Customer Reviews

Introducing the New Testament: A Short Guide to Its History and Message

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Every book should, of course, be evaluated only on the basis of its own claim of purpose. Approaching this book, "Introducing the New Testament: a short guide to its history and message", and having already encountered its bigger older brother (An Introduction to the New Testament), I noticed it's size, and then it's subtitle with the words "a short guide" in bold. With the editing help of Andrew Neselli, Carson and Moo have the opportunity to get this volume into the hands of people that want a short guide.

This book fulfills its purpose (to be that short guide), and is actually helpful at the same time. The authors are able to hit all of the big questions (content, authorship, genre, date, place, audience, purpose, and contributions) concerning the introduction of the New Testament and its individual books. They do so briefly, insightfully, and all the while they point to further resources for study.

Having discipled several people hungry for the basics of the New Testament, but not interested in acquiring commentaries with this information or larger books that deal with similar content, this book fits well. I recommend it.

This is an excellent resource by Dr. Naselli. I highly recommend it.

It is a condensation of the excellent *Introduction to the New Testament* written by Don Carson and Doug Moo, two top-rate NT scholars.

This short introduction to New Testament gives basic introductory information about each book of the New Testament such as author, date, recipients, and message. It also has some broader chapters such as the Synoptic Gospels (discussing how Matthew, Mark, and Luke relate to each other), The New Testament Letters (sometimes called the epistles), and Paul: Apostle and Theologian. Each chapter includes discussion questions and additional resources for study.

This is an excellent resource for those who are interested in studying the New Testament but are somewhat overwhelmed by the five hundred plus pages of Carson and Moo. It would work well in a local church setting for teaching a NT survey class, for individual study by a Bible study teacher or leader, as a quick reference when you don't want to read the big one, or for someone who just wants to know more.

I love when I come across sources that serve the church well. This short guide to the New Testament that Andy Naselli has edited is one such source!

In short what Naselli has done is taken Carson and Moo's larger work, An Introduction to the New Testament (784 pages) and summarize it down to 163 pages. He has taken some very in depth content targeted towards the seminary student or pastor and made it accessible for the average church member in the pew.

The work is setup to deal with each book of the New Testament, and in some cases a group of books (i.e. 1, 2, 3 John all appear in one chapter), at a very overview level. It is not setup so much as a book one would sit down to read cover to cover, though some would, but more as a quick reference guide looking at each book of the New Testament. Each chapter seeks to answer eight questions:

1. Content: What is the book about?

2. Author: Who wrote the book?

3. Genre: What style of literature is used?

4. Date: When was the book written?

5. Place: Where was the book written?

6. Audience: To whom was the book written?

7. Purpose: Why was the book written?

8. Contributions: What does the book contribute to our understanding of the faith?

The other thing that I find extremely helpful is that each chapter ends with a set of questions that will help the reader process the information of the chapter. Following the questions the reader will find a list of sources where they can go for more information.

On the whole, Andy Naselli has served the church well by making this material more accessible to the average person in the church and I would wholehearted encourage anyone wanting a fuller understanding of their New Testament to pick up this book.