Thanksgiving

by Pao, David W.

• ISBN13: 9780830826131
• ISBN10: 0830826130
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2002-11-01
• Publisher: Ivp Academic

Summary

"Be thankful" (Colossians 3:15) is a recurring exhortation in the letters of the apostle Paul. No other New Testament writer gives such a sustained emphasis on thanksgiving--and yet, major modern studies of Paul fail to wrestle with it.David Pao aims to rehabilitate this theme in this comprehensive and accessible study, a New Studies in Biblical Theology volume. He shows how, for Paul, thanksgiving is grounded in the covenantal traditions of salvation history. To offer thanks to God is to live a life of worship and to anticipate the future acts of God, all in submission to the lordship of Christ. Ingratitude to God is idolatry. Thanksgiving functions as a link between theology, including eschatology, and ethics.Here Pao provides clear insights into the passion of an apostle who never fails to insist on the significance of both the gospel message and the response this message demands.

Author Biography

David W. Pao is Assistant Professor of New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. His PhD is from Harvard University

Table of Contents

Series preface	7	(9)
Author's preface	9	(2)
Abbreviations	11	(4)
Thanksgiving as God-centredness	15	(24)
Source and traditions	16	(1)
Epistolary thanksgiving	17	(2)
A cross-cultural examination	19	(2)
To say 'Thanks'	21	(4)
Thanksgiving and worship	25	(8)
Thanksgiving as God-centredness	33	(6)
Thanksgiving within the covenantal traditions	39	(20)
God and his people	39	(3)
The past in covenantal traditions	42	(2)
The present in covenantal traditions	44	(1)
The future in covenantal traditions	45	(2)
Paul and the covenantal traditions	47	(6)
Thanksgiving and the covenantal traditions	53	(6)
Thanksgiving and covenantal history	59	(27)
Thanksgiving as remembrance	59	(1)
Remembrance as a covenantal act	60	(4)
Confessing the mighty acts of God	64	(5)
Climax of history	69	(2)
'Do this in remembrance of me'	71	(3)
The Pauline gospel	74	(4)
Divine acts through human agency	78	(3)
Grace and thanksgiving	81	(5)
A life of thanksgiving	86	(33)
To walk in him	86	(5)
Anti-idol polemic	91	(7)
Thanksgiving offering	98	(5)
In all circumstances	103	(5)
Redefinition of the structure of authority	108	(8)
Covenantal relationship	116	(3)
Thanksgiving and the future	119	(26)
Faithful and powerful God	119	(7)
Bridging the past and the future	126	(5)
Future as grounds for thanksgiving	131	(8)
In light of the future	139	(6)
Ingratitude	145	(20)
Rejection of the mighty acts of God	145	(4)
Forgetting their Lord and worshipping idols	149	(4)
'Do not grumble, as some of them did'	153	(6)
'They neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him'	159	(3)
'Lovers of themselves'	162	(3)
Appendix: Pauline thanksgiving and the Greco-Roman benefaction system	165	(9)
The Greco-Roman patron-client network	165	(3)
Gratitude in the patron-client relationship	168	(2)
Pauline thanksgiving and the patronage model	170	(4)
Bibliography	174	(23)
Index of modern authors	197	(4)
Index of biblical references and ancient sources	201	(10)
Index of subjects	211