Published by SPCK
<www.thedramaofscripture.com>

Our passion is that people learn to read the Bible as it was meant to be read—as one unfolding story. The Drama of Scripture has been written to tell the biblical story of redemption as a unified, coherent narrative of God's ongoing work within his kingdom. After God had created the world, and after human rebellion had marred it, God set out to restore what he had made: “God did not turn his back on a world bent on destruction; he turned his face toward it in love. He set out on the long road of redemption to restore the lost as his people and the world as his kingdom.” The Bible narrates the story of God's journey on that long road of redemption. It is a unified and progressively unfolding drama of God's action in history for the salvation of the whole world. The Bible is not a mere jumble of history, poetry, lessons in morality and theology, comforting promises, guiding principles and commands; it is fundamentally coherent. Every part of the Bible—each event, book, character, command, prophecy and poem—must be understood in the context of the one storyline. 

Many of us have read the Bible as if it were merely a mosaic of little bits—theological bits, moral bits, historical-critical bits, sermon bits, devotional bits. But to read the Bible in such a fragmented way is to ignore its divine author's intention to shape our lives through its story. All human communities live out of some story that provides a context for understanding the meaning of history, that gives shape and direction to their lives. If we allow the Bible to become fragmented, it is in danger of being absorbed into whatever other story is shaping our culture, and will thus cease to shape our lives as it should. The dominant cultural story of the secular Western world has been twisted by idolatry. If as believers we allow this story (rather than the Bible) to become the foundation of our thought and action, then our lives will be shaped not by the story of scripture, but the lies of an idolatrous culture. Thus the unity of Scripture is no minor matter: a fragmented Bible may produce theologically orthodox, morally upright, warmly pious idol worshippers!

If our lives are to be shaped by the story of Scripture, we will need to understand two things well: that the Biblical story is a compelling unity on which we may depend, and our place within that story. This book is the telling of that story. We invite the reader to make it their story, to find their place in it, and to indwell it as the true story of our world.

There are three important emphases in this book. First, we stress the comprehensive scope of God's redemptive work in creation: the biblical story does not move toward the destruction of the world and our own “rescue” to heaven: it culminates in the restoration of the entire creation to its original goodness. The comprehensive scope of creation, sin, and redemption is evident throughout the Biblical story and is central to a faithful Biblical worldview. Secondly, we emphasise our place within the biblical story, that is, the era of Biblical history in which we live. Some refer to four questions as foundational to a biblical worldview: “Who am I?” “Where am I?” “What's wrong?” “What's the solution?” N. T. Wright adds an important fifth question: “What time is it?”—that is, “Where do we belong in this story? How does it shape our lives in the present?” We will explore the biblical answers to these five questions as part of our telling of the grand story of the Bible. Thirdly, we highlight the centrality of mission within the biblical story. There is God's mission: The Bible narrates God's mission to restore the creation. Israel's mission flows from this: God chose a people to again embody God's creational purposes for humanity and so be a light to the nations, and the Old Testament narrates the history of Israel's response to their divine calling. Jesus' mission: When Jesus comes on the scene, he takes upon himself the missionary vocation which had been Israel's. He embodies God's purpose for humanity and accomplishes the victory over sin, opening the way to a new world. When his earthly ministry is over, he leaves his church with the mandate to continue in that same mission. And so the church's mission: In our own time, standing as we do between Pentecost and the return of Jesus, our central task as the people of god is to witness to the rule of Jesus Christ over all of life.

We have also borrowed from Tom Wright his very helpful metaphor of the Bible as a drama. But whereas Wright speaks of five acts—creation, sin, Israel, Christ, church—we tell the story in terms of six acts. Following Walsh and Middleton we add the coming of the new creation as the final, unique element of the biblical drama. We have also added a prologue. This prologue addresses in a preliminary way what it means to say that human life is shaped by a story.

This book is a revised version of our book by the same title published by Baker Academic Press in 2004. A number of things have been done to make this book more suitable as a study version for individuals and churches. First the book has been significantly shortened. Many of the details in the earlier book have been eliminated. Second, almost all of the explanatory footnotes have been dropped. Third, a brief section on the contemporary significance of that part of the story follows each act. They are short so they are not meant to be exhaustive by any means. It is meant, rather, to be suggestive of how one can read these sections with integrity in terms of their significance for today. These sections are followed by some questions that can be used as discussion starters to reflect on the meaning of the story for our lives today.

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