Scholars in Residence

From Sunday, June 14th to Sunday, July 5th we will be pleased to host David and Anna Westfall as scholars in residence. They will be preaching a sermon series entitled “The Satisfaction of Christ and the Heart of the Gospel.”

David Westfall is a New Testament scholar by training (PhD, St Andrews, 2018), but also a lover of church history and theology in general. His wife, Anna, has MAs in Old & New Testament from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. In David’s work, he is especially interested in how the church throughout history has understood the biblical witness to Christ’s work of salvation (the doctrine of “atonement”).

In their sermon series, David will be preaching for three Sundays as we explore a traditional way of summarizing that saving work: Christ’s “threefold office” (munus triplex) of king, priest, and prophet. Our lectionary readings will take us through several key moments in Matthew’s passion narrative, connecting the climactic events of Jesus’ earthly ministry with their foreshadowing in the Old Testament books of Genesis, Leviticus, the Psalms, and Isaiah. On their fourth and final Sunday, Anna will conclude the series with some reflections on how the atonement speaks to our experiences of spiritual despair, drawing on Isaiah and the conclusion to Matthew’s passion narrative.