“Bible reading that today’s Korean church must consider.
"Farewell Class by Professor Kim Ho-kyung, a Public Biblical Scholar"

The New Testament is a very old book, written two thousand years ago.
The people who wrote this book lived a completely different history than those of us living in the modern era.
But between the people of the New Testament and us, a resonance of faith in God that transcends the discordant circumstances of life still occurs in this age.
Professor Kim Ho-kyung shows how this kind of 'Bible reading' is possible.
The New Testament is a historical book containing the confessions of faith of those who experienced the one God in various places in life.
The authors of the New Testament sought God's will within the time and space in which they lived and interpreted the lives of individuals and communities.


Reading the Bible is an act of entering into the stories of the Bible, looking into the confessions of faith of people of faith, and reflecting them in our lives.
We interpret our story of living here and now in light of the story of the Bible.
Just as the people of the New Testament in different circumstances confessed the same faith, so too, through reading the Bible, we, in our own different circumstances, come to join in their confession of faith.
"New Testament Classes" is the brilliant fruit of Professor Kim Ho-kyung's 30 years of teaching the New Testament at a seminary, and is also his farewell lecture notes for the Korean church.
The author, in a fluent tone, reveals to readers what kind of reading of the Bible the Korean church today should consider.
When the stories of individuals in the New Testament come to life, the name of the one God comes into focus.
Through this masterpiece by Professor Kim Ho-kyung, a popular Bible scholar, we will be able to read the Bible again, in a new and unfamiliar way.

This book is a kind of introduction to the New Testament.
This work has been a long-held hope of mine.
But along with this hope, which has been a kind of long-held wish, there is a question that has long been lingering.
With so many books on the New Testament available, the question was, do we really need a new introductory book? Do I really need to do this?
In an age when books can become a public hazard, it was imperative to secure the legitimacy and necessity of books.
My interest has always been with the general public, not theological scholars.

There is something I think is a sign of something wrong with the Korean church.
Korean churches have been particularly emphasizing reading the Bible.
But in reality, when ordinary believers seek the meaning of the Bible, they often rely on pastors or other authorities who interpret the Bible, rather than on themselves who read the Bible.
The act of reading and the act of interpreting are separate.
Pastors emphasize Bible reading to their congregations, but often they say, “Just read it.
“I will do the interpretation,” he says.
So the saints do not have 'one of many eyes' to interpret the Bible.
While reading the Bible so much.
--- From "Introductory Remarks"

The unity that restrains diversity serves as a fence to prevent us from arbitrarily interpreting and misinterpreting the Bible, and the diversity that restrains unity provides the motivation for our faith to be non-uniform and to create our own history.
Because within ‘our’ faith, ‘my’ faith and ‘your’ faith are together.
The diversity of Scripture translates into the diversity of life, and the diversity of life creates the diversity of confession.
And the diversity of confessions allows us to acknowledge ‘you’ and ‘we’ to live together.
In God.
The starting point that connects various confessions is God.
This surprisingly simple fact is also the worldview of the New Testament.
The New Testament worldview is that all people, diverse as they are, are part of God's work.
--- From "Our Perception of History"

Jesus says that the kingdom of God is already within you.
Jesus is the Messiah who brought the kingdom of God.
When we say, “Jesus Christ,” we are confessing, “Jesus is the Christ.”
Not only do we not confess anyone else as the Messiah, we do not even wait for anyone else.
We confess that the Messiah has already come.
And I believe he is Jesus.
That doesn't mean Christianity doesn't wait for the end.
We wait for Jesus to come again.
We don't wait without knowing vaguely who it is.
Christianity believes that Jesus has already come as Christ and awaits his return.
Because He who is to come again has not yet come.
--- From "Our Faith"

It was Christianity that used agape as a general word for love.
The New Testament tells us that the culmination of agape was revealed on the cross of Jesus.
Before Jesus, the cross was a symbol of shame and contempt (1 Corinthians 1:18).
But through Jesus, the cross became a symbol of salvation.
The cross of Jesus overturned the world's values ​​and created a new order of love.
Because Agape is a love that abandons ‘me’ and saves ‘you.’
Therefore, the way we demonstrate our faith in Jesus is no different.
The faith that reveals what Jesus desires, the faith that makes Jesus visible to the world, is the practice of impossible love.
Like Jesus.
--- From "Our Love"

Jesus speaks of the suffering and persecution that awaits them in the future, rather than of comfort.
But then, we must remember that it is not those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul, but the One who can destroy both body and soul in hell.
When they are abandoned by someone, when they face inexplicable hardship, they must remember clearly who they fear and live without forgetting it.
Therefore, this short missionary journey is not a one-time event.
This is a kind of example for the journey of life as a disciple of Jesus.
They will have to live a arduous life of spreading the gospel of the kingdom of heaven as if they were on a missionary journey.
That is the way of the disciple.
--- From the Gospel of Matthew

The peace of Rome, where someone who is well-fed rejoices in his own righteousness and ignores the suffering of others, cannot be true peace.
Therefore, Jesus makes the surprising statement, “Do you think that I have come to bring peace on earth? I tell you, no, but division” (12:51).
Jesus declares war on counterfeit for true peace.
Conflict is not the ultimate goal of Jesus.
The ultimate goal of Jesus is peace.
For this ultimate purpose, Jesus casts fire on the world (12:49) and causes us to fight and confront for the true peace of Jesus.
The fire of Jesus is directed at a world that constantly creates sinners and alienates and excludes others.
And proclaiming new righteousness, we enjoy God's peace together.
--- From the Gospel of Luke

The First Epistle of John repeatedly points out the false beliefs of those who do not confess Jesus as Christ and encourages them to regain their faith through love.
Because similar stories are repeated, it makes little sense to divide 1 John into paragraphs according to the flow of the story.
It is enough to clearly remember the starting point and destination of 1 John for the right faith.
The starting point of faith is Jesus who came in the flesh.
But ultimately, the place where this takes us is God.
Therefore, if the theme of “Who is Jesus?” runs through the Gospel of John, the theme that runs through 1 John is “What kind of being is God?”
God is light (1 John 1:5).
Therefore, if we have fellowship with God, we are not in darkness but in the light, and our love for our brothers is proof that we are in the light (2:10).
God is love (4:7-8).
These existential characteristics of God provide those who are in God with the duty to love.
--- From "1 John, 2 John, 3 John"

The word 'diakonos', translated 'worker', is also used of Apollos.
“…they are ministers through whom you believed, just as the Lord assigned to each one” (1 Corinthians 3:5).
The same word is translated 'worker' for Phoebe and 'minister' for Apollos.
Why did the translator make this difference?
Even if Phoebe had a leadership role in the church, I suspect that the title "minister" was somewhat reluctant for a woman.
Even though Paul used the same word for Phoebe, a woman, and Apollos, a man.
However, according to Romans 12:3-8, what is important in working in the church is the 'measure of faith' or 'fraction of faith'.
It is important to participate in the body of Christ according to the degree of faith you have.
Whether it's serving, teaching, or helping others, it's based on the amount of faith, not on gender, race, or economic status.
--- From the Epistle to the Romans

Paul speaks of humans as 'body', not as spirit and flesh.
A living human being cannot be divided into spirit and flesh, and Paul speaks of this in the holistic language of body.
The body is life and vitality.
Our salvation is not limited to the spirit, but takes place in our body, in our life.
Even though it is not easy for us to live in the new body of Jesus in the fleshly order, this is why we must follow the new order, not the old order.
So here too the question of identity arises.
Paul says that our bodies are “members of Christ” and “temples of the Holy Spirit” (6:15, 19).
--- From "1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians"

The Colossian hymn shows the universe beginning with God's creation.
It is a universe that began with Jesus.
There is no need to say anything to the adversaries other than that Jesus Christ is before all things, above all things, and in all things, and that the church is ruled by Christ.
Christ is a cosmic being that nothing can approach.
For there has never been a time, since the creation of the world, or before the creation of the world, when Christ was not present.
So, angels and such cannot be compared to Christ, who is in the image of God.
It is because of this understanding of the fundamentals of the world that Colossians can dismiss the arguments of its opponents as vain and elementary.
Jesus Christ was in the beginning, and now he is with the church that believes in Jesus Christ.
--- From Colossians

The comparison between Jesus and Moses moves to a comparison between Jesus and the high priest.
This is to differentiate Christ's salvation from the Jewish salvation through sacrifice.
Since the high priest is chosen from among the people, he must offer a sin offering for himself as well as for the people (5:1-3).
But Jesus, the man of our faith, is the ascended Son of God, who was tempted like us, yet without sin (4:14-15).
Such Jesus is our great high priest.
Jesus' existence cannot be compared to that of the Jewish high priests.
The Jewish high priest had to enter the sanctuary every year to offer a different blood sacrifice, but Jesus offered himself as a sacrifice 'once for all' to forgive the sins of the world and will come again for us (7:27; 9:25-28).
Compared to the countless sacrifices of the Jews, the completeness of Jesus' salvation, achieved through his 'once for all' offering, is incomparable.
--- From the Book of Hebrews

This book begins with the hope that even without theological training, with just a little help, your understanding of the Bible will change, its meaning will be renewed, and ultimately, even a minimal amount of knowledge and information will lead you to the right faith.
So, while writing, I kept writing and deleting, trying to find a balance, with concerns like, "Should I say this much?", "Do I really need to say this much?", "Is this story too complicated?", "Did I skip too many steps?"
I believe that this balance will keep us from losing sight of the path of faith in the swamp of geographical information.
In fact, the ultimate goal of all other theological books that general readers find difficult is to show the path of faith.
It's just that overly complex and difficult words and specialized knowledge inadvertently block the way.
So, this book has been carefully designed to provide readers with a path to faith within the New Testament.
I hope this heart and this path will reach the readers.

--- From "Outgoing Words"