Beth Snodderly | William Carey International University (original) (raw)

Papers by Beth Snodderly

In November of 2011, in the edition of Regnum Books International, the book Evangelical and Front... more In November of 2011, in the edition of Regnum Books International, the book Evangelical and Frontier Mission Perspectives on the Global Progress of the Gospel was published and placed on the market. The story of this book begins with the World Missionary Conference held in Edinburgh in 1910 where Christians from major Protestant denominations and missionary societies gathered together to discuss the nature of Christian missions. After 100 years, a similar event occurred in Edinburgh and this book is the result of that event. Also, it is one of the books that was published as a part of the Regnum Edinburgh 2010 Centenary Series. This book is a collection of 19 articles from various authors divided into six major sections depending on the areas of study/interest, plus it includes the Tokyo 2010 Declaration about Making Disciples of Every People in our Generation. The book starts with a foreword by A. Scot Moreau (who is one of the editors) in which he explains the scope and aim of the book. The first two articles are part of the historical section and discuss Christian missions in the last 100 years. The first article, written by A. Scott Moreau, discusses the development of evangelical missions in the North American setting. The aim is to present the story of evangelical missions from 1910 to the present, and to provide a better understanding of the Lausanne Movement and the reasons Lausanne chose to celebrate the centenary of the 1910 Edinburgh Conference separately from the Ecumenical Movement. The second article, written by David Taylor, discusses the frontier mission movement in the last 30 years between the missions conferences in Edinburgh 1980 and Tokyo 2010. The author analyzes changes and successes in evangelical missions toward unreached people and the possible future of such endeavors. The second section, called "Unreached Peoples Insights, " contains four articles. The first article, written by Greg Parsons, informs readers about the history and impact of the Fuller School of World Missions. This article, in the editor's words, presents "a significant case study for those who would understand American evangelicals and frontier mission" (55). The second article, written by Ezra Sargunam and Andrew Swamidoss, is dedicated to Donald A. McGavran and Ralph D. Winter. In this short article, the two writers talk about their personal memories and the influences that McGavran and Winter had had on their lives. The third article is dedicated to a history of the Perspectives Course in which Yvonne W. Huneycutt describes major trends in American culture and in missions leading up to the mid-seventies, its early development up to 1981,

Acta patristica et byzantina, 2007

A socio-rhetorical approach to analyzing portions of the text of First John brings out new answer... more A socio-rhetorical approach to analyzing portions of the text of First John brings out new answers to questions about the text, related to genre, structure and interpretation that have puzzled biblical commentators over the years. This article looks at the text from two perspectives. From a socio-rhetorical perspective it looks at the text through lens of a socialscientific model termed by Bruce Malina and Jerome Neyrey a "Status Degradation Ritual" 2 (adapted from sociologist Harold Garfinkel 3), which enriches the understanding of the purposes, genre and structure of First John. From a literary perspective this article looks at the way language is used to facilitate the Status Degradation Ritual and finds the intentional use of chiasm, a common oral-literary device in ancient Hebrew 4 and Greco-Roman literature. Insights from the chiastic parallelisms of the structure of the proposed Status Degradation Ritual offer new explanations for exegetical issues such as the seeming contradiction between 1 John 1:8, 10 and 3:6, 9 regarding the sin and sinlessness of the believer.

This was the opinion of the late Ralph D. Winter, noted missiologist and my mentor and friend. Dr... more This was the opinion of the late Ralph D. Winter, noted missiologist and my mentor and friend. Dr. Winter, as his friends called him, often lamented that American evangelicals took a detour away from the university tradition at the time of D.L. Moody, when they began founding Bible Schools, which have only recently become universities. Winter bemoaned that “evangelicals ... have not gotten into politics nor into university structures until very recently. How can you go as a professor from a Bible school to a university? You can’t. ... Th at was a mission strategy that went wrong, that refused to contextualize” (Winter 1998).

As we reflect on the past century, then, the stories of the evangelical world church deserve to b... more As we reflect on the past century, then, the stories of the evangelical world church deserve to be heard. In this volume, we do not have space to even begin to scratch the surface. Being forced to choose an orientation, we collected stories and thinking related to the way evangelicals have idealized, operationalized and organized in light of the remaining frontiers of mission.https://scholar.csl.edu/edinburghcentenary/1005/thumbnail.jp

WCIU Journal, 2019

First John 3:8: The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. Ralph W... more First John 3:8: The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. Ralph Winter quoted this verse frequently in his last years. In my doctoral studies I explored this verse in great detail to discern what the original audience might have thought was included in the phrase, "the works of the devil." I used a Social Science model called a "Status Degradation Ritual" to understand some of the dynamics in the First Epistle of John. The author’s community is having to distinguish between “the children of God,” and those who are having their status degraded to “children of the devil.” In this article I ask if this model also applies to the way some politicians talk about asylum seekers at America's southern border who are fleeing violence and intolerable conditions. Do the degrading comments by top leaders put those people in a position of being non-persons in the eyes of many people? How should believers respond?

William Carey Internationa Development Journal, 2019

A social science model, called a "status degradation ritual," can help us understand some of the ... more A social science model, called a "status degradation ritual," can help us understand some of the dynamics in the way people sometimes relate to others in a time of crisis. This article looks at a community crisis in the First Epistle of John and notes how the author used the elements of a status degradation ritual to try to solve the problem. The author's community was having to distinguish between "the children of God," and those who are having their status degraded to "children of the devil." In this article I ask if this model also applies to the way some politicians talk about asylum seekers fleeing violence in their home countries. Do the degrading comments by top leaders put those people in a position of being seen and treated as non-persons? Might the similarities and differences between these 1 st and 21 st century crises help Jesus-followers know how to respond to current immigration issues?

This article expands on my Hebrew Words studies from Genesis 1:1, 2, specifying the exegetical pr... more This article expands on my Hebrew Words studies from Genesis 1:1, 2, specifying the exegetical principles and the implications for the key term, tohu wabohu, in relation to God's will for his creation, including societies.

This edited book is a collection of stories by and about men and women—some well-known, others no... more This edited book is a collection of stories by and about men and women—some well-known, others not so well-known—who have chosen to let God work through them as his change agents in the world. Their stories each demonstrate something of what God’s will looks like within their spheres of influence.

This edited volume is a collection of WCIU faculty and student writings. In Part 1 the authors de... more This edited volume is a collection of WCIU faculty and student writings. In Part 1 the authors describe the difference made in the world by people of biblical faith. Part 2 focuses on Ralph D. Winter's theme of overcoming evil through intentional activities such as disease eradication. Part 3 talks about the difference made by worldview while Part 4 gives examples of intentional breakthroughs toward expanding God's kingdom. The conclusion states that Shalom is the goal of God's kingdom and of international development.

This book combines a socio-rhetorical analysis of 1 John with traditional biblical exegesis of Ge... more This book combines a socio-rhetorical analysis of 1 John with traditional biblical exegesis of Genesis 1:1,2 to make a case of international development as cosmic battle. God created everything and every possibility, but something went wrong and the land became tohu wabohu: destroyed and desolate. Jesus was the new beginning and 1 John shows how God's children join the cosmic battle, engaging in overcoming evil with good.

In his call to the evangelical world to include fighting disease as an aspect of mission, Winter ... more In his call to the evangelical world to include fighting disease as an aspect of mission, Winter is echoing biblical themes that have their origin in Genesis 1:2. It is the thesis of this paper that tohu wabohu is anything that is the opposite of creation and order and that it is a description of the root of human problems around the world, including disease and violence found in missions settings. It is fighting tohu wabohu to do anything that brings order out of chaos. This is the origin of a theology of disease. (Dis-ease is the opposite of ease; the opposite of order; the opposite of God's intentions = tohu wabohu.)

In rural East Tennessee, where I served as a pastor's wife for 18 years among Appalachian country... more In rural East Tennessee, where I served as a pastor's wife for 18 years among Appalachian country folk, quilting and knitting afghans are regular pass-times of many of the women. County Fairs and Country magazines regularly feature prize-winning squares and finished quilts. One blue-ribbon knitted square particularly stands out in my memory. It was very simple-not much to look at as an individual square. The design consisted of a number of diagonal rows of complementary colors. The genius of the prize-winning square was revealed in the finished product. When each square was stitched in place at a particular angle in relationship to surrounding squares, a geometric pattern emerged that could not have been envisioned from seeing one square alone.

Acta patristica et byzantina, 2007

WCIU Journal, 2019

William Carey Internationa Development Journal, 2019

PREFACE: This article is an informal account in story format of a proposed hypothesis about the r... more PREFACE: This article is an informal account in story format of a proposed hypothesis about the relationship between some members of the Qumran Community (also called Essenes here) and the Johannine Community. It is based on historically accepted facts, accounts from the New Testament and other early Christian literature, as well as scholarly speculation, both by the present author and by well-known New Testament scholars. The purpose of this article is to encourage appreciation for the cultural context of the Johannine Community and the difficulties members faced in making their message acceptable and understood by those in other cultural contexts.

the Book of Revelation, Sigve K. Tonstad, MD, PhD in New Testament, urged his listeners to try ou... more the Book of Revelation, Sigve K. Tonstad, MD, PhD in New Testament, urged his
listeners to try out using the “audit” of the Seven Churches in Revelation chapters 2–3 as
a diagnostic on an individual level, a church level, a cultural level, and a national level.
He asked,
• What is the meaning of this message if we see it as a metaphor for the church?
• Does the message sent to the last of the seven churches address church and culture in
the 21st century in a meaningful way?

French philosopher-theologian Jacques Ellul contributed the insight that “even before we humans k... more French philosopher-theologian Jacques Ellul contributed the insight that “even before we humans knew we lived on a globe we sought a global understanding of our humanity” (Fasching 2014). He also highlighted the problem of trying to find that understanding in the great cities of today’s global civilization that are held together by technology and science. The dominant technological, rationalist explanations for what we see happening around us are what we speak of as a “secular” worldview, which does not give satisfactory answers to the “why” questions. Rather than attempting to see the whole picture (a “metanarrative”), a secular approach, without God in the picture, just explains the science and technology pieces of reality.
But, in agreement with Winter, missionary-theologian Lesslie Newbigin pointed out that the human spirit cannot live permanently with a form of rationality which has no answer to the question “Why?” (Newbigin 1989, 213).

This is an excerpt from my Master's Thesis, giving a very detailed outline resulting from inducti... more This is an excerpt from my Master's Thesis, giving a very detailed outline resulting from inductive study in dialog with Johannine scholars.