Writing Again

I breathed a sigh of relief when I started writing again after more than 14 months of inaction. This pastoral role has taken a lot of my energy and now I am relieved of it all and began to write. I managed to comment on John 17:2-4 in its bare bones. What I do is first exegesis, explaining the text in its context and then there will be some application on the more important verses or passages. There is hardly a more important verse in the whole Gospel than one found in John 17:3, defining what eternal life is.

It is knowing the one true God and Jesus Christ whom He had sent. The word, “true” is most significant because in John’s Gospel the word, true or truth, truly is found more than 40 times, a key word in the understanding of John’s description of the divine. 

The divinity in its very essence is “truth”. He is a true God whereas everything else beside is false and is judged by what we know of this God who is true and is the truth. Every thing else is falsehood. So I wrote a couple of pages this morning commenting on these few verses. 

I rejoice that I have started to do what I am called to do, to do His work, to complete His work. How many people out there in the world that can write in Malay armed with proper theological training in the Bible? I count myself blessed, fulfilling a role that few could, to write in the two most important languages in Malaysia and in the world, English. 

Just a few days ago, I found a couple of articles in Polish, Hungarian and one other European language that I know not citing my book on John’s Revelation. It’s been more than 20 years now, and when I finish the commentary on John’s Gospel, I may try writing another one, Romans which I taught three times, twice in Namaus, Ranau and once in Singapore. 

In Singapore I read several thick commentaries on Romans in preparation and there were about 20 students in my class. All my electives, except in my final Semester were well attended on average 20 plus students. I taught John’s Gospel four times, twice in TTC and twice in Namaus.