical corpus

While volume notes interact with the best of recent research, the text of each work avoids untransliterated Greek and Hebrew or too much specialist jargon. The volumes are written within the framework of confessional evangelicalism, but they also engage a variety of other relevant viewpoints and significant literature.