ACTS

WILLIE JAMES JENNINGS

© 2017 Willie James Jennings

First edition

Published by Westminster John Knox Press

Louisville, Kentucky

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. For information, address Westminster John Knox Press, 100 Witherspoon Street, Louisville, Kentucky 40202-1396.

Or contact us online at www.wjkbooks.com.

Scripture quotations from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible are copyright © 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. and are used by permission.

Cover design by Lisa Buckley

Cover illustration: © David Chapman/Design Pics/Corbis

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Jennings, Willie James, 1961- author.

Title: Acts / Willie James Jennings.

Description: First edition. | Louisville, KY : Westminster John Knox Press, 2017. | Series: Belief: a theological commentary on the Bible | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2017005493 (print) | LCCN 2017007882 (ebook) | ISBN 9780664234003 (printed case : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781611648058 (ebk.)

Subjects: LCSH: Bible. Acts--Commentaries.

Classification: LCC BS2625.53 .J46 2017 (print) | LCC BS2625.53 (ebook) | DDC 226.6/07--dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017005493

BELIEF

A Theological Commentary on the Bible

general editors

Amy Plantinga Pauw

William C. Placher†

Contents

Publisher’s Note

Series Introduction by William C. Placher and Amy Plantinga Pauw

Preface

Introduction: Why Acts? Why Now?

COMMENTARY

1:1–4:37 THE REVOLUTION IS HERE!

1:1–12 The Death of Nationalist Fantasy

Further Reflections: Christians, Jews, and Nationalism

1:13–26 Grasping for the New

2:1–13 The Sound of Intimacy

2:14–36 Speaking in the Spirit

2:37–41 A New Response

2:42–47 A New Reality of Giving

3:1–11 A New Gaze

3:12–26 History in the Making

4:1–37 The Criminal-Disciple Emerges!

5:1–9:43 THE STRUGGLE OF DIASPORA

5:1–17 The Death of the Sovereign Couple

Further Reflections: Marriage, Money, and Discipleship

5:18–42 The Unity of Suffering

6:1–15 The Pain of Diaspora

7:1–8:2 A New Storyteller

8:3–25 The Scattering and the Saving

8:26–40 A New Sight of Love

Further Reflections: Evangelization and Loving Difference

9:1–19a Disrupting Life

9:19b–30 The Diaspora in Faith and Fear

9:31–43 The Repetition of Jesus

10:1–15:41 THE DESIRE OF GOD EXPOSED

10:1–23a The Revolution Comes to Us

10:23b–48 This Is What Intimacy Sounds Like

11:1–18 The Transgressing God

Further Reflections: Word of God against Word of God

11:19–30 The World according to Antioch

12:1–25 The Prison Returns

13:1–12 The Unambiguous Spirit

13:13–52 Between Diaspora and Antioch: The Christian Cosmopolitan

14:1–18 The Threat of Loss and the Promise of New Life

14:19–28...