Cool little book
You can read my fuller review at Spoiled Milks (8/16/19).
Paul wrote to "a set of house churches in Rome in the first century when Nero was emperor and Paul was planning his future mission to Spain" (x). Paul wants these Christians to be conformed to Christ ("Christoformity"). McKnight has "imagined how the Strong and Weak heard this letter" (ix).
The issue in the church in Rome is the same we have today: the issue is the inability of the Privileged and the Powerful [the Strong] to embody the gospel's inclusive demand and include the Disprivileged and the Disempowered [the Weak] (xiii). Romans 1-11 offer the rationale to the "lived theology" Paul gives his readers in Romans 12-16. They should seek the good of one another because God has made them one in Christ. They both have the same salvation, the same Spirit, they serve the same King, and have the same Father.
A few things that were a tad annoying:
McKnight reminds us who the Weak and the Strong are almost every time he brings them up. It makes sense to add on to the definitions of the Weak and Strong at the beginning of each chapter (even if that is repetitive), but to give small reminders throughout the chapter was a bit overkill.
Phoebe is a fantastic woman, but she seems to be thrown into the conversation to make sure I didn't forget about her, often distracting me from the argument's flow.
Finally, random nouns are capitalized (like in German). Placing the words in bold would have had a better effect.
This book was great. McKnight doesn't claim that this way is the way to read Romans, but he does this to help give us a proper perspective on whom Paul was writing to and why he did so. I think readers will come away with a helpful sense of reading Romans. I plan to read Romans next time with these ideas in mind to see how well I agree with it.
