Introduction: Whether the story be oral or written, the story-teller largely controls and determines the story that he or she tells. Other factors may well intrude into the details of the story, such as the audience's expectations, and (at least according to some contemporary authors) the feeling that the characters are "taking over" the story, but by and large, authors shape their story so that it says just what they intend.

Readers therefore expect a careful author to tell the story in a way that suggests how they should read or understand it. This is true whether or not those "clues" are intentional. Since no linguistic choices are unmotivated (Longacre) every aspect of a story is significant, and none can be changed without changing the story, however slightly.

When a footnote says that "names and details have been changed to protect the innocent", readers know better than to expect a verbatim account of events or accurate descriptions of persons. They still expect, nonetheless, that the author has told the story as accurately as possible-that is, as proximate to the truth-yet in a way that would make it difficult for them to reconstruct precisely what happened, or at least who said or did what to whom.

Introduction: When I began teaching the required course on interpreting biblical poetry at Biblical Theological Seminary, I wanted to address the function and interpretation of "figures of speech". Students therefore read brief discussions of metaphor and other figures (Packard (1989); Ryken, Wilhoit, & Longman (1998); and Ryken (1982, 1993)), and we looked at some clearly figurative statements in the various poetic books.

Summary: Systematic and biblical theologies tend to imply that Scripture records eschatological visions of a new and perfect world (e.g., Isa 11.1-9; 65.17-25; Ezk 40-48; Rev 21-22) for two primary reasons: (1) to encourage readers; and (2) to construct models of the future. Is this their purpose?

Sir Philip Sidney's insight that an author (a "poet" in Sidney's language) "creates" a "golden world" (1595) which the reader is invited to enter-an insight developed by Shelley et al., and more recently popularized by Walter Brueggeman, i.al. (2001; cf. also Mays 1993)-suggests that perhaps these biblical "utopias" have been recorded and preserved in order to provide a touchstone for the Church now, rather than merely hold out a hope to be fulfilled then.

In other words, while these messages are clearly intended to encourage believers, they also have another purpose: to set before the people of God a vision of those telic values toward which God is in Christ moving all things. They therefore provide the citizens of the Kingdom of God, severally and jointly, with an agenda for engaging the world with the Gospel of Christ, the hope of true redemption and renewal.

Abstract: Since the Reformation (at least), it has become traditional to treat separately the covenantal, proverbial, and prophetic materials of Scripture. Briefly surveying each corpus, this paper shows that they present a single and unified vision of the community of the Kingdom of God-a community characterized by justice and its consequences, viz., security, peace, and the common weal-the welfare of every individual within that community. This harmony, the great continuity among the biblical visions of the Kingdom, reveals that the God who established the covenant, inspired the wise, and spoke through the prophets is deeply and eternally concerned with justice, a justice that grows out of his very person and reflects his ongoing work in the world and reveals the end toward which he is moving all things.

Read Congruent Visions for Free.

Buy and listen to the CD/MP3: Listen to Congruent Visions (off site link)