NEWS

Forthcoming, February 2008, Westminister John Knox Press, $19.95

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PUBLICATIONS

New Article on Word and Spirit
Bob Ekblad
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Jesus’ Subversive Victory Shouts in Matthew 27:
Towards an Empowering Theology of the Cross
Bob Ekblad

I exercise my ministry as executive director of Tierra Nueva in part through my role as chaplain to inmates in a county jail and pastor to immigrants, many of whom are undocumented. I also lead retreats and teach seminars to leaders who work with people on the margins in different parts of the world. As a Bible scholar and pastor in my particular ministry contexts it is almost impossible to not be politically engaged (though not necessarily in a partisan way). The effects of my context on my own research and the nature of my engagement will become evident as I lead you through the following Bible study on Matthew 27.
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God Loves and Calls Violent Men
Bob Ekblad

Violent men make the headlines daily, and many people consider them deserving of banishment or death. God has called me and many here at Tierra Nueva to seek for, find, bind up, love, pray for and in various ways minister to violent men and women­both inside and outside jail . . .
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Following Abraham and Sarah out of Babylon
Bob Ekblad
January 2002

Abraham and Sarah, the founding couple of Judaism, Islam and Christianity need to be rediscovered and followed out of Babylon into a new way of thinking outside the impasses of USA, Israel/Palestine and Islamic nationalism. Today when “us-them” distinctions have never been more destructive, those who claim to follow Jesus must be clear about our identity as bearers of Good News to all people. Focus on the particularities of our heritage as heirs of the promise given to Abraham and Sarah must be balanced with the deeper meaning of our founding stories in sacred Scripture . . . >>Read Entire Article<<

The Word of God ... Through the Toilet Bowl
Bob Ekblad

I serve as a part-time chaplain to people who are in jail. Twice a week, I make my way through five thick steel doors into the dreary center of Skagit County's high-security facility. Guards let men who are interested in my Spanish Bible study out of their cells and pods, escorting them to the jail library and multipurpose room, where I await them . . . >>Read Entire Article<<

“Don’t fret about the wicked: the meek will inherit the earth”
Bob Ekblad
Fort Benning, Georgia, January 2002

In late November 2003 I attended the Society of Biblical Literature and American Academy of Religion annual meeting in Atlanta, Georgia, where nearly 10,000 professional Bible scholars and theologians gathered to listen to papers on specialized topics at a luxurious convention center . . . >>Read Entire Article<<

Jesus' Suprising Offer of Living Cocaine
Bob Ekblad
6-21-04

Intercultural reading of the Bible demonstrates that reading strategies and interpretations vary widely and are relevant to reading communities to the extent that they are faithful to the text, the social context of the group, and the daily lives and concerns of individual readers. In this article I seek to include the perspectives of Latino immigrant inmates who participated in the Intercultural Reading of the Bible Project.

How might these people identify the contemporary equivalent of the well and water in their communities and lives? Where are today's wells where contemporary Samaritans might quench their thirst in their encounter with the Word become flesh? What is the role of the facilitator among people who are mostly first-time Bible readers, are outside the church, and often consider themselves condemned by God and unable to change? >>Read Entire Article<<

Berries, Farmers, and Workers: Endangered Species

Thousands of migrant farm workers have moved into Skagit County's ten labor camps this summer with hopes of plentiful work harvesting strawberries and other local crops. Many have found work. At the same time workers complain that more laborers and increased machine harvesting has meant far less work than expected . . . >>Read Entire Article<<

Journeying with Moses
Bob Ekblad
5-03-04

I often read the story of Moses' awakening and call with incarcerated Latino immigrants who attend my weekly bilingual Spanish-English Bible studies in Skagit County Jail in Washington State . People in our reading circle immediately identify with characters in the narrative of Exodus 2:11-3:12 and appear to feel excluded from other roles in the story. Participants' first-glance assumptions about each biblical character's social location and their own place in world leads to a prejudiced reading of the story.

These biased interpretations of Biblical stories are often alienating, reinforcing people's feelings of powerlessness or exclusion. I am convinced that oppressive interpretations can be subverted by careful reading of the narrative itself . . . >>Read Entire Article<<

Finding Refuge in God's New Earth
Bob Ekblad
5-03-04

Today we are facing an unprecedented assault on both the world's poor and the natural world. Marginalized people and wildlife all need refuge or the planet's most vulnerable and beautiful life will become extinguished. Those of us in solidarity with people at the edges of society and with nature feel the pain and chaos of marginalization.

We often find it difficult to step out of the fray into contemplative spaces where our minds, bodies and spirits can be renewed. Yet this is essential since there are direct links between the degradation of the human spirit and the destruction of the natural world . . . >>Read Entire Article<<

Subjects of Their Own Liberation: Facilitating Dialogue in a Monologue World
Bob Ekblad
12-03-01

Many a pastor, priest and rabbi strive to preach and teach in ways that will inspire their parishioners to live lives marked by compassion and service to the poor and excluded. This prophetic task is highly complex, made especially difficult in mainstream circles by a myriad of nearly insurmountable obstacles.

Before considering some of these obstacles and strategies for preaching that empowers, I will briefly present my context and understanding of the role and objectives of the preacher followed by a dialogical sermon on John 9 . . . >>Read Entire Article<<

"I Need a Beating" - Reading for Good News among Mexican Immigrants and Inmates Submerged in the Bad News
Bob Ekblad
12-03-01

The socially-engaged biblical scholar or "trained reader" of the Scriptures must be as aware as possible of the many obstacles and prejudices that stand in the way of reading with people on the margins.

Distrust of and discomfort in the presence of the bible study facilitator or religious professional, compounded by differences in race, social class, language and religion, are the biggest obstacles to effective intercultural reading . . . >>Read Entire Article<<

Jacob and Esau Behind Bars: Resisting Rejection by the "Elect" in Genesis 25-27
Bob Ekblad
11-27-01

People who are truly on the margins do not expect to receive benefits legitimately. Accustomed to being rejected by the powerful, they learn to survive by hook or by crook. If Scripture is to be relevant to today's "damned" it must be freed from dominant theological paradigm that assumes that blessing in this world is a reward for good behavior and exclusion a punishment for bad.

I encounter people at many levels of marginalization as chaplain of Skagit County Jail and director of Tierra Nueva and The People's Seminary- an ecumenical ministry to migrant farm workers and study center for Scripture study with people on the margins . . . >>Read Entire Article<<

From Intimacy to Revolution: Receiving the Full Prophetic Experience in the Body of Christ
Chris Hoke, Assistant Jail Chaplain
8-2006

There persists a rather wide chasm between two schools of Christian faith and ministry: the highly personal and individual on one hand, and the socially informed, engaged and resistant on the other. Social and structural injustices are so overwhelming that the latter activist tradition may actively avoid what seems to be an overly individualistic and internal ministry, seeing it as a pacifying distraction from more urgent communal and organizational development. And more evangelical or inner healing traditions moving in a sensitivity to the Spirit too often embrace an extremely “sovereign” understanding of God’s will on the earth that would see little need for people of faith to question or challenge kings, rulers, authorities, markets and injustices beyond issues of personal morality or the nuclear family . . . >>Read Entire Article<<

Against the Laws: Incarceration as Re-evaluation of the Natural World
Chris Hoke, Assistant Jail Chaplain
3-8-06

During the months Daniel was in Skagit County Jail, he dreamt of oceans and oceans. He would be swimming, he tells me, with whales and his family. Daniel has never been to the ocean; the closest this recently released, 19-year-old local gang affiliate gets to the Pacific is when we stand on the dyke behind his parents’ house in West Mount Vernon and he points out where he’d play on a large drainage pipe in the Skagit River at low tide when he was a kid . . . >>Read Entire Article<<

Reading the BIBLE with the Damned
 

Reviews on "Reading the BIBLE with the Damned"

>> Jeshua Erickson <<

>> Joe Hamby - Meyers Park, United Methodist Church, Charlotte, NC <<

>> Society of Biblical Literature <<