Women in ministry, Church unity & Paul’s “End of the World” Ask NT Wright

Summary

Ask NT Wright Anything – Episode Summary Episode: Women in Ministry, Church Unity & Paul’s “End of the World”
Hosts: Mike Bird & N.T. Wright
Release Date: March 23, 2026

Episode Overview

This episode addresses listener questions about significant and sometimes contentious issues within Christianity: the role of women in church leadership, unity amid theological differences, and whether Paul was mistaken (or misinterpreted) regarding the timing of Christ’s return. Through thoughtful dialogue, Tom Wright and Mike Bird unpack the scriptural, historical, and practical complexities of these matters, aiming to encourage deeper understanding, unity, and grace within the church.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Can Egalitarians and Complementarians Coexist in the Same Church?

Timestamps:
[02:59] Mike Bird introduces questions from Nick Maxson and Bernadette McNamara
[06:22] Tom Wright responds

• Cultural Context:
  Tom notes that American evangelicalism has been "more, shall we say, stridently masculine and male led" than much of the rest of the English-speaking world, especially influential in the South ([06:32]).

  “That culture has shaped the church in ways that not everybody in the church is aware of.” — Tom Wright [06:45]

• Terms 'Complementarian' and 'Egalitarian':
  Tom cautions against these labels as “both very, very misleading.” For Paul, “in Christ there is neither male nor female,” but that does not erase differences or roles ([07:10]).

  "Saying there are significant differences and that they are meant to work together does not result in the so called complementarian position which always has men in the dominating position." — Tom Wright [08:40]

• Biblical Precedents:
  Paul’s letters, especially 1 Corinthians, show women leading in worship—not silent or hidden ([07:40]).
  Mary Magdalene was chosen by Jesus to first proclaim the resurrection, signaling a new world order in ministry roles ([08:07]).

• Practical Advice:
  Tom discourages dividing churches over this issue. “I don't like deal breakers... we need to work this one out in fellowship.” He invokes Romans 14: do not judge others for what they reckon to be acceptable ([10:32]).

  Mike adds:

  “Don't go to this church for the purpose of causing a fuss... If it is a church where you feel respected, valued, you're being ministered to in word and sacrament, that's good as well. My only reservation is that at some point it's the women who will pay the price.” — Mike Bird [17:08]

  Ultimately, both recommend discerning in “the precincts of your own conscience” whether one can remain, especially if callings are stifled ([17:44]).

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2. Women (and Deacons) Baptizing: Is It Permitted?

Timestamps:
[05:24] Bernadette’s question raised
[12:48] Tom Wright responds

• Who Is Authorized to Baptize?
  Tom explains that in his tradition (Anglican) and many others, “actually anyone can baptize in a situation” of necessity (e.g., critical illness in infancy).

  “If it is Trinitarian and with water in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, that is valid.” — Tom Wright [13:03]

• Baptism and Community:
  While “anyone can baptize,” it is not a private event but “a celebration by the whole community.” When done outside the congregation (e.g., Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch), new believers should be formally welcomed into the church body at the earliest opportunity ([14:01]).

• Significance of the Baptizer:
  Tom resists the idea that “it would be good if this person could be baptized by a woman,” stressing that “baptism... has nothing really to do with the person doing the baptizing. It's everything to do with Jesus and the Spirit.” ([14:34])

  Mike agrees, but adds he doesn’t favor “freelance baptizing,” emphasizing that baptism should be connected to an actual church community ([17:45]).

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3. Christian Unity Amid Doctrinal Differences

Timestamps:
[19:34] Transition to church unity concerns
[22:40] Tom Wright’s perspective on unity

• Unity as an Imperative:
  Tom stresses that unity is central to Paul’s thought. The early church took proactive steps to prevent division along language and ethnic lines, insisting, “We're not having disunity, thank you very much, on ethnic or linguistic or any other lines.” ([23:38])

• Balancing Unity and Holiness:

  “Unity is easy if you don't care about holiness... Holiness is easy if you don't care about unity.” — Tom Wright [24:35]
  Both are essential and their tension must be lived, not solved by easy separation.

• Basis for Unity:
  Tom recounts his experience among Catholic bishops, who highlighted “two instruments of unity”: Baptism and the Bible ([25:23]).
  All major traditions acknowledge the validity of Trinitarian baptism, and “we all have the Bible,” even if the canons differ in detail.

• Role of the Creeds:
  Creeds like the Nicene are valuable, but “they are later...than the Bible” and arose in response to particular historical needs. Tom suggests unity should focus on shared biblical narrative and prayerful, practical cooperation, not just creedal formulae ([28:40]).

  “Let’s read the Bible together and let’s find the basis of our faith in those stories in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.” — Tom Wright [28:56]

• Moving Beyond Deal Breakers:
  Tom references Rowan Williams and Cardinal Walter Kasper, highlighting that substantial agreement already exists among denominations—so differences over, say, Marian dogmas should not always “destroy our fellowship” ([30:45]).

  Memorable Moment:

  “If you were an Anglican priest in England in say, 1900, you certainly wouldn't...be having coffee with the local Roman Catholic. We have come a long way. We should celebrate that and be praying for wisdom about what the next steps are.” — Tom Wright [31:25]

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4. Was Paul Mistaken about the End of the World?

Timestamps:
[33:54] Lauren White’s question introduced
[35:45] Tom Wright’s answer

• Historical Misreadings:
  Tom critiques the modern idea, stemming from scholars like Albert Schweitzer and Rudolf Bultmann, that Paul and Jesus were simply “wrong” about a near-term apocalypse.

  “We have been conned...by particularly Albert Schweitzer...who wanted to be able to say, well Jesus and Paul were wrong about the end of the world. So they were probably wrong about a bunch of other stuff as well.” — Tom Wright [35:51]

• Paul’s Actual Expectation:
  The “urgency” in Paul’s writings is not about predicting a date, but readiness:

  “Let me say quite categorically for the early Christians, the second coming of Jesus might happen at any time.” — Tom Wright [36:54]
  The New Testament imagery of imminent return emphasizes preparedness, not prediction.

• Misreading Apocalyptic Language:
  Passages in Mark 13 referencing “this generation” refer to the destruction of Jerusalem, “and it did—spot on, 40 years after Jesus’ death” ([38:05]).
  Apocalyptic language about the sun, moon, and stars is metaphorical, indicating world-shaking social change, not literal celestial events ([43:35]).

• Why the Urgency?
  Paul wanted to “plant and establish churches which will be Judean plus Gentile, so that when the worst comes...the church nevertheless will hang on...across ethnic boundaries in Christ” ([41:17]).

• End of the World?:

  “It won’t be the end of the world. It will be the goal of the world. God is making new creation...He is not going to throw this present space, time, and matter universe into the trash can.” — Tom Wright [44:45]

• Eucharistic Insight:
  Mike Bird adds that the Lord’s Supper, as “you proclaim his death until he comes,” presumes ongoing expectation rather than a missed deadline ([45:09]).

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

• “In Christ there is neither male nor female... But that saying there are significant differences and that they are meant to work together does not result in the so called complementarian position which always has men in the dominating position.” — Tom Wright [07:10 & 08:40]
• “At some point it’s the women who will pay the price.” — Mike Bird [17:18]
• “Unity is easy if you don’t care about holiness. Holiness is easy if you don’t care about unity.” — Tom Wright [24:35]
• “Let’s read the Bible together and let’s find the basis of our faith in those stories in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.” — Tom Wright [28:56]
• “God is making new creation...He is not going to throw this present space, time, and matter universe into the trash can...” — Tom Wright [44:45]

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Important Timestamps

• [02:59] – Listener questions on women in ministry introduced
• [06:22] – N.T. Wright: perspectives on culture and leadership
• [12:48] – Who can baptize? Church tradition and practice
• [19:34] – Transition to church unity and creeds
• [22:40] – N.T. Wright: imperative of Christian unity
• [33:54] – Lauren’s question: Paul and the end of the world
• [35:45] – N.T. Wright: context, urgency, and New Testament eschatology

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Conclusion

This episode provides rich biblical insight and pastoral wisdom on divisive topics, with a consistent call toward unity, humility, and faithful living. Tom and Mike urge discernment on issues of church practice, a biblical foundation for unity over division, and a robust, hope-filled understanding of the world’s ultimate destiny in Christ.

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For further reading:

• Tom Wright, Paul and the Faithfulness of God
• Tom Wright, A Vision of Ephesians
• Cardinal Walter Kasper, Harvesting the Fruits

To submit your own questions or access bonus episodes:
Visit Ask NT Wright Anything at Premier Unbelievable.

Transcript

[Podcast Host (Intro Announcer)]

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[Mike Bird]

Hello and welcome to the Ask nt Write Anything podcast, the program where we answer your questions about Jesus, the Bible and the life of faith. I'm Mike Bird from Ridley College in Melbourne, Australia, and I'm joined by Tom

[Tom Wright]

Wright from Oxford in England.

[Mike Bird]

And Tom, I hear you've been hanging around the west coast of America. Was that a lot of fun? I saw all the stuff. Pictures on Facebook, people having good times.

[Tom Wright]

Oh really? No, it was fun. It was a bit frantic. Massive long journey out to Sacramento. I was routed through Charlotte and the Carolinas, which is a bizarre way to go, but that's what the travel agent arranged. And then I was in Sacramento, then I was in Portland, then I was in Seattle. And each time lovely hosts, good audiences and no, I had fun. It's just rather a lot of it and I'm just getting over jet lag now, but you know all about that.

[Mike Bird]

Oh, as someone who's had to gallivant between Australia and Europe and America, which I think in December I literally went around the world. I went from Australia to America, to London, then back home via Dubai. So it's busy. But it's worth coming back because we've got great questions to answer today, Tom. We've got topics like, you know, can you be part of a church where you disagree with the leadership's view of women in ministry? Questions about creeds and unity and Paul and the end of the world. So our first question is about women and leadership, the church, and how you deal with differences. Now we had two people send in questions around about this topic. The first question was from Nick maxson of Greensburg, USA, and the second one was from Bernadette McNamara of Powell, USA. Now this is what Nick asks. He says, hello, Tom and Mike. Thanks for everything you do here on the podcast. Your thoughts and theology have shaped me tremendously in my understanding of what it means to be a follower of Jesus. My question for you today is one I've struggled with for some time. My family and I find ourselves in a wonderful church body but hold some theological doctrinal differences, particularly when it comes to the role of women in the church. What we might call the more traditional or complementarian stance is one my wife and I have come to reject and now, with the birth of our first daughter, are worried about how being raised in such a church might affect her. Don't get me wrong, we love our church, our pastor, the people, and everything else. But can we egalitarians and complementarians coexist? The obvious answer is yes, as we are all one in Christ. But would love to hear your thoughts. Thanks. So that's the question from Nick. And then there's an analogous one from Bernadette. She says, good evening. Thank you for the work you do both in bringing clarity and understanding to the complex word of God in a deeply divisive time, particularly in the United States. Your voices and scholarship have been genuinely faith sustaining for me. I was recently ordained as a deacon in an EPC church that's the Evangelical Presbyterian Church in the United States. A woman who I lead through a monthly Bible study asked whether I could baptize her. This study serves women recovering from human trafficking. She's not currently a member of a church and does not regularly attend due to her work schedule. I believe it could be a profoundly redemptive experience for her to be baptized by a woman actively involved in her discipleship. However, I have never been asked this question before, and my initial response was uncertainty about whether I am permitted to do so. This has led me to ask who is authorized to perform a baptism? Are there limitations within the church or tradition, and would it be appropriate for me as a deacon, to baptize her? So there we go. Tom, two questions about women in ministry. One concerning can you be part of a church? Whether you hold a different view to the leadership and if you like the church and you think it's a good church. And the second one about who can baptize. Can women baptize or can deacons baptize? So, Tom, what do you have to say to Nick and Bernadette?

[Tom Wright]

Goodness, these are great questions and I very much understand the context and the force of them. But there's several things to say right. By way of introduction, the first is I've been reading a bit around some aspects of contemporary American Christian culture, and it seems to me that in a way that I hadn't fully appreciated, much of American would be evangelical culture over the last two or three generations has been more, shall we say, stridently masculine and male led and male shaped than what seem in other ways to be equivalent movements around the world. Now, of course, this has all sorts of cultural nuances and so on, but I'm just aware as I come and go to the States, which is the place I tend to travel to more than anywhere else, I'm just aware that there is a big culture difference there, and there's still many parts of the United States, especially in the south, but not only where the whole culture is still much more masculine dominated than much of the rest of the English speaking world, I think that would be fair to say. So that culture has shaped the church in ways that not everybody in the church is aware of. Within that I want to say something about these blessed words complementarian and egalitarian. I think they're both very, very misleading because in Christ there is neither male nor female. Now, does that mean egalitarian? No, because it's quite clear that for Paul, men and women are different, are significantly different, and do have what you might call apparently in some ways complementary roles. I mean, you see it in First Corinthians, where very specific instructions about what men do, what women do. And it's clear from that, incidentally, that the women in 1 Corinthians Paul expects them to be leading part of the worship service at least. So it's not that they're to sit down, shut up and keep out of sight. It's that when they are active in public ministry, they are to look like women and not to look like ersatz men. I mean, that raises all sorts of other issues. But it does imply to me that simply saying complementarian and meaning by that, therefore men take all the leading roles and women take all the subordinate and out of sight roles. That simply isn't the case. And I have argued, as you have and others have, that there is much in the New Testament which makes it clear that with the death and resurrection of Jesus, a whole new world order has opened up in which the first person to take the good news that Jesus is Lord and God has raised him from the dead is Mary Magdalene. Now that's not accidental. In the resurrection narratives, John 20 particularly, I've often said, and it gets a little wry smile if not a laugh when I say it, Jesus did not say to Mary, look, Mary, there's an important announcement to be made, but it's obviously got to be made by a man because this is the beginning of the Church's mission to the world. So please go and get Peter or John so that one of them can make the announcement. Jesus says to Mary, no, you go and tell my brothers and everyone else that the crucified Jesus has been raised from the dead and is now the Lord of the world. Now that's the beginning of the Gospel and it's given to Mary. So yes, I do believe that men and women are significantly different. But that saying there are significant differences and that they are meant to work together does not result in the so called complementarian position which always has men in the dominating position. And of course in Ephesians 5, the famous passage about husbands and wives, it isn't husbands, you're in charge, so watch out, wives, sit down, shut up. It's very much submit to one another out of reverence for Christ and the humility of the husband in that role is really quite striking. So there is egalitarianism in the sense that we are all one in Christ and that we are all redeemed in the same way and we are all baptized in the same way. Which points to the second question, which is interesting because of course in the Judaic world it was the men through circumcision who had the mark of being a member of the people of God. Whereas in Christianity from the very beginning it's men and women together. It's very interesting that when Paul is persecuting the very early church in Jerusalem, he goes after men and women, women. I remember Ken Bailey pointing out ages ago that you only go after people who are significant in taking an active and probably public role in a new movement. And so the men and the women are both involved in this. So maybe in complementary ways, but certainly in balanced ways, if you like. So I think watch out for those two terms. They really don't help. And so as to the question of whether this is a deal breaker for a church, I don't like deal breakers. I'm very much in the mode because I read books like Ephesians about the unity of the church and Galatians. I'm very much in the mode of saying we need to work this one out and we need to work it out in fellowship. Now, of course, there are some moments, and you can see this in First Corinthians particularly, there are some moments where some people will say and particularly do certain things for which the only answer is this person must be put out of fellowship. But that's not Paul's normal way. Paul's normal way is by teaching, by getting people to learn to think in bigger pictures, in a more Christ shaped and spirit led fashion, and to arrive at a common mind. And where that's not possible, then the rule of Romans 14 would kick in which says, do not judge somebody else for what they reckon to be acceptable. Now, Paul is talking there about food laws and about Sabbath and symbolism, similar festival days, but those, I mean, those were pretty big, obviously in the Judaic world, so to say. Look, this is not something to divide the church over. That was quite a bitter pill for some people to swallow. But Paul is very clear about it and I would say the same. Now, of course, if there is a church which is absolutely adamant that there are no women in leadership at all doing anything other than maybe teaching a women's Bible study or running a Sunday school or something, and if there are people who believe strongly as women that they are called to such a ministry, then at certain points there may have to be some sort of parting of the ways, but only in the hope of an eventual reconciliation. I mean, I have worked with many women who I have been ordaining, who in telling me their stories have talked about how when they were quite young they were sure God was calling them to ministry, but their church at that time didn't accept that, didn't want that, and how they just had to wait and be patient and pray and discuss with others who were wrestling with the same issues. And now the huge sigh of relief when my church eventually said yes we can ordain them. And I have seen such women come through into wonderful, wonderful, rich variety of ministries in the Church of England. Now, I know not all churches have done that, and there are lots of different cultural distinctives. If you go to the Middle east, if you go to Africa, or as I said, the Southern States of America, culturally it may be very difficult for women to take on strong leadership roles. But it does seem to me that in the Gospel that is one of the revolutionary things that happens in the early church and we should be bold and go with it while making space for those, as in Romans 14 or 1 Corinthians 8, whose conscience doesn't let them do that at the moment. As to whether a woman can baptize, I mean, in my tradition, and I think in most Christian traditions, actually anyone can baptize in a situation where a baby is born very sickly and not expected to live long. Then in a hospital, a nurse, an unordained nurse can baptize. And the baptism, if it is trinitarian and with water in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, that is valid, proper baptism and to be recognized as such in the church. Now, again, not all Christian denominations would agree with that, but that's certainly the position that, that I grew up with and have always held as the Anglican position that anyone can baptize. Of course, part of the point of baptism is that it shouldn't be a private event. Sometimes it has to be like Philip baptizing the Ethiopian eunuch. But actually baptism involves the whole community and bringing somebody into that community. Baptism is a celebration by the whole community of the death and resurrection of Jesus as the thing which has shaped them and is then celebrating the, the fact that this person is being brought into that fellowship. So if somebody is baptized in a one off, then as soon as possible, they should be brought in by some means into a public declaration of faith within the larger assembly. There are many ways of doing that, but that's the key thing. So I would be slightly worried about saying, wouldn't it be good if this person could be baptized by a woman? Baptism is, as Paul insists in First Corinthians, has nothing really to do with the person doing the baptizing. It's everything to do with Jesus and the Spirit. So we shouldn't lean towards putting an emphasis, oh, I was baptized by so and so. As Paul says, that's not a big deal. The key thing is, are you baptized and hence part of the one body of Christ? So quick flip around some very tricky but Important issues there.

[Mike Bird]

Yeah, I mean, on the church. I mean, this has come up for people on both sides, people who are more complementarian, but attending an egalitarian church, or people who are egalitarian and attending a complementarian church. One thing I say, look, don't go to this church for the purpose of causing a fuss, teaching them a lesson and trying to bring them down. You know, don't. Because that never ends well. It's like God has sent me to change this church's view on women in ministry, baptism, church, governments, whatever. That never ends well. If it is a church where you feel respected, valued, you're being ministered to in word and sacrament, there's great fellowship, there's a commitment to the mission of God. That's. That's good as well. My only reservation is that at some point it's the women who will pay the price. Now, it's all right, I guess, for you and me, Tom, where we're never going to be told no, you can't do that.

[Tom Wright]

That.

[Mike Bird]

But at some point in a church, a woman who maybe wants to do some great godly initiative, wants to take the lead on something, may be told no. And that's where you have to discern in the precincts of your own conscience. Is this the place where I can feel. Fulfill the calling that God's put on my life? Or is this where I need to look elsewhere? Even though I love this church and all of my friends and family here, it may not work.

[Tom Wright]

Work.

[Mike Bird]

And then on Bernadette's question, Tom, I remember when I was in Scotland and the Church of Scotland changed its rules that said deacons would now be able to baptize people. Before that, they could not be Baptist. They could not say they could not baptize. They could. Only elders could do that. And then that was a big change, sort of democratizing. But, yeah, I think it's. It's not the person you're baptized by that's important. I do think that Bernadette and her friend should be connected to a local church. Church. I don't think we should have freelance baptizing people, just going around randomly or semi randomly baptizing. I think baptism is normally connected to a church. Maybe that's my. My Baptist roots talking here, Tom.

[Tom Wright]

I think that's very New Testament here. I mean, baptism is a celebration of the identity of the whole church. And it's not a private thing. That just happens as a special spiritual experience for somebody away from everybody else. Of course, in Acts 8, we have Philip baptizing Ethiopian eunuch somewhere down on the lonely road from Gaza down towards Egypt. But that's clearly a one off and part of the apparently random guiding of the Spirit to the early apostles to do extraordinary things. And it's normally reckoned that that man went back home to Ethiopia and became the founder of the Ethiopian church. Now who knows whether that's historical or not, but in other words, it is all connected up with the identity of the Church.

[Mike Bird]

Yeah. Well, Tom, I would certainly love to hear more questions from, you know, women or anyone about how they've wrestled with issue like this and how it actually lands in the church. So that I would like to hear

[Tom Wright]

more questions and in their local culture and in their local.

[Mike Bird]

Yeah, exactly, exactly. Well, Tom, let's pivot slightly from women baptism church to the topic of unity in the church. And this is where we've got a question from Jane Hoyle of London about creeds and unity. And this is what Jane says. She asks. Your new book, A Vision of Ephesians is about Christian unity. There have also been steps taken in the Catholic Church under Pope Leo to encourage Christian unity. It's been 1700 years since the First Council of Nicaea and Catholic and Orthodox churches met there this year. And Charles, as head of the Church of England, went to Rome and prayed with the Pope this year. Pope Leo, even in late 2025, issued an apostolic letter, this is Unit Unitate Fide, suggesting that the Catholic Church present the Nicene Creed without the filioque clause. That means the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. This would be used in ecumenical context, treating the original 381 formula as a common foundation to foster unity. Though the Church still affirms the filioqu doctrinally. How can all different parts of the Church get closer to this vision of unity? Churches generally adopt the Nicene Creed, although there are differences which remain. Can we accept that no one has all the truth and agree on the essentials? And if so, so what would that look like? Tom, here I had to add we did a bonus episode on this very question. We talked about Pope Leo's recent statements about the filioque clause because this is what happened. The Latin Church in the west added the phrase to the Creed that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son to ensure that the Goths converted to the, you know, proper Trinitarian faith. But the debate was can you go around changing creeds willy nilly? Who's got the authority to do that? You know, you can't just go around, you know, changing parking signs but it's been a big point of contention between the Latin west and the Greek East. We did a great episode on that. So become a premium subscriber, you'll hear all about that. But Tom, it does raise a good question. When people read your book on Ephesians, they seem to get very serious and excited about the topic of unity. And I, I can certainly relate to that, you know, both reading that and I think you're actually your book Paul on the Faithfulness of God, that that sort of ends on the note that Paul's big idea is the unity of Jew and Gentile together, you know, being the custodians of the mission of God, God in the world. If we don't, if we don't focus on the technical debates of, you know, Latin terms, historic creeds, if we just focus on how the church today can realize that Ephesian vision of Jews and Gentiles, Arabs and Americans, you know, everyone together, united in Christ. How can we do that? Do we need to say that none of us has all the truth? Truth are the essentials we can focus on. You know, the Nicene Creed, the writings of C.S. lewis. How do we. How do we bring people together?

[Tom Wright]

Tom, much as I love CS Lewis and much as I enjoy thinking of him walking right past my front door where I'm speaking from now, because he would have come and gone up the street many, many times. I wouldn't myself say that C.S. lewis is infallible. Far from it. He makes many mistakes, as we all do, while being a great and wonderfully readable teacher. Anyway, that's to one side, I confess I don't remember exactly what we said in that bonus episode about creeds and unity and so on, but I do know that you mentioned my book Paul and the Faithfulness of God when that book came out in 2013, I think it was. The publishers sent me on a book tour to publicize it. And again and again when it was question and answer time, people would say, if Paul could come back today, what would most surprise him about the modern church? And I unhesitatingly said what would really shock him would be not just that we are not united, but that we don't care. In other words, for Paul, the unity of the church is an imperative. It's got to be done. The first big breakup in the early church was when Aramaic speaking widows in Jerusalem and Greek speaking widows in Jerusalem were being discriminated one way or another because of their very slight but significant linguistic differences, even though they were all Judeans and the Apostles came down on that like a ton of bricks, appointed seven people people to deal with it. We're not having disunity, thank you very much, on ethnic or linguistic or any other lines. Galatians is the same, Acts is the same, it's all over the place. And Ephesians kind of brings all that together. And Romans 14 and 15, which is really where the whole of the argument of the letter to the Romans really lands, is all about how to be united, even when there are serious apparent differences. Because Paul works towards the great statement that you may with one heart and voice, glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus. As Paul knew perfectly well, if the Church is disunited, Caesar will take no notice. It's just a bunch of funny squabbling people from the Middle East. Don't bother about them. Whereas if the Church can speak with a united voice across ethnic, gender, class, culture lines, then wow, the world will see that a new humanity has been launched upon the world and has got something to say which is Jesus focused and Jesus driven and spirit inhabited, et cetera. So unity really, really matters. I have to say as well for Paul, and you can see this in Ephesians 4, 5 and 6, it's a matter of unity and holiness. I've often said unity is easy if you don't care about holiness, you just get together and who cares? No, holiness matters. Holiness is easy if you don't care about un unity. Every time there's a debate, do we do this, do we do that? You just divide the Church, which sadly is what much Protestantism has done over the last four or five hundred years. Having said all of that back to the Pope and the unity thing, I was in Rome as the Anglican observer in the Synod of bishops in 2008, and I vividly remember some of the Catholic bishops from around the world, including many cardinals from all over the place, talking about the imperative to unity, and one of them saying very clearly there are two instruments of unity ecumenically which are baptism and the Bible. Isn't that interesting, the two Bs? Because we share baptism. Technically, I know it's not always observed, but technically, if somebody is baptized by a Roman Catholic priest, then if they become Anglicans or indeed Methodists, they do not get or should not get re baptized. Likewise, if someone has been baptized in the Trinitarian faith in a non Roman church, then in theory the Romans do not rebaptize them. Sometimes they do, but that's something to be worked at. But baptism is held in common and likewise we all have the Bible. And I know that the Roman Catholics have some books in their Bibles which are what we Protestants would call the Apocrypha. They're books which weren't in the Hebrew canon of the Old Testament, but were in the Greek, the Septuagint canon. We can discuss about those, but that's not really the point. The point is we've got Genesis through to Malachi. We've got the four Gospels, Acts, the Epistles and the Apocalypse. We share all that. Now, that's a much harder basis for unity than the Nicene Creed, because how do we read the Bible? Who says what this bit means, what that bit means? But actually, the point is it's a great story about the Creator God rescuing his creation through Jesus and the Spirit and launching his new creation. We can all agree about that. And indeed, the. There's a book by Cardinal Walter Casper, who, when I was doing ecumenical work, he was the lead from the Vatican on the ecumenical movement. And Walter Casper had been part of dialogues between Romans and Anglicans, Romans and Methodists, Romans and Baptists, Romans and Orthodox. And he wrote a book at the end of that period called Harvesting the Fruits in which he draws together all the things which all the major churches agree on. The point being, hey, guys, we all do basically agree about this, about God, about Jesus, about his death, about his resurrection, about the gift of the Spirit. So if we can agree about that, please, can we work together? And the key thing there is, can we work together and pray together? As you said, King Charles has just recently prayed with the Pope. Well, we ought to be praying with our local Christian brothers and sisters, whatever denomination. You know, I'm in this church, they're in that church. Well, give them a call. Say, could we meet once a month for prayer, or could we meet once every fortnight and just read the Gospels together or something, find ways of doing things together. And then particularly this church has got a particular thing about drug rehab mission here. That church would love to have a similar thing, but hasn't got the resources. Get together if there are things locally that the Gospel needs you to do in the local area, have the economy of scale work together. Because as you do that, you'll find yourself praying to together, you'll find yourself sharing together. And then you see the creeds. I love the creeds. I regularly say the great creeds, the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed. But they are later, much later than the Bible. And not only are they later, they come from a period when the church was tasked with particular issues to deal with in order to hold the Roman Empire together when east and west were threatening to pull apart, et cetera, et cetera, the creeds had to specific function and it wasn't to provide a uniform standard for 1700 years hence. It does do that because we all do come out of those great agreements. But actually there's a hiatus between the Bible, the New Testament on the one hand, and the creeds on the other. Some Roman Catholic theologians today are saying, yeah, we go with the creeds because the Bible is still a bit muddled and random and, and all sorts of stuff. And actually it's the creeds where it all comes together. I resist that strongly. I say, no, let's read the Bible together and let's find the basis of our faith in those stories in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. It's not as easy as a formula, but it's to do with the whole life of the praying people of God and their witness in the world. We can do that together. It then does raise the question, how do we know which things are not. Not deal breakers? Rowan Williams gave a paper in Rome several years ago on this in which he argued that since Hella. Walter Casper, we clearly do agree about all the really big things. Could we at least agree that there are some things, and in the case of Roman Catholics, Rowan would have said, for instance, some of the particular dogmas about Mary. Are there some things which we can say, well, you believe that the rest of us don't, but that's not gonna destroy our fellowship. That's the way we ought to be addressing it. And what are the real deal breakers and behind that, what are the great truths which we can all affirm? I'm very excited about this because if you look back 100, 150 years, we weren't talking to each other at all.

[Mike Bird]

Yeah, that's right.

[Tom Wright]

If you were an Anglican priest in England in say, 1900, you certainly wouldn't be having coffee with the local Roman Catholic. You certainly wouldn't be going and preaching in an exchange with the local Methodist. That was completely verboten. We have come a long way. We should celebrate that and be praying for wisdom about what the next steps are.

[Mike Bird]

So that's a great way to put it, Tom. The vision of Ephesians leads you to a union, the church across nominational divides. When we find out what are the things that matter most. We're going to take a break there, but when we come back, we're going to look at a very penetrating question. Was Paul wrong about the end of the world. Back after these messages. What if engaging Scripture could be both deeply informed and beautifully accessible? With the Filament Bible app, your print Bible becomes a rich interactive study experience. Simply scan the page number and Filament Open opens thousands of expertly crafted notes, devotional reflections, interactive maps and videos, plus audio scripture to help you explore the text with greater insight and context. It's a seamless way to go deeper into God's Word wherever you are. Learn [e-mail] you didn't start a business

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[Tom Wright]

So good, so good, so good.

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[Mike Bird]

Our third and final question for this week is from Lauren White of Nashville, Tennis Tennessee. Tom, I'm going to be in Nashville soon. Maybe I'll see Lauren there. I'm going to be speaking at the Kerygma Conference, so if you're going to be there, Lauren, hopefully I'll get to meet you in person. But this is what Lauren asks. Tom and Mike, may God bless you for your steady work with this podcast. It has been a great encouragement to me, as to many others. My question is concerning a comment that a friend and retired New Testament scholar recently shared with me. He said that Paul's phrases like the time is short and the Lord is near, strongly suggests that Paul expected a very soon second coming of Christ. And this fact has troubled my friend for years and has made him question the validity of Christian claims about the eventual return of Christ. I wonder how you would respond to this and if you have recommendations for further reading on this topic, including within your own work. Thank you. Tom. Was Paul just another apocalyptic fanatic who had a chart, some timetables and believed that the end of the world was going to happen around next week at 4:15. Or is there a little bit more going on? Because there are some passages in Paul's letters that do make it sound like Jesus could be coming back any day. Paul does have that sense of anticipation and even urgency in his theology, his pastoral exhortations, and he does seem to have the Lord's return on his mind. So what would you say to Lauren and her dear New Testament scholar friend about Paul and the end of the world?

[Tom Wright]

Yeah, I think we have been conned by particularly Albert Schweitzer from a century ago who himself was completely soaked in the ring cycle of Wagner, the great music which Schweitzer loved so much and wrote about. And Wagner was influenced by Nietzsche and by Schopenhauer and various other German philosophers. And there was a lot of philosophy at the end of the 19th century about the end of the world and the great thing that everything ends and so on. And this was picked up by many in English theological circles who for quite other reasons wanted to be able to say, well Jesus and Paul were wrong about the end of the world. So they were probably wrong about a bunch of other stuff as well. So we take it all with a pinch of salt. And that has come through in English speaking Christianity while in German speaking Christianity it's still been very much, well they were wrong about the end of the world. So now. And that was why Rudolf Bultmann translated the Gospels into his version of Christian existentialism. And so I mean, so this question is not just a one off, it's got trailing clouds of muddle behind it. And we have to be aware of that. Let me say quite categorically for the early Christians, the second coming of Jesus might happen at any time. Now saying it might happen at any time means if it's gonna be like a thief in the night coming at any time, you've gotta be ready. But, but the point of that is not that we know the thief is coming at 11:30pm the point is the thief might come tonight, he might come next week, he might come next month. You've got to be ready. You've got to have your doors locked and barred or whatever. And in the same way the New Testament is very emphatic. Jesus might come back at any time, not at a specific time. The specific time stuff comes particularly from a misreading of Mark 13 where, where. And the parallels in Matthew and Luke where Jesus says this generation will not pass away till all this has been accomplished. And that is tacked on the end of a passage which has a quote from Daniel 7 about the son of man coming on the clouds. That was regularly misunderstood to mean the return of the Son of Man to earth. That was not what Daniel 7 was about. In Daniel 7 itself and in its quotation in the New Testament, it's about the vindication of the Son of Man, the coming to heaven, the coming to God, coming to sit at God's right hand. And that has already happened. And then the corollary of that, that Jerusalem was gonna be destroyed, which is what Mark 13 and parallels are basically all about, that was definitely gonna happen within a generation, and it did spot on. 40 years after Jesus death, more or less, Jerusalem was destroyed by the Romans. So when you forget about that, then you, you take those prophecies about Son of Man coming on the clouds. Oh dear, that's Jesus return. He said it was within a generation. What does that mean? How do we cope if it didn't happen? And this has produced wave upon wave upon wave of muddle and misunderstanding and one off little verses like that one in 1 Corinthians 7, or the one in Philippians 4, or indeed the one in Romans 13. Now, is our salvation nearer than when we first believed? Well, if it might happen at any time, then of course it's nearer than when we first believed. But Paul, just urgent, and I'll come back to why, in a minute, but those two other passages, Philippians 4. The Lord is near. Many, many commentators, without any particular axe to grind about, oh dear, we're getting the eschatology wrong, have said no, what that is about is about the fact that the Lord, even though he's sitting at the right hand of the Father, that doesn't mean he's millions of miles away out in outer space somewhere. Because where heaven is, where the Father is with the Son at His right hand, is to each one of us. He's right here. He's behind the hidden veil which separates at the moment earthly from heavenly realities. So it's about proximity rather than futurity. And the passage in 1 Corinthians 7, again, many, many people have made this point. It's not just you or me. It's about the present time is, and it's an odd Greek word, apostolemonos, sorry, sunostelmanos. The present time is constrained. We're living at a time of great, great difficulty. And Bruce Winter, compatriot of yours, Bruce Winter, and others have argued that that's because when Paul is writing 1 Corinthians There's a famine, there's a major social problem. And Paul is saying it's time to batten down the hatches. It's time just to hold on to where we are and get through the present crisis, not, oh dear, the world is going to end in 5 minutes time. Therefore, don't bother about any, any matters of your own personal life, which is how Bultman and others read 1 Corinthians 7. So it's always possible in any thesis that you make about the New Testament to find passages which people say, but what about this? What about that? Yeah, and we can deal with those. Generations of exegetes have dealt with those. But the crucial thing is that Paul would not be phased to know that after the fall of Jerusalem, there would be an extended period of time during which the Gentile nations of the world would be brought under submission to the Gospel of Jesus. A process which is still going on. So what was Paul on about with his urgency? I think it goes like this. Paul, like all the earliest Christians, knew that Jesus had predicted that Jerusalem would be destroyed within a generation. Now Paul is passionate about God creating one new people out of Judea, Judean and Gentile alike together. And he knows perfectly well that he has to plant Jew plus Gentile churches on Gentile soil ahead of that. Otherwise the thing which he dreads would come about, namely that Judean Christians would say, oh, it's all the fault of those Gentiles. It's because we let those Gentiles come into the family that this bad thing has happened. And the Gentiles would say to the Judeans, there we are, your city's been destroyed. That's because God's written you off. And following Jesus is now a Gentiles only thing. Thank you very much. And so Paul's urgency is to plant and establish churches which won't be like that, which will be Judean plus Gentile. So that when the worst comes to the worst, within a generation, as it will, then the church nevertheless will hang on and will hold onto its unity across ethnic boundaries in Christ, particularly the Jews, Judean Gentile1. I think that's really, really important. And it's because many exegetes have forgotten Paul's very realistic boots on the ground approach to ecclesiology that then these speculations about the end of the world, et cetera, have come into being. And I have to say as well, Mike, I know you know this as well as, as well as we all do, but not everyone listening, may we need to take the End of the world language in the Old Testament and in its derivation, the New, in the sense in which the first century readers would have heard it. And Old Testament regularly talks about the sun and the moon being darkened and the stars falling from heaven and all that sort of thing. This is not a primitive weather forecast. This is not about actual astral phenomena. This is how you talk about the extraordinary events that are going ahead. You and I are recording this just as the Americans are bombing Iran and Iran is taking retaliatory action. If I was living in Tehran right now, I would think that the language about the sun and the moon being darkened and the stars shaking in the sky, that would describe pretty well how people felt. Not the actual physical bombs and drones and so on, but the shaking of our world. That's what that language means. And I think that's how Paul and the others used it. So it's a complicated question, like most simple questions do have complicated answers. But when you dig around, the point is not that it's going to happen at a specific time, but that it might happen at any time. But last point, it won't be the end of the world. It will be the goal of the world. God is making new creation. He is not going to throw this present space, time and matter universe into the trash can and have us all in some Platonic heaven sitting on clouds, playing harps. That's not the point. The end language is that God's purposes for the world are going to be fulfilled in the new creation which will happen. Romans 8, Revelation 21, the new creation, the new heavens and new earth, when God finally redeems this sad old world and brings about his new creation and raises us to new life, new bodily life to share in that new world.

[Mike Bird]

A great vision is. I mean, the thing I would add to that, Tom, is I think when Paul talks about the Lord's Supper, when he says, you proclaim his death until he comes, that sense of until does leave a little bit of a question mark about when is the Lord Jesus going to return? Yes, there's strong anticipation there, but one of the, you know, core rituals, the meal that celebrates both Christian unity, unity with the Lord, Lord, his, His death, and resurrection. For us. Also recognize that the Lord is bodily absent and we are called to be faithful and to show allegiance towards him for however long history should tarry. So I think I would answer with the Lord's Supper because that implies there's an impending nature to the promise that we're given in the Gospel, that that's

[Tom Wright]

great that's very helpful, Mike. And and of course what it does by reverse, as it were, is that it gives to the Lord's Supper that sense of anticipation that the Lord will come in the future. And there is a sense in which he comes to us in the Lord's Supper in anticipation of that. Just like some first century Judeans saw every Sabbath as an anticipation of the ultimate age to come. So every Lord's Supper is an anticipation of the time when Jesus, personal, personally comes to be with us in the new creation.

[Mike Bird]

Yeah, very well put, Tom. As it turns out, that's all we have time for today. We hope you've enjoyed this episode of Ask NT Write Anything. Please do keep us. Sorry, let me do that again. Well, that's all we have time for today. We hope you've enjoyed this episode of Ask Anti Write Anything. Don't forget to send us your questions [e-mail] and in our next episode we're going to cover why did Jesus turn water into wine? Should certain hymns be rejected? And did Paul tinker with and change for the worse? Jesus's message? All that will be coming towards you in the future. And don't forget as well. You can get access to our subscriber episodes by clicking on the link and getting an extra episode episode in your inbox every week where we talk about the ethics of regime change, the creeds and Christian unity and plumb the depths of Ephesians. And don't forget to to subscribe to the YouTube channel if that's how you're watching the program. Otherwise it's goodbye from me, Mike Bird.

[Tom Wright]

Goodbye from me, Tom Wright.

[Mike Bird]

And we look forward to seeing you on the next episode of Ask NT Write Anything. Until then, God bless you and take care.

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