R. Reed Lessing

Dr. Reed Lessing was born and raised in Denver, Colo. He was ordained into the Office of the Holy Ministry on June 29, 1986 at Christ the Servant Lutheran Church, West Monroe, La. Reed served as the church’s pastor until March of 1990. From March 1990 to August 1999 he was the pastor of Trinity Lutheran Church, Broken Arrow, Okla. In September of 1999 he was installed as assistant professor of exegetical theology at Concordia Seminary. In May of 2005 he was advanced to the rank of associate professor. In August of 2007 he became the director of the Seminary’s Graduate School. Reed is married to Lisa (nee) Radke and their marriage has been blessed with three children: Abi (24), Jonathan (21) and Lori (17).

Position:

  • Associate Professor of Exegetical Theology
  • Director of the Graduate School

Degrees:

  • B.A., St. John’s College, Winfield, Kan.
  • M.Div., Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, Mo.
  • S.T.M., Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, Mo.
  • Ph.D., Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, Mo.

Contact Information:

Concordia Seminary
801 Seminary Place
St. Louis, MO 63105
Office phone: 314-505-7148
Email: lessingr@csl.edu

Courses

Books

  • Interpreting Discontinuity: Isaiah’s Tyre Oracle. Eisenbrauns, Winona Lake, IN, 2004.
  • Jonah: Concordia Commentary Series. Concordia Publishing House: St. Louis, 2007.
  • Amos: Concordia Commentary Series. Concordia Publishing House: St. Louis, 2009.
  • Isaiah 40-55: Concordia Commentary Series (Concordia Publishing House: St. Louis; to be published in 2013.
  • Isaiah 56-66: Concordia Commentary Series (Concordia Publishing House: St. Louis, in progress).

Journal Articles
In Concordia Journal

  • “Preaching Like Amos” – July 2007
  • “Dying to Live: God’s Judgment of Jonah, Jesus, and the Baptized” – Jan. 2007
  • “Pastor, Does God Really Respond to My Prayers?” – July 2006
  • Discontinuity in Prophetic Texts: Isaiah 23 as a Test Case – Oct. 2004
  • Orality in the Prophets – April 2003
  • Preaching Like the Prophets: Using Rhetorical Criticism in the
  • Appropriation of Old Testament Prophetic Literature – Oct. 2002

Articles elsewhere

  • “Satire in Isaiah’s Tyre Oracle.” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 28.1 (2003).
  • “Amos and the Earthquake.” Concordia Theological Quarterly, April, 2010.

Booklets

  • Principle Drafter for the CTCR document, “A Lutheran Response to the Left Behind Series” (Published by CPH June, 2004)
  • Principle Drafter for the CTCR Bible Study on “A Lutheran Response to the Left Behind Series” (Published by CPH August, 2006)
  • “Mercy in the Old Testament” published by LCMS World Relief and Human Care (October, 2007)
  • Consultant for Lutheran Study Bible on the books of: Isaiah, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Malachi

Lutheran Witness Articles

  • Whose Land is It? – November, 2006
  • Our Wonderful Bodies – May, 2007
  • Jonah – January, 2008
  • All That Jazz – September, 2008
  • Matthew’s Christmas Pageant – December, 2008
  • Bach’s List – March, 2009
  • Buy the Field – June, 2009
  • Isaiah’s Easter Feast – April, 2010

Theological Observers in Concordia Journal

  • What Really Happened at Sinai? (Oct. 2004)
  • Living with the Laments (July, 2005)
  • Broken Teeth, Bloody Baths, and Baby Bashing (Oct. 2006)

Sermon Studies
In Concordia Journal

  • 2 Kings 2:1-12c (Jan. 2000)
  • Numbers 21:4-9 (Jan. 2000)
  • Acts 2:37-47 (April 2001)
  • Colossians 1:1-14 (April 2001)
  • Philippians 1:1-11 (July 2002)
  • Philippians 4:4-13 (July 2002)
  • John 6:1-15 (July 2003)
  • John 8:31-36 (July 2003)
  • Matt. 1:18-25 (Oct. 2004)
  • Matt. 2:13-23 (Oct. 2004)
  • 1 Cor. 9:24-27 (Jan. 2006)
  • Jer. 1:4-10 (Oct. 2006)
  • Isaiah 43:1-7 (Oct. 2009)

In Concordia Pulpit Resources

  • Isaiah 42:1-6 (Jan. 2004)
  • Isaiah 61:1-3, 10-11 (Dec. 2005)
  • Isaiah 41:21-31 (Jan. 2009)
  • Deuteronomy 18:15-20 (Jan. 2009)
  • Isaiah 44:6-8 (June 2011)
  • Isaiah 55:7-13 (June 2011)

Book Reviews
In Concordia Journal

  • The Face of Old Testament Studies (Oct. 2000)
  • The Rhetoric of Revelation in the Hebrew Bible (Jan. 2001)
  • The Prophetic Books and Their Theological Witness (Jan. 2001)
  • A Review and Reference Grammar for Biblical Hebrew (April 2001)
  • A Theological Introduction to the Old Testament (Oct. 2001)
  • Civilizations of the Ancient Near East (Jan. 2002)
  • Dictionary of the Ancient Near East (Jan. 2002)
  • The Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (Jan. 2002)
  • The Masorah of Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (Jan. 2002)
  • Yahweh and the Gods and Goddesses of Canaan (April 2002)
  • Biblica Hebraica Leningradensia (April 2002)
  • Basics of Biblical Hebrew (April 2002)
  • Culture Shift (July 2002)
  • The Israelites (July 2002)
  • Isaiah (Brevard Childs) (Oct. 2002)
  • The Religion of Ancient Israel (Jan. 2003)
  • The Social World of the Hebrew Prophets (Jan. 2003)
  • Building Your Biblical Hebrew Vocabulary (Jan. 2003)
  • Hear the Word of Yahweh (April 2003)
  • A Smooth Stone (April 2003)
  • A Modern Grammar for Classical Hebrew (April 2003)
  • Elements of Biblical Exegesis (July 2003)
  • From Paradise to Promised Land (July 2003)
  • Life in Biblical Israel (July 2003)
  • Amos: The Prophet and His Oracles (Oct. 2003)
  • The Dictionary of the Old Testament Pentateuch (Jan. 2004)
  • Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament – Vol. XII (Jan. 2004)
  • Reading Isaiah (July 2004)
  • The Land (July 2004)
  • Reverberations of Faith (Oct. 2004)
  • Beyond Babel (Oct. 2004)
  • Show Them No Mercy: Four Views on God and Canaanite Genocide (Jan. 2005)
  • Understanding Old Testament Ethics (Jan. 2005)
  • Encountering the Book of Psalms: A Literary and Theological Introduction (Jan.
  • 2005)
  • Jonah (Rosemary Nixon, IVP) (April 2005)
  • Preaching Without Notes (April 2005)
  • Thematic Threads in the Book of the Twelve (April 2005)
  • A Biblical Text and its Afterlife (July 2005)
  • Immanuel in Our Place (July 2005)
  • What Does God Know and When Does He Know It? (July 2005)
  • A Biblical History of Israel (Oct. 2005)
  • Shades of Sheol (Oct. 2005)
  • Giving the Sense: Understanding and Using Old Testament Historical Texts (Jan. 2006)
  • On the Reliability of the Old Testament (Jan. 2006)
  • Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. Smyth and Helwys Bible Commentary (Jan. 2006)
  • A Case for Amillenialism: Understanding the End Times (Jan. 2006)
  • The Politics of Ancient Israel (Jan. 2006)
  • The Religion in Ancient Mesopotamia (April 2006)
  • Jeremiah – Fretheim (April 2006)
  • Inscribing the Text: Sermons and Prayers – Walter Brueggemann (July 2006)
  • Biblical Theology – James Barr (July 2006)
  • Intermediate Hebrew Grammar – Steinmann (Oct. 2006)
  • Story as Torah: Reading Old Testament Narrative Ethically – Wenham (Oct. 2006)
  • Treasures Old and New – Blenkinsopp (Oct. 2006)
  • Preaching and Teaching the Old Testament – Kaiser (Jan. 2007)
  • Jeremiah – Stulman (Jan. 2007)
  • The Prophetic Literature – Peterson (Jan. 2007)
  • Eerdman’s Commentary on the Bible (Jan. 2007)
  • The Prophetic Literature – Sweeney (April 2007)
  • Inspiration and Incarnation – Enns (April 2007)
  • Isaiah: The God Who Saves – Ortlund (April 2007)
  • Interpreting the Psalms (April 2007)
  • Old Testament Turning Points – Matthews (April 2007)
  • God and World – Fretheim (July 2007)
  • Hosea – Zvi (July 2007)
  • Ezekiel – Odell (July 2007)
  • Old Testament Theology, Vol. 1 – Goldingay (Oct. 2007)
  • Reasonable Ethics – Benne (Jan/April, 2008)
  • Old Testament Theology, Vol. 2 – Goldingay (Oct. 2008)
  • The Majesty of God in the OT – Kaiser (Oct. 2008)
  • Prophecy and Hermeneutics – Seitz (Oct. 2008)
  • The Message of Isaiah 40-55 – Goldingay (Jan. 2009)
  • We Become What We Worship – Beale (June 2009)
  • Challenging Prophetic Metaphor: Theology and Ideology in the Prophets – O’Brien
  • (June 2009)
  • The Destiny of the Righteous in the Book of Psalms – Creach (Oct. 2009)

In Concordia Theology Online

In the Catholic Biblical Quarterly

  • Thematic Threads in the Book of the Twelve (April 2004)
  • Eerdman’s Commentary on the Bible (Oct. 2004)
  • Jeremiah – Fretheim (Jan. 2005)
  • Jeremiah – Stuhlman (Jan. 2006)
  • The Prophetic Literature – Sweeney (July 2006)
  • Hosea (FOTL) – Zvi (Oct. 2006)
  • Like Fire in the Bones – Brueggeman (July 2007)
  • The Reader-Orientated Unity of the Book of Isaiah – van Wieringen (Jan. 2008)
  • Encountering the Book of Isaiah – Beyer (July 2008)
  • Messianism in the Scriptural Scroll of Isaiah – Heskett (Jan. 2009)
  • The Destiny of the Righteous in the Book of Psalms – Creach (April 2009)
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