There’s Something About Mary—J.I. Packer and Thomas Oden Talk to Christianity Today
What were early church impressions of Mary?
Oden: It is very speculative, but my own view is that the mother of Jesus was quite important to the earliest church—the church during the writing of the gospel of Luke. It was probably written in Ephesus during the middle part of the first century, and there is a very good chance that Mary was living there at that time.
Now if you take that as a premise, which is uncertain historically, you then have a very important figure in the whole world church who is still alive. She has stored these memories in her heart. She is highly revered. After she died, [the church] was facing much persecution, and there was a great emphasis on the memory of holy lives. She was certainly at the center of that.
Read it all.
Oden: It is very speculative, but my own view is that the mother of Jesus was quite important to the earliest church—the church during the writing of the gospel of Luke. It was probably written in Ephesus during the middle part of the first century, and there is a very good chance that Mary was living there at that time.
Now if you take that as a premise, which is uncertain historically, you then have a very important figure in the whole world church who is still alive. She has stored these memories in her heart. She is highly revered. After she died, [the church] was facing much persecution, and there was a great emphasis on the memory of holy lives. She was certainly at the center of that.
Read it all.
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