The tension: Paul stacks Romans 3:28, Romans 4:13, Galatians 2:16, Galatians 3:11-12, and Ephesians 2:8-9 to insist humans are justified by faith apart from works of the la…
The tension: Acts 2:30, Acts 13:23, Romans 1:3, 2 Timothy 2:8, Hebrews 2:16, and Revelation 22:16 all describe Jesus as physically descended from David 'according to the fl…
The tension: Matthew 5:9 blesses peacemakers; Luke 2:14 has the angels announce 'on earth peace'; John 14:27 and 16:33 have Jesus give peace to his disciples; Acts 10:36 sa…
The tension: Matthew 10:5-6 and 15:24 have Jesus restrict his and his disciples' mission to "the lost sheep of the house of Israel" — explicitly forbidding any approach to…
The tension: The Synoptic Jesus identifies one sin that will never be forgiven "neither in this world, neither in the world to come" — blasphemy against the Holy Spirit (Ma…
The tension: Matthew 27:6-7 has the chief priests buy the potter's field with the silver Judas threw back at them, because as blood money it can't go in the temple treasury.
The tension: Matthew, Mark, and Luke all give Joseph of Arimathea sole credit for taking Jesus down, wrapping the body in linen, and laying it in the tomb.
The tension: Matthew 28:10 and Mark 16:7 have Jesus (or his angelic messenger) tell the disciples to head north to Galilee — that's where they'll see him.
The tension: John 7:39 says outright that 'the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.' John 20:22 has Jesus breathe the Spirit onto the dis…
The tension: John 5:22, John 5:26-27, John 9:39, Acts 17:31, 2 Corinthians 5:10, and Revelation 19:11 say Jesus judges everyone, with the Father committing all judgment to…
The tension: Acts 1:1-2 opens with Luke telling Theophilus that his "former treatise" (the Gospel of Luke) covered "all that Jesus began both to do and teach" up to the asc…
The tension: Acts 1:15 reports the number of names "together" right after the ascension as "about one hundred and twenty." Paul, writing decades earlier in 1 Corinthians 15…
The tension: Matthew 27:5 has Judas throw the thirty pieces of silver down in the temple and then hang himself; the priests use the money to buy the Potter's Field.
The tension: Acts 9:26 says that when Saul came to Jerusalem after his conversion he tried to join the disciples, and the Lukan narrative places this trip very close to the…
The tension: 1 Corinthians 8:4-8 has Paul argue that since an idol is nothing, food sacrificed to it is theologically neutral — eating it neither commends nor condemns you…
