If I had to boil Paul down to one phrase or
one sentence instead of one page and one
very long German-type sentence, I would
simply say that for Paul, Jesus is Lord.
Beginning, middle, and end of story.
That is in many ways, the gospel.
"Reading Paul" was an invitational book.
I had other things going on at the time,
but it sounded like a good project.
So I took it on and I loved writing that book.
Trying to get everything I knew about Paul
down into what was supposed to be about a
hundred pages. It was more than that.
I think as I was writing that book I began
to see that Paul was a real live human being
and not just a set of ideas or a theology
waiting to be uncovered and trying to see him
as a person who was dealing say with being
in prison and writing letters, that connected
me to Martin Luther King. It also, the
connection there also took place because of
what I began to see as a more specific
interest in what we today would call issues
of peace and justice in Paul that I wouldn't
have seen without sort of viewing that through
the lens of Martin Luther King.
And then similarly with Dorothy Day.
Although there it was a little bit more
her ability to keep sort of social justice and
spirituality together.
Not that Martin Luther King didn't.
And there were other figures where similar
things happened. So I began to read Paul
through the lens of real people, hopefully
without distorting Paul, but seeing him
as a real human being.
When we think about people like
Martin Luther King or if we think about
Dorothy Day or a few other people I
mentioned in the book, I don't know that
they were always necessarily, deliberately
working out of a Pauline framework,
but what I think is true, is that people who
are living consistently with the gospel
message are going to in some way, shape,
or form, end up looking like Paul,
because I think thats what Paul was doing.
His life was kind of an embodied gospel.
Not perfect. None of us is. But
so I think the similarities are because of
their ultimate connection to Jesus, and not
necessarily their ultimate connection to Paul.
