Endings

This book looks at the "last words" of some of our New Testament books, and considers their purpose and message. Looking especially at each of the narrative books - the Gospels and Acts, the author finds that the ending of each narrative is carefully crafted, in order to pick up some of the themes spelt out earlier in the book which it concludes. In particular, each ending appears to point backwards to the beginning of the book. Each of the narrative texts has a "suspended ending", which challenges the reader to continue the story for themselves. It demonstrates how literary structures were used by these early Christian writers to convey important theological beliefs.