Show Notes
In this rich and eye-opening episode of Peaceable and Kind, host Derek Vreeland sits down with Marty Solomon—president of Impact Campus Ministries, host of the BEMA Discipleship podcast, and author of Asking Better Questions of the Bible. Together, they explore how reading Scripture through its original Jewish context can transform our understanding of Jesus, justice, and the story of redemption.
Marty shares his own journey—from a fundamentalist evangelical upbringing, through seasons of doubt and “deconstruction,” to a renewed faith rooted in the historical and cultural world of the Bible. You’ll hear why becoming “people of the text” means more than knowing Bible facts—it’s about letting Scripture shape our lives, imaginations, and relationships.
The conversation dives into how the Jewish background of the New Testament illuminates the ministry of Jesus, why historical context must come before theology, and how biblical justice (mishpat) and righteousness (zedekah) work together to restore shalom—wholeness, peace, and flourishing—in a broken world.
Whether you’ve been wrestling with faith, longing for a deeper way to read the Bible, or curious about how Jewish roots change our perspective on the Gospel, this episode offers wisdom, challenge, and hope.
Key Takeaways ✔️ Why historical context changes how we read the Bible ✔️ The difference between Greek and Hebrew ideas of justice ✔️ How righteousness and justice create biblical shalom ✔️ Why curiosity—not certainty—should guide Bible study ✔️ How Jesus’ Jewish world shapes His teaching and ministry
🎧 Listen now and rediscover the Bible as a living, transforming story that points us to Jesus.
**Scriptures Mentioned in This Episode:**Isaiah 55
Psalm 97
Books Mentioned in this Episode:
_Asking Better Questions of the Bible_by Marty Solomon
Jesus the Jewish Theologian by Brad Young
Listen to Marty’s conversation with Lecrae on The Deep End podcast: https://youtu.be/RN4vJFAJeDI
Learn more about Marty Solomon at martysolomon.com.
Preorder Derek’s new book, Incarnation: 8 Lessons on How God Meets Us here: https://amzn.to/42jSZAs
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Transcript
Narrator: Welcome Welcome back to another episode of Peaceable and Kind. I am your host, Derek Vreeland, and we have a conversation today that I know you are going to love and appreciate. But before we jump into our conversation, Conversation for this episode. Let me encourage you to subscribe to Peaceable and Kind wherever you are listening to podcasts. And if you enjoy this conversation and this episode today, Would you consider sharing it with other people? Put it on your social media accounts that helps other people discover this podcast. And do leave a rating or a review. If you love the podcast, hate the podcast, leave a review and give us five stars. Even if you hate it. Leave five stars and tell us why you hate it. But I do appreciate you joining me today. My guest is Marty Solomon, who is the president of Impact. Campus Ministries and the host of the very popular BEMA podcast. He leads the BEMA Discipleship Initiative. He’s also the author of Asking Better Questions of the Bible, a guide for the wounded, weary, and longing for more. This was a book that came out just a couple of years ago. And Marty’s teaching through his podcast, through his YouTube channel, have shaped the way many read the Bible. helping followers of Jesus approach the text with curiosity and humility and depth. He brings wisdom and clarity and a deep love for the Scriptures. in what he’s doing. And so I am grateful for his work, for his writing, for his podcast, for his teaching, and I’m even more grateful to have him with us today. Marty, welcome to Peaceable and Kind.
Derek Vreeland: It is so good to be here. I feel like that’s what everybody says at the beginning of an introduction, and we gotta find something new, but I haven’t figured out what to say. So thanks for having me.
Narrator: It has been far too long. Um we are uh into a year of this podcast, and you have been on the list, and I do not know why I haven’t brought you on sooner. I have so appreciated uh all of your work and i meant to tell you before we hit record uh congratulations on the podcast interview with I’m a I’m a huge LaCrae fan. I subscribe and then I just I saw a a new podcast dropping on YouTube And it’s my main man Marty Solomon. How did that come about? Had you had connection with him before?
Derek Vreeland: Not personally. He reached out to set up that interview. We knew that Lecrae listened. He would often uh kind of drop us as a resource in his own interviews and people would send us links. So we were aware that he was listening. Um, I’d liked a few things on social media, but we had never directly connected. And then his team reached out and asked if I would do an interview and I happened to be heading to Atlanta just within two weeks, and so we set that up and
Narrator: It went well and had a great time.
Derek Vreeland: He he’s a wonderful he’s a wonderful guy. I loved talking with him. Really enjoyed just yeah, getting to know him and his appreciation for what we do is very humbling.
Narrator: And for those who don’t know, LeCrae is a Christian hip-hop artist. He’s a rapper. He’s a record producer. Um, he leads uh Reach Records. uh which is signing and getting uh younger hip hop artists out there and he is a committed follower of Jesus and uh yeah so shout out Lecrae and the Deep End podcast. If you don’t know La Crae’s story, he has one. of coming to faith and then being in sort of a reform context, and then he had a uh dark night of the soul. uh sort of hit that wall as many of us do and uh went through what he calls a a time of deconstruction and reconstruction. And uh has said that the Bama podcast was a part of helping him sort of reconstruct his faith. And so yeah, man, I enjoyed your your conversation. We’ll put a link to that interview in the show notes And you can hear Marty and Lecrae talk Jesus in scripture and theology. But Marty, for those who are not familiar with you, tell us a little bit about your spiritual journey.
Derek Vreeland: Sure. I identify as a Jewish follower of Jesus, but wasn’t raised with that heritage. I was raised in a very fundamentalist evangelical space. The joke I often make is Dr. James Dobson was a fourth member of the Trinity in my house. So that’s the kind of upbringing that I I had. I had an awareness of my Jewish heritage, my our our name and our European heritage and where we came from. But they were raised in a world that said, well, Jesus came, so why would you be Jewish? And why would that even matter? And so that was kind of what I was raised in. And then I went to uh to Bible college. I too was coming out of a Reformed context, a Dutch Reformed context. I went to a Bible college on the other side of the theological spectrum. not as a strategic choice, but it’s where I felt like God was calling me. Um followed that call there and that’s also where our my f I I I had my own moment, whatever we want to call that, deconstruction, pulling my faith apart. putting it back together and ended up kind of planting my feet in that kind of more Church of Christ Christian church tradition, which is where I call home today, just as a a faith expression. And during my time Kind of going through that is where I got to go study under Ray Vanderlawn in Israel and Turkey. And he is he got me connected to a bibliography that would end up changing the course of I mean really helping save my own faith, just changing the course of how I read the scripture, how I understand it, putting my theology together in a way that made sense, in a way that seemed to be vibrant and consistent with Jesus and a and a Christocentric ethic of justice and anyway, that that that it all just kept pulling me further and further towards Jesus, deeper and deeper into faith. And I was deeply grateful for that. So it’s been a little bit of a little bit of my journey. Somewhere about 20 One and a half years ago, I got married to my wife. We’ve got a 16-year-old daughter and a 15-year-old son, and and we live in Cincinnati, Ohio. So there you go.
Narrator: Love it. And you have seen the value of the Jewish rootedness to Jesus and the Apostles and And I and I do love about your ministry that it always comes back to Jesus. We are understanding the roots of our faith. in order to follow Jesus better. It’s interesting that a lot of people who reject Christianity or would reject the propositions of the Christian faith do so because the only expression of Christianity they know is a fundamentalist evangelical perspective. And uh when I’ve talked with people pastorally with um the problems with their faith. They’re not aware of other theological streams and traditions and and they don’t know our our history as the people of God. Absolutely. So a lot of people I think have shared your your journey. I think people who follow me, listen to this podcast, some of them at least, have uh a similar journey sort of out of fundamentalism, out of evangelicalism, at least pop evangelicalism and what it’s become today, and are looking for uh a a deeper, more substantive faith And so the Bama podcast, d was that a was that a COVID project or did you launch before COVID? When did that get started?
Derek Vreeland: Yeah, definitely before COVID. We we were doing BEMA When I got hired by Impact Campus Ministries before I was serving as president, I was just a regular old associate field minister. And Bema was my flavor of campus ministry.
Narrator: It’s what I was doing with students.
Derek Vreeland: It was a class I was teaching on college campus, both at the University of Idaho and Washington State University. And I had done that for about four years, five years before they asked me to serve as president. And then I started traveling so much because of my job that the students didn’t know Are you in town? Are you out of town? So we decided to move our content online and flip the classroom. We weren’t even trying, Derek, to start a podcast. We weren’t really trying to We just used podcasts as the medium. It’s like a hundred episodes in before we realized like we knew people were listening, but like how many people were listening outside of we were assuming our college students. Like we’re thinking of this group of sixty students that are a part of our larger programming. They go to our church. They’re a part of a larger discipleship thing we’re doing. And Bayma’s a part of their learning experience. And then we realize, oh, people are consuming this like as a podcast. And that’s when we kind of shift and change our tone. And COVID was a time where a lot of people found us because a lot of people were trying to find online resources and helpful stuff. So that was absolutely a a big boon in our in our podcast journey
Narrator: Yeah, I think that’s when I came across uh the Bama Podcast and and you, and so we sort of connected uh online and then uh met at a writer’s retreat a couple of years ago. Yes. And uh so yeah, 2020 was when when you kind of came into view uh for me as well. And so the podcast has become an entire discipleship initiative. And so Bema Discipleship encourages us to become people of the text. Where does that come from or kind of unpack that becoming people of the text?
Derek Vreeland: Yeah, Ray in particular, Ray Vanderloan, who I always kind of call my teacher. My teacher was Very passionate about his experience being trained in a Jewish world. He went to Hebrew University, then sat at Yeshiva and audited classes for 14 years. He was very much in a Jewish world, not a Christian. world that was thinking Jewish, but a very Jewish world. And he was just enamored with their immersion in the Hebrew scriptures in the text. And he had a belief, because he too was coming out of a more evangelical reformed, a fundamental belief in the power of the Word of God, like the text, like the scriptures, the Bible. Like it’s it’s something. We always grew up calling it inspired, infallible, all this stuff. Like it was the authority. And he had this fundamental belief that there was power. He used to always quote Isaiah 55. as the rain and the snow fall from the heavens, and do not return to it without watering the earth, causing it to bud and to flourish, providing seed for the sower, and bread for the eater, so my word goes forth from my mouth. It will not return to me empty. It will always accomplish the purpose and the desire for which I sent it. Like that was one of his staple passages. It became one of my staple passages. This belief that. The text has the ability to do something that my words, my reasoning, my philosophy, my poetry cannot. And if that’s true, my teacher said. We need to not just know about the text. We need to not just know we need to not just craft great theology about from the text, we need to, we need to have the text in us. We need to become people of the text. That the text is a part of us. Because we’re going to get the text wrong. We’re going to misunderstand the text. If the text of God has power, then getting it inside of it of us allows the Holy Spirit, and Ray used to always love to talk about. have with you the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God. Like if that sword is at work, give it give it a chance is essentially what he was saying. And and this is the last thing I’ll say and I’ll I’ll let you move on. But I was so convicted, I thought fundamentalist Christians love the Bible. And when I studied the Second Temple World of Judaism, I realized, oh, no, no, no, no, no. Like we couldn’t hold a candle. To this culture and their commitment with no printing press, no UVersion Bible app, no they had to memorize this thing and the commitment they had to the scripture put my passionate convictions to shame. And that’s what I wanted to, I think there’s something there. I I really do believe there’s something for us even today, with all the tools we have, we should, we should become people of the text.
Narrator: Yeah, I I agree. My my roots are in the Southern Baptist world, not necessarily Reformed, uh, but definitely sort of the Bible church approach. uh that was the great value for me in the Baptist world is is they gave me a Bible and they told me to to read it and to love it and to study it and to do it. And I’ve lost none of that passion uh for the scriptures. But I do appreciate in your ministry that Christo-centric approach. In other words, we’re becoming people of the text, not merely that we would be smart and educated, but that we would become better followers of Jesus. Because the the the Hebrew scriptures formed the heart and the imagination and the teaching of Jesus. So if we’re gonna understand and follow Jesus right. we have to understand his Hebrew background. And um I did my seminary work at Oral Roberts University and our New Testament professor, uh Brad Young, who’s the author of uh Jesus one of the best. Well, see, I didn’t know at that time how good I had it. He had just published or it was just coming out, Jesus the Jewish Theologian. Oh, goodness gracious. So In my very and I didn’t know, I was a young seminary student, and I the that was a great foundation because his New Testament survey was all about uh backgrounds, um uh Jewish backgrounds. He had studied under David Fluser at uh Hebrew University. So I got a lot of that. And it it was interesting. There were seeds. They were seeds planted that at first, honestly, I thought, I’m in a New Testament class. Why do we keep going back to the Hebrew scriptures? And I wasn’t satisfied at the moment, but I so appreciate it now. Yeah. 100%. Hey friends, I wanted to pause for just a second to let you know that my next book, Incarnation, 8 Lessons on How God Meets Us, is available for pre-order. This Bible study is for individual devotional use or for small group discussion. Link to pre-order is in the show notes. So you often are deconstructing, if we want to use that word. And by the way, it’s not my preferred vocabulary, Lecrae on his church clothes for album. um has a song called Deconstruction. And um I don’t personally like the term. I think it’s a little bit too violent, honestly. I see people who Who use it as a way not to prepare for reconstruction, but they just want to blow up the Christian faith But it is the term, I think, that’s in vogue these days. So you will often deconstruct bad readings of the Old Testament and reconstruct better ones What makes a bad versus better reading of the Old Testament?
Derek Vreeland: Well, I can definitely start with what makes a better one. One that is informed by I believe in the conversation surrounding authorial intent. What that means is I believe the, if we want to use language of inspiration, the authoritative conversation, the one that matters to me as a Bible student, as a Jesus follower. Is a conversation that’s happening between biblical author and biblical audience. That doesn’t discount a spirit-led movement of the spirit. uh maybe a more Pentecostal hermeneutic either, but as a work of exegesis to go back and try to find with as much objectivity as possible what the historical author is saying to the historical audience. So If that’s true, I want a historically informed reading. That’s going to be a better reading. And our readings are typically informed by theology. It’s theology forward. Somebody already figured out what it meant. I’m kind of using history to color, kind of add some color. I’m using history But we kind of already know where we’re headed when we get started. And then the Bible becomes a prop somewhere in the middle of the process, rather than the thing that I’m actually expecting to provoke me and change me and transform me and bother me. And so a better reading of the Bible isn’t one driven by a system that I’ve already decided works for me, but okay, the sense of curiosity. And the beauty of the history conversation is we’re never going to know everything there is to know. So we’re always so curiosity is going to have to rule the day because what have we learned in the last 20 years? What have we learned in the last 20 years? What will we learn in the next 20 years? About historically what’s taking place in that conversation. And it just keeps me tethered. I think one thing I’ve I’ve rarely articulated that I’m coming to appreciate now is a better reading of the Bible. Is is a little bit more dynamic and a little bit more curious because it’s not truly objective. It’s not fixed, but it has this awareness that the Bible’s not written to me And so there’s this other conversation. It might it might have been written for me, but it’s not written to me. So I’m getting to eavesdrop. And just as I get used to that hermeneutical dance, I become a better student of the Bible and I become more curious, I become more open, and I become more changed. And that’s that’s what the Bible’s meant to do.
Narrator: And I can hear in the in the just tone of your voice that you’re still passionate about this. You’re s the curiosity is still alive in you, which it the same with me, and that’s why I encourage people to continue to incorporate the scriptures, Old Testament and New Testament, in their life and to stay curious because the more you seek with that spirit of curiosity, the more the more nuggets that you you you find. And yeah, I think putting theology first is problematic. So I’m a pastor and a writer who has been influenced by Tom Wright, N. T. Wright, and one of his really primary axes to grind is that We need history and theology. We need to merge them. And history really comes first, which is what I learned very early on in seminary that we we want to understand what the text meant in its historical context before we begin to work on what it means, because without that history piece, we’re going to bring too many modern ideas. into into the text. So we have to start with history and the authors and the original uh audience. I that’s such an important key.
Derek Vreeland: Yeah, and I I appreciate you also maintaining that balance because my my my language often betrays the fact that I people will hear me say like down with theology. The you can’t get rid of it. Theology’s gonna have to be a part of this conversation. And even like it wasn’t even that long ago. It was probably, well, I don’t know, probably less than a decade. And and people were calling me a theologian, and I was like, I was taking offense at it. And I had to realize, like, no, this is the work we’re doing. What what I was pushing against was the way we would posture ourselves. Like you would have the same pieces on the pieces you can’t get rid of. Me, theology, Bible, and hermeneutics. And what was what I was upset about was not the theology shouldn’t be on the table, but how they had been ordered And so I just had to reorder it and then I could actually lean into the fact of, oh, no, I I am a the I’m more I’m more of a theologian than I am a scholar. So That’s probably probably the right word, but I had to get used to that. And and it brought me to appreciate theology for what it is.
Narrator: Well, there are people that that like theology just because it touches something. uh in intellectually with them, which is which is good and fine. And I always tell people I I love having theological conversations. I have little interest in theological debates. I don’t want to I don’t want I’m not trying to argue one theological perspective over the other because I just want to go back to the text and have a have a have a fresh reading of it. And and maybe, because I’ve a I’ve always been on more of the Arminian side uh versus the Reformed Calvinistic side of most conversations. I still find myself More at home in sort of a Westland with a little bit of Eastern Orthodox mixed in there. But there was a there was a season of my life where some of my reform friends are like, Yeah, but you need to listen to some of these ideas. And I did. I listened and uh wrestled with things and and grew because of that conversation, not a debate. My friends were trying to prove their theological position, but what it did for us is it had some pastor friends we’d have these uh coffee gatherings. This is when I lived in Southwest Georgia, and our different theological perspectives just sent us back to the text. And uh and I grew so much from that But let’s get back to Jewish rootedness for a little bit. How does understanding the New Testament’s Jewish background, both in terms of Jewish culture, Jewish language, how does understanding that inform how we read the New Testament? Or or what are some of the maybe you have some examples you’re thinking of, of misreadings of Jesus and the Apostles that people have made because they don’t know the Jewish backgrounds
Derek Vreeland: Yeah, I think I think we often come with those prescribed understandings of of who Jesus is. And when we don’t have this awareness that Jesus didn’t appear in a vacuum. But Jesus is this Jewish rabbi. For whatever reason, we could all kind of think about or philosophize or even debate: like, why did Jesus come at this point in history? As this person, as but he did. He came as a Jewish rabbi into a Jewish world at a particular moment of collision between a westernizing, Hellenizing, Greco-Roman imperial dominating world colliding with a world that was built on a really opposite And so when I understand the story of God’s people up to that point, I now understand all the stage that has been set. I understand the context One of the more favorite parts of the Beimod journey of five seasons. We call we kind of call the first five seasons like our body of work. And from all of our listeners, one of definitely one of the top two or three spots in the podcast is right before we get into the gospels. And we just spend 15 episodes setting the context of what is Hellenism? What’s happened to Judaism after the exile? Synagogues, commitment to text, rabbis and disciples. Who is Rome? How is Judaism responding to Rome? There are different people groups, and we probably oversimplify and we over-categorize that we’ve got Pharisees and you’ve got Essenes, and we read about these people, and we don’t even like We take no time to go, okay, but who are people often just say Pharisees and Sadducees without realizing their sociopolitically couldn’t be more different. Like they’re opposite they’re as different as Republicans and Democrats. Like And so understanding that world, well, now all of a sudden, I I’m realizing that Jesus isn’t having Independent conversations in a vacuum for the first time, he stepped into a very Jewish world with very Jewish conversations, very Jewish questions. And offering them relatively Jewish answers, transcendent Jewish answers, answers that are full of wisdom, but having that awareness that this is really a this is I always talk about the gospels being the climax of the Hebrew scriptures. Like it is It it is the pinnacle of the narrative arc of God’s people. So if I don’t understand that, it would be like picking up the Lord of the Rings. Like at Mount Doom. Like you’re like, well wait a minute. What they’re carrying a ring? Like who cares? I guess the ring is this. Like you have to know the whole backstory. You have to know the whole journey of how we got here. to truly appreciate what’s happening.
Narrator: And I don’t know if that answers your question, but that’s probably what I love. Definitely. And and so let’s take a concept and and work with it for a little bit. Let’s let’s talk a little bit about the biblical concepts of justice and righteousness. Because in my own spiritual journey, I think I had a very cartoonish vision of justice a very Western, a very modern understanding of justice. For me, for the longest time, justice was associated with law enforcement. So justice was the good guys getting the bad guys and putting the bad guys in jail. That is justice. Justice has been served when wrongdoers are punished. I think it’s a very modern, very common conception. But As I began to really invest time in the language of the Old Testament, I just notice justice and righteousness, these twin concepts popping up over and over and over. Um I’m very dedicated to the Psalms as a part of my prayer life. And you see it, it’s replete in the Psalms, like uh Psalm 97, right? The that righteousness and justice are the very throne, the very foundation of the Lord’s throne. And so help us understand a little bit the Jewish understanding of justice and righteousness. And how does that compare to the more modern and Greek-influenced understanding of justice?
Derek Vreeland: Yeah, let’s let’s go backwards. Let’s start with a thing that we’re familiar with. We have like a A more Western, a more Greek understanding, justice is, especially in our if we’re listening in an American context, it’s often more retributive, it’s more punitive. Right. And that’s that’s stating it in the negative. That’s that’s the giving people what they deserve. That’s the punishing wrongdoers. But you can also use the same concept in the positive way. It’s giving people what they’ve earned, giving people the appropriate like they can earn something bad. They can also earn something good. And that’s that’s one way of seeing justice. It’s giving it’s It’s giving people what is rightfully theirs.
Narrator: Right, very that’s very modern, but that goes all the way back to ancient Greece, because Aristotle had justice um as one of the cardinal virtues and justice in the Greek mind, Dio Kaisune, was giving people what they’re due. So rich people they’re due their riches. Royalty are are due honor. Uh okay, I d I had to jump in. Continue.
Derek Vreeland: Yeah, no, that’s absolutely right. And I would not say that the Hebrew concept is the opposite, but it is different, and it is significantly different. So the Hebraic or maybe even more Eastern, and this is still true in modern settings today, that aren’t Western or Imperial or Greek, uh Greco-Roman centric, or any of those kind of things. You still will find this with indigenous people groups or more Eastern tribes in different parts of the world or all kinds of things. But their understanding of justice Is making everything whole again, putting it right again. In the Jewish mind, they would call this shalom, everything in its proper place, peace, wholeness. Well, shalom is made up I mean you you said you noticed it all throughout the Hebrew scriptures, they’re always paired together, righteousness and justice, because those are the key ingredients. of Shalom. The psalmist says righteousness and justice are the foundation of God’s throne, because God’s throne is a throne of shalom. Like that is the Oh, so good. And so in Genesis we’re told one of my favorite places to go. God’s about ready to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, and he he goes to Abraham and he says, I have to tell Abraham about my plan because I’ve chosen him, and he says for this reason, because he is going to teach his descendants how to do Righteousness and justice. And those two words, Zedeka and Mishpah, and they always go together. Zedekah, righteousness. Is the Hebrew concept of being in right relationship. And the rabbis talk about this triangle: God, humankind, and creation. There’s relationships between God and humanity. There’s relationships between God and creation. And there’s relationships between. Creation and humanity. And when those relationships, if all those relationships were in right relationship, you would have Zedeka and you would have Shalom. The fact of the matter is we live in a world that’s all kinds of twisted and distorted and broken. And so those right relationships get crooked. And that so that Zedika gets broken. And that means we have to be about the work of Mishpat, which is the word for justice. So justice is the work of restoring righteousness. Justice is the work of putting right what’s been torn asunder. Bringing wholeness back to the perfect shalom triangle. And that work of which means sometimes it’s not giving people what you deserve. Because giving people Aristotle’s justice. ultimately just keeps tearing the world further and further apart on its punitive ends. Right. At some point, mercy, compassion Forgiveness is the only thing that can truly restore the world, because you can’t restore shalom by continuing to give brokenness what brokenness deserves. Now. That can be out twisted in all kinds of ways. But that’s the idea behind Hebrew justice. Sometimes we’re going to show mercy. Sometimes we’re going to extend compassion. Sometimes we’re going to be generous, not because it’s deserved, but because it’s what leads to wholeness and putting things back right again
Narrator: Oh, so good. And to me, that you have just unlocked so much in just those few words. Because shalom, uh, peace is not only the absence of conflict, but in the Jewish mindset it is about well-being and flourishing and wholeness and this is God’s design from the beginning. And I also appreciate that you are saying in the Hebrew mindset, Justice includes mercy. It’s not just giving people what they do, what they’re due, they’re broken and sometimes what they need is Mercy, compassion, a lift up, because often when you see righteousness and justice in the Hebrew scriptures, it’s associated with the poor. with the oppressed, with the marginalized, and this is to me, this is the ministry of Jesus. Though you don’t see justice as often in the New Testament, you’ll see righteousness a whole lot more But the ministry of Jesus is a ministry of bringing shalom, right? It bringing wholeness and order, and bringing the high low and bringing the low high to a place of of of of wholeness, both as individuals and their relationship with God, as well as our relationships with one another and our relationships with with the world itself. And uh to me that’s like the that’s like the big picture of the story of scripture. And so understanding those concepts, so, so important.
Derek Vreeland: Yeah. I and I would say like it doesn’t undo the fact that punitive still shows up. Like it doesn’t un like there’s still but it puts it in its proper place now. Like sometimes in order to bring shalom you do have to take the abuser and put boundaries up Sometimes there is consequences to wrongdoing. It’s not that mercy is the only response, but it becomes just one of many tools. And a much larger justice toolbox. I and I do I do love that idea of Shalom. You should call you should start a podcast called like a peaceable and I don’t know peaceable sound.
Narrator: Well see the peaceable part that is that’s That’s the shalom component. Actually, one of the early episodes when I was describing the podcast, I talked a little bit about shalom. The other thing I love about hearing the Hebrew backgrounds to the concepts of righteousness and justice, you’ve underscored the story of the ancient people of God is the story of God’s mercy and grace. Yes. Because the, you know, false paradigm that, oh, it’s all law and punishment in the Old Testament and now in the New Testament it’s all grace and compassion is such a misnomer. And so when you understand the Jewish backgrounds, you begin to break down. that bad way of reading the scripture. I mean, from the call of Abraham forward, this is God’s gracious act. of mercy inviting humanity uh into this beautiful story of redemption and restoration.
Derek Vreeland: Yeah. And and mercy is just runs all throughout Torah. That’s why God keeps saying, remember you are slaves in Egypt. Like remember my mercy I showed you cause I’m gonna I’m asking. And we sometimes don’t see it cause all we see is this clunky, what we feel like is primitive, barbaric Torah law, but that Torah law is a law of mercy. Keep showing mercy, keep showing compassion, keep showing generosity, because that is the work of justice. And that’s all based on that experience.
Narrator: Torah was not given to the ancient people of God so that they could somehow earn God’s favor, because that misses the whole covenantal understanding of God’s relationship with humanity. The Torah was given to the ancient people of God So that they would know, okay, if I’m going to participate in this work of shalom, of justice, then this is this is what I do. Because God has chosen to participate with us. Yes. And Marty, we are running out of time, and so I would love to invite you back for another conversation. This has been so enliving and informative. Hey, tell people where they can find you online. What’s the best places to go to find you online?
Derek Vreeland: The easiest place is just go to martysolomon. com. And they can find all the things. They can find the podcast from there, the YouTube channel. They can find me on my socials, even though I think we need to update a couple of those at the moment. Um, they can find appearances, my book. Like pretty much everything they need to find, just go to martysolomon. com, they can find it there.
Narrator: Alright, so go to martysolomon. com Subscribe to his podcast, his YouTube channel, follow him on social media, even if his accounts need to be updated. Definitely check out his book, Marty. Thank you for joining me today. Absolutely. Thank you. Well, that’s all we have for this episode. Thank you for joining this conversation. And if you found value And what we’re talking about, share this with others. But thank you for being with us today. Go in peace and be kind.
This transcript was generated with AI and may contain errors.