Thursday March 1: Academia, Church and World: what's the use of biblical studies - Prof John M.G. Barclay

John Barclay who is visiting Alphacrucis in February/March 2018 is Lightfoot Professor of Divinity at Durham University. He is a distinguished New Testament scholar and books include Obeying the Truth. A Study of Paul’s Ethics in Galatians (T&T Clark 1988), Jews in the Mediterranean Diaspora from Alexander to Trajan 323 BCE - 117 CE (T&T Clark 1996), Colossians and Philemon (JSNT 1997). His Paul and the Gift (Eerdmans, 2015) has been hailed as the most significant book on Paul since E.P. Sanders's Paul and Palestinian Judaism in 1977.

Kara Martin has worked in several institutions and with Christian professional organisations to spiritually form students and workers. She is the author of Workship: How to use your work to worship God, and the forthcoming second volume Workship: How to flourish at work. She is a Project Leader with Seed, mentoring women entrepreneurs for social innovation. She is currently researching the skills, knowledge and attitudes that faithful workplace Christians display. The goal is to apply principles of spiritual formation in individual, church, theological college and marketplace ministry settings to empower Christians to integrate their faith with their work.

Ellen T. Charry is the Margaret W. Harmon Professor of Systematic Theology at Princeton Theological Seminary. Her books include God and the Art of Happiness (Eerdmans, 2010), Inquiring after God: Classic and Contemporary Readings (Blackwell, 2000), By the Renewing of Your Minds: The Pastoral Function of Christian Doctrine (Oxford University Press, 1997), and her current research undertakes a thorough reconstruction of the theological relationship between Judaism and Christianity, entitled For God’s Sake: The Wall of Hostility has to Come Down.

Dr Michael Theophilos is senior lecturer in Biblical Studies and Ancient Languages in the Faculty of Theology and Philosophy. He is currently writing a volume for the Papyrological Commentary on the New Testament series, to be published by Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen. This work, and much of his research, focuses on the corpus of Greek papyri, ostraca and tablets that are able to illuminate the historical, social and linguistic context of the New Testament. In 2012 he was awarded the Australian Government Citation for Outstanding Contributions to Student Learning for the adoption of innovative and exciting approaches to teaching biblical languages and history.

Thursday June 14: Rethinking Leadership - Naomi Nash and Peter Kaldor
Naomi Nash is CEO and lead consultant with New River. She has worked with social welfare agencies, schools, executives and individuals to explore leadership and cultural change.
With a background in community development and social policy, Peter Kaldor is a researcher, partnership-builder, innovator and experience- based educator. He was one of the founders of the National Church Life Survey and now a consultant with New River. Together with New River colleagues they are authors of the recently published book Rethinking Leadership: Building Capacity for Positive Change

Frank Macchia is Professor of Theology and Associate Director of the Centre of Pentecostal and Charismatic Studies at Vanguard University, USA. His books include Justified in the Spirit: Creation, Redemption, and the Triune God (Eerdmans, 2010), Baptized in the Spirit: A Global Pentecostal Theology (Zondervan, 2006) and a forthcoming commentary on the book of Revelation. His University of Basel, PhD thesis (published as Spirituality and Social Liberation: The Message of the Blumhardts in the Light of Wuerttemberg Pietism 1993 won the Jacob Burkhardt Prize). Professor Macchia is a past President of the Society for Pentecostal Studies, and editor of the journal Pneuma.

Stuart Piggin’s recently published The Fountain of Public Prosperity: Evangelical Christians in Australian History, 1740-1914, volume 1: The Missing Story is a sustained revisionist interpretation of Australian history. It highlights the participation of ‘vital Christians’ in the development of the Australian nation and culture and argues that Australia at the beginning of the twentieth century was one of the most ‘Christianised’ nations on earth. Stuart Piggin is Conjoint Associate Professor of History at Macquarie University where he directed for twelve years The Centre for the History of Christian Thought and Experience, supervising 28 doctoral candidates along the way. His publications include Shaping the Good Society in Australia (2006) and Spirit, Word and World: Evangelical Christians in Australian History first published by OUP in 1996 and has gone through three editions.

Cherith grew up in Pentecostal circles with her father and grandfathers as Assembly of God pastors. Cherith has been a sessional lecturer at Regent College, Vancouver, BC, Kuyper College and Cornerstone University in Grand Rapids, MI, and Fuller Seminary and Wheaton College. She taught for five years at Calvin College and Seminary while serving as Co-Director of Christian Formation with her husband Robert. She speaks and teaches in various contexts, and has authored and contributed to many publications. Most recently, Cherith has been working on a book on theological anthropology and the resurrection, and a condensed version of Paul’s Christology with her father, Gordon Fee