Biographical Data

Graduated from Sydney Bible Training Institute

Secretary of the Missionary Fellowship (NSW)

Graduated from Moore Theological College

Served as minister of several parishes in Sydney (assistant minister of one in London)

On the Faculty of Moore College (5 years) and Sydney Missionary & Bible College (12 years)

Director, Tyndale College, The Australasian Open Theological College (20 years)

Currently

Dean of New Testament and Ethics, Tyndale College, The Australasian Open Theological College (20 years)

Academic

Associate of the Sydney Technical College (Accountancy)

Diploma in Religious Education (Melbourne College of Divinity)

B.Comm (University of NSW) (Majors in Accountancy and Economics)

B.A. (University of Sydney) (Majors in Classical Greek and Anthropology)

B.D. (First Class Honours) (University of London)

M.A. (Reading University , U.K.) (Major in Linguistics)

Ph.D. (University of London) (Thesis on marriage, sex, divorce, remarriage etc. in the NT)

Th.D. (South African Theological Seminary) (Thesis on sources and relationships of the Synoptic Gospels)

Contact Details

B.Ward Powers	Email: ward@bwardpowers.info
259A Trafalgar Street	International Tel: +612 9590-3944
PETERSHAM NSW 2049	Australian Phone: (02) 9590-3944
AUSTRALIA	Australian Mobile: 0425-227-255

Web Presence

A participant for many years in email/web groups relating to current issues, New Testament Greek, and the application of Bible teaching to modern society. He welcomes and values feedback from readers by email.

Bibliographical Data

Author of a dozen or so books and booklets, plus journal and magazine articles

Books available for purchase through any Christian bookstore

The Sin We Treat as a Virtue : The Major Issue in Christ's Teaching
(Published by Trafford Publishing; Available for Kindle or as a paperback, from Amazon and Koorong Books.)
Yes, there is a sin we are treating as a virtue. This sin is greed - sheer plain greed. Coveting. The comfortable, respectable, sin. But the extremely dangerous and damaging sin. It is condemned by the Tenth Commandment. It is the sin Christ spoke against more often and more vehemently than any other - he warned against it in the strongest possible terms: Beware! Take care! Watch out! It chokes the Word of God in your life, he said. It hinders a person entering the Kingdom of God and deprives them of eternal life. That is how serious it is. Paul said that greed is a form of idolatry and can destroy a person. He found this sin sneaky, tricky, and insidious. The risk to us from this sin is all the worse because it is so often not recognized as sin. It is so all-pervasive that we do not actually see its deceitful danger. But statistics show it is insidiously at work in the church, seriously affecting its work and witness in the world. It is a trap and a snare that can so easily catch us quite unawares. Breaking free of it is in fact one of the most difficult issues we face in our Christian lives. Can anything be done about this? Yes! It is crucial that we become aware of what the Bible says about it, and then think through how to live our lives in accordance with biblical teaching. This book will point to all the relevant Scriptures. Can you afford not to heed what they say? They just might save you from spiritual disaster. Don't treat this lightly. Jesus didn't. Paul didn't.
For a detailed summary of the issues and overview of the book see this survey. Also available online is the introduction and chapter one, and the backcover text.

Learn To Read the Greek New Testament
(Published by SPCK Australia; Available from Amazon and Koorong Books.)
This self-teaching guide and classroom textbook takes complete beginners in Greek, and leads them right through to where they start reading the New Testament for themselves in the original 'koine' Greek - and understanding it. Now in its 5th edition, completely revised and updated, this book has long been a trailblazer in applying linguistic science to the understanding and teaching of New Testament Greek. It is more than an introduction to New Testament Greek. It contains more than the elements, more than the basics of New Testament Greek.

The Ministry of Women in the Church
(Published by SPCK Australia [SparkLit]; Available from Amazon and Koorong Books.)
A large amount of the debate about women’s ministry results from the fact that we do not always distinguish things that differ. This book starts by drawing attention to two areas of potential confusion in our thinking about the question of the role of women in the church: The first is our frequent failure to distinguish between authority and structure in the church on the one hand, as distinct from gifts and ministry; the second is that we mix up what Scripture says about the relationship between husband and wife in marriage with the question of the relationships between men and women in the church. The teaching of Scripture is clear about this, but often we are not: we fail to distinguish things that differ.

Now available as an e-book... https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/602700

FIRST CORINTHIANS: An Exegetical and Explanatory Commentary

(Published by Morning Star Publications, Northcote VIC 3070, and Wipf and Stock, 199 W. Eighth Avenue, Eugene OR 97201 US; also available from Amazon and Koorong Books.)

This commentary explores many of the issues in First Corinthians that puzzle both readers and translators, and often lead to misunderstanding and discord. Interestingly, the conclusions reached mostly accord with the views held by the early Church Fathers concerning the teaching of this Epistle, views which are often overlooked these days. In particular, in keeping with the early Church Fathers, the Reformers, most Scripture expositors until recent times, and many present day exegetes, this Commentary expounds the interpretation that “tongues” refers to "languages", i.e. human languages spoken on earth. The one major area where the Commentary parts company with the Fathers of the first Christian centuries is in relation to matters of sex and marriage, divorce and remarriage, and attitudes to women generally. The commentary shows that Paul is more affirming of sex, marriage, and remarriage, and women, than many early writers (and some modern writers) have understood him to be.

The Progressive Publication of Matthew
(Published by Broadman and Holman, Nashville Tennessee U.S.A.; Available for Kindle or as a paperback, from Amazon and Koorong Books.)
The Progressive Publication of Matthew’s Gospel presents an explanation of the relationship between Matthew, Mark and Luke that shows how the Gospels have originated from documents first written by the apostle Matthew.

For a detailed summary of some of the relationships see this conference paper: presented paper, diagrammatic summary (HTML). For a preview, read now the first chapter of this book: Chapter 1 (PDF).

Marriage and Divorce - The New Testament Teaching

(Published by Family Life Movement of Australia; available from Amazon and Koorong Books.)

Dr Powers has identified the eleven different and mutually exclusive views about divorce and remarriage which are (or have been) held in the church. He examines each of these in relation to the Scriptures, and looks at the question of how so many teachers can look at the same passages in the Bible and come to so many different conclusions as to what they mean.

Divorce and Remarriage
(Published by Morning Star Publications, Northcote VIC 3070 Australia; available from Amazon and Koorong Books.)
This book has a more detailed focus on the teaching of Jesus and the New Testament about the nature of marriage and the issues of divorce and remarriage. It carefully discusses Paul’s three-step procedure for when one is facing a sundered marriage relationship, and the situation about remarriage, and his statement that remarriage after a divorce is not a sin (1 Corinthians 7:28).

Also available in Indonesian as Perceraian & Perkawinan Kembali: Pensekatan Hukum dan Anugerah Allah dalam Alkitab (published by Yayasan Komunikasi BINA KASIH).

Hymns

I have written several hymns and metrical translations from the Psalms, which I will be putting up gradually.

Articles

I have written several articles, some of which are available via Google Scholar or Academia.edu and others are available as posts on Blogger.
Gradually I will link them in here.

The Christian and Alcohol

Online version of article (html with synopsis)
Online version of article (html without synopsis)

Print ready version of article (pdf with synopsis)