Frank Stagg was Senior Professor of New Testament Studies at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. The service opens with a word of prayer (00:00-00:30). Frank Stagg is introduced as the Page Lecture speaker (00:31-02:15). Stagg’s lecture is entitled “Universals & Codes,” and he begins by defining these terms (02:15-05:41). Stagg gives many examples from both the Old and New Testaments where believers have both universalized certain laws of God and also minimized other laws and commands, and he also says that figuring out what God commands for his people to do in Scripture can be a difficult task with what appears to be contradictions, even from the words of the same human author (05:42-39:20). Stagg uses Paul’s letters as an example of how to do proper hermeneutics, and he argues that the readers of Scripture must discern a writer’s prophetic voice and distinguish between universal commands and particular commands given in a certain context (39:21-49:30). The service ends with a word of prayer (49:31-50:17).
