Monday with Mounce

Before I get into this blog, I want to share an interesting fact that someone sent me. This is my 500th episode for Monday w/ Mounce. I started in 2008 and have tried to write consistently, with a few summers off. I am thankful for having been able to do this and trust that you have found it helpful.

This blog is really about how you decide on the meaning of a Greek word that rarely occurs.

One of the more interesting passages in the Bible is the 73 verses between Mark 3:7 and 5:6 because the name “Jesus” never occurs. In 3:7 “Jesus withdrew with his disciples to the lake” and in 5:6 the demon–possessed man “saw Jesus from a distance.” In fact, we don’t see “Jesus” as the subject of a verb in an independent clause until 5:21. This brings up a few interesting points.

I hesitate to blog on this verse again. When I did previously I was inundated with people driven more by their theological convictions than the text. But I came across a preacher preaching from The Passion Translation, and it was so egregious I decided to say something about this “translation.”

When talking about women in Ephesian leadership, Paul starts by saying, “A woman should learn in quietness, in all submissiveness (ἐν πάσῃ ὑποταγῇ).” The application is that “I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to be in quietness.” But submissive to whom?

I was on Preston Sprinkle’s podcast the other day and I don’t know if it was something he said or just that I have been away from this issue for several years, but a thought popped into my head that is making me rethink my conclusion.

This is one of the more difficult exegetical decisions in the Pastorals and one upon which I have changed my mind since writing the commentary. Do the children have to have faith in Christ, or do they have to be faithful kinds of people?