TEI Seminars

John Rankin has taught hundreds of seminars across the years, on a range of subjects where biblical theology and public policy interface. Here are seven seminars he presently teaches, and if you have interest, contact the TEI.

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1. The Only Genesis Seminar covers the content of the books, Genesis and the Power of True Assumptions, The Six Pillars of Biblical Power, The Six Pillars of Honest Politics and Jesus, in the Face of His Enemies. It can be taught in a succinct 1-3 hour format, as a summation of TEI Class 1.

  • The all-defining doctrines of creation, sin and redemption.
  • The four all-defining subjects of God, life, choice and sex.
  • The twelve positive assumptions of Genesis 1-2: Only Genesis has a positive view of God’s nature, communication, human nature, human freedom, hard questions, human sexuality, science and the scientific method, verifiable history, covenantal law, and unalienable rights and the First Amendment.
  • The six pillars of biblical power and honest politics: the power to give, the power to live in the light, the power of informed choice, the power to love hard questions, the power to love enemies, the power to forgive.
  • The Gospel and political issues.
  • Spiritual warfare.
  • Jesus, in the Face of His Enemies: the strategy to transform culture in advancing the Gospel.

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2. The Good and Dangerous Prayer Seminar is based on the content of the Lord’s Prayer (Matthew 6:9-13), and is a structure through which to organize the church to be salt and light in society (Matthew 5:13-16). This prayer is good to those who seek the good, and dangerous to those who do not seek the good. If we live by it, how simple, ordered and prosperous life will be for all people of good will.

There are four comprehensive arenas addressed in the universality of the Lord’s Prayer:

  1. Family – Our Father, the One in the heavens, holy is your Name.
  2. Politics – Your kingdom come, your will be done, in heaven and on earth.
  3. Economics – Give us today our daily bread, and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.
  4. Spiritual Warfare – And do not bring us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.

Line 1: Our Father, the One in the heavens, holy is your Name

  1. The radical nature of the Fatherhood of God, the one true Creator. (Contrast with paganism, Islam and secular constructs).
  2. The derivative nature of fatherhood/family.
  3. The greatest social evil in human history – the chosen absence of the biological father.
  4. The holy or sanctified (“set apart”) nature of God the Father.
  5. The call for us, as his image-bearers, to be sanctified.
  6. The interpretive power the eleven positive assumptions of Only Genesis.
  7. The sanctifying power of the six pillars of biblical power — what it means to love God and neighbor.

Line 2: Your kingdom come, your will be done, in heaven and on  earth

  1. Genesis 1-3 = political theology.
  2. The social and political structure of Only Genesis and the Ten Commandments.
  3. The kingdom of our heavenly Father versus big daddy human government.
  4. The kingdom of God now, and as the antidote to tyranny.
  5. The “dangerous” political nature of Matthew’s Gospel.
  6. The power of the pre-partisan.
  7. The six pillars of honest politics.
  8. Occam’s razor and simplified law.

Line 3: Give us today our daily bread, and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.

  1. The nature of economics as rooted in the Greek term oikonomos (“the rule of the household”).
  2. The freedom of daily bread versus human certainty, and the cognate of entrepreneurial free market economies.
  3. The abolition of usury, and of debt that is unrelated to sound and honest investment.
  4. The Jubilee ethic of the Law of Moses, Cities of Refuge, and the power for gaining national economic freedom.
  5. TEI Care, a biblical alternative to health insurance.
  6. Covenant Islands.
  7. The simple contract.

Line 4: And do not bring us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.

  1. The universality of the language of “temptation,” and its non-accusatory power in helping people face reality.
  2. The universal need for deliverance not just from an amorphous “evil,” but from “the evil one,” i.e., Satan.
  3. Sorcery at the right hand of power: the all-defining spiritual war in the Bible, and its interface with politics and economics.
  4. Jesus, in the face of his enemies.

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3. Hebrew Covenant and Political Freedom: The Foundation for Advancing the Gospel in a Skeptical World. This is the subject of John’s Ph.D. dissertation in Oxford.

4. Jesus, in the Face of His Enemies: The Basis for Grasping the Mission Field of Politics. This is based on John’s book, Jesus, in the Face of His Enemies.

5. Meeting Satan Face-to-Face, and Other True Stories – the Testimony of an ex-Unitarian. This is the proposed title for John’s most recent book, now being reviewed by a major publisher.

6. Changing the Language of the Abortion Debate: How to Win Equal Legal Protection for Women and Their Unborn. This is based on John’s book, Changing the Language of the Unborn, and all my years of pro-life work.

7. The Real Muhammad in the Face of Moses and Jesus. This is based on two of John’s books: The Real Muhammad: In the Eyes of Ibn Ishaq; and Moses and Jesus in the Face of Muhammad; and also on 41 Vignettes on the Life of Muhammad at www.johnrankinyoutube.org.

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