Grenville Kent

Grenville J. R. Kent (born 1965)^[1] is an Australian academic, film producer, author, and Christian communicator. He is the producer of Big Questions, a forthcoming documentary series examining faith, and the "10 Questions for God" series of booklets. He has earned a PhD from the University of Manchester, England, and a D.Min from the Australian College of Theology, and taught Cultural Apologetics (Arts/Theology) and Old Testament at the Wesley Institute (Excelsia College) in Sydney.

Biography

Grenville Kent is producer of Big Questions, a forthcoming documentary series. The pilot episode, "Does God Exist? Part 1" examines flight and compares design features of the albatross and the Airbus A380. It includes interviews with two Oxford University professors: atheist Peter Atkins and John Lennox, a Christian. It was shot in New Zealand, Hungary, England, France and Australia. Kent is co-presenter alongside his seven-year-old son Marcus. Future episodes will discuss consciousness, space and the stars, human morality, and whether God genuinely spoke through the Bible.^[2]

Kent has taught Old Testament and Cultural Apologetics (Arts/Theology) at the Wesley Institute in since 2003. His PhD from the University of Manchester is in Old Testament literature, and examines the Witch of En-Dor narrative (1Samuel 28) using film theory. His DMin is in Apologetics (the rational explanation of Christianity)and looks at factors influencing Australians towards and away from belief in God. His MA (Theol) from Morling College studied the Song of Solomon, a piece of Biblical erotica.^[3] His MA (Film) was from the University of Technology, Sydney.^[4] He also earned a Grad. Cert. Commerce (Marketing) UNSW, BA (Theol) Pacific Union College, and a BA (Mass Communication) UTS.^[3]

Kent's memberships include the Society of Biblical Literature and the Evangelical Theological Society in the United States, and the Tyndale Fellowship in the United Kingdom. He has guest-lectured in the Philippines and Trinidad.^[3] He has presented papers at the annual Society of Biblical Literature meetings.

He has presented on Christian apologetics for the Cambridge Scholars Network, European Leadership Forum^[5] (Hungary) and Campus Life, and travels internationally as a youth outreach speaker across several Christian denominations. He is a frequent presenter on Christian TV programs.^[6]

Kent started "Church With No Ties" as a youth pastor and university chaplain^[7] in the Seventh-day Adventist Church, where he was ordained a minister of the gospel.

A popular presenter, Kent's speaking appointments have included men's conferences,^[8] theology congresses^[9][10] camp meetings,^[11] and many others.^[12]

Personal life

He is married to Carla; they have six children: Zoe, Marcus and Ethan,^[3] Thomas, Jeremy and Zara.

Publications

Kent has authored dozens of articles, the "10 Questions for God" Bible study series, films, comic books (graphic novels), books, and book chapters.

Books

• Say It Again, Sam: A Literary and Filmic Study of Narrative Repetition in 1 Samuel 28 [the witch of Endor]. Pickwick, 2011
• Grenville Kent, forthcoming commentary on Song of Songs^[13]
• Grenville Kent and Philip Rodionoff, The Da Vinci Decode (Victoria, Australia: Signs, 2006); ISBN 1-876010-90-8; book website; a critique of Dan Brown's 2003 novel The Da Vinci Code.^[14] Also published in Portuguese^[15] and Czech.^[16]
• Christina Hawkins, Warwick Bagg, and Grenville Kent; Health (Berkeley Vale, New South Wales: Sanitarium Health Food Company, 1999) (Kent was one editor for a series of 12 booklets)
• Grenville Kent, Millennium (Sydney: Religious Education Media Australia, 1996); ISBN 0-646-27865-7
• Grenville Kent, The Siege (Sydney: self-published, 1994); ISBN 0-646-21173-0
• Grenville Kent, What Future? The Forgotten Dream (Sydney: self-published, 1994); ISBN 0-646-17185-2

Book chapters and scholarly articles

Scholarly articles:

• 'Preaching Old Testament Narratives’, Southeastern Theological Review 2/1 (Summer 2011) 11–24.
• ‘Mary Magdalene, Mary of Bethany and the sinful woman of Luke 7: the same person?’ Journal of the Asia Adventist Seminary 13.1 (2010): 13–28.
• Book review of Theology and Film: Challenging the Sacred/Secular Divide by Christopher Deacy and Gaye Williams Ortiz. European Journal of Theology 18:1 (2009), p80–81

(See also below).

Book chapters:

• ‘The Heavens Are Telling: A Biblically Informed Cosmology’, in Bryan W. Ball (ed), In The Beginning: Science and Scripture Confirm Creation (Boise: Pacific Press, 2012), 171–183.
• ‘"His Desire Is For Her": Feminist readings of the Song of Solomon’, in Andrew Sloane (ed.), Tamar’s Tears: Evangelical Engagements with Feminist Old Testament Hermeneutics (Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 2011), 217–245.
• Grenville J. R. Kent, Paul J. Kissling, and Laurence A. Turner, eds., Reclaiming the Old Testament for Christian Preaching (Inter-Varsity Press, 2010), publisher's page. Kent also wrote the chapter, "Preaching the Song of Songs". The book won the annual Preaching Today award for the "Enhancing the Preacher's Skill" category.^[17] An alternative title is He Began with Moses: Preaching the Old Testament today (Inter-Varsity Press, 2010), publisher's page.
• 'Did The Medium at En-Dor Really Bring Forth Samuel?', in Gerhard Pfandl (ed.), Interpreting Scripture: Bible Questions and Answers: Biblical Research Institute Studies, vol. 2 (Silver Spring: Biblical Research Institute, 2010), 196–200.
• "Pop Culture: My Angel Goes to Movies" in Andy Nash, ed., Unleash the Dream: A New Generation Challenges the Church They Love (Hagerstown, MD: Review and Herald, 1999), p52–62; publisher's page

Additionally, Kent has many stories published in the "Australian Stories" series of books, which are published from Sydney by Strand:

• Australian Stories of Life ed. David and Rachel Dixon (2005) chapters "Hardly Davidson",^[18] "Bowled Over",^[19] and "Oink!"^[20]
• Inspirational Australian Stories ed. David and Rachel Dixon (2004) chapters "Common Scents",^[21] "Going Off",^[22] "The Game They Play in Heaven",^[23] and "When Is an Atheist Not an Atheist?"^[24]
• Australian Stories for the Spirit (2003), one chapter^[25]
• Australian Stories for the Heart (2002) chapters "I'm Rich!",^[26] "Meeting the Godfather",^[27] and "Hedonists Don't Get No Satisfaction"^[28]

Films and documentaries

Kent has produced the following films:

• Big Questions documentary series
• The Cross, a 2000 short film written and directed by Kent^[4][29]
• What is a Seventh-Day Adventist?, a 2000 documentary written, produced, and co-directed by Kent^[30]
• Cushy Job: Rwanda Volunteer, a 1995 short film written and directed by Kent^[31]
• What Future? A 1994 short film co-written and co-directed by Kent^[32]
• Alcheringa, a 1993 short film written by Kent^[33]

References

1. Andy Nash, ed., Unleash the Dream (United States: Review and Herald), p140 allows a rough estimate of his birth year
2. "Tackling the Big Questions" by Hannah Bath. Wesley Institute, 25 August 2009
3. "Theology Faculty" section "Rev Dr Grenville Kent", Wesley Institute. Accessed September 2009
4. Keynote speakers, Reel Dialogue conference 2008. Accessed September 2009
5. European Media Communicators Network, European Leadership Forum. Accessed 8 October 2009
6. Wahroonga Adventist TV. Accessed September 2009
7. Andy Nash, ed. Unleash the Dream, p140?
8. 2007 Men For Christ Ministries conference in Sydney, topic "Images of Masculinity in the Media". Free audio download available from the conference webpage. See also 2008 poster (archived version)
9. For instance, Wesley Institute Theology Conference 09 on 1 August 2009. Theme "Jonah's God: Then and Now", and Kent was the keynote speaker
10. One talk, "Who appeared at Endor?" was published in a 2006 book (OCLC number 76952711)
11. For instance South Australian Adventist Big Camp 6–8 March, posted 25 February 2009
12. Such as a workshop at Submerge in Sydney, November 2009. Another was at "London Live" – "Our Story: Adventist Young Adults Launch 'London Live' to Reach Peers" by Melissa Thomson, Jennifer Elwood, and ANN Staff. Adventist News Network, 27 June 2006
13. Cited in Richard M. Davidson, Flame of Yahweh: A Theology of Sexuality in the Old Testament (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2007), page 617 – footnote 36. Quote: "See the forthcoming exegetical monograph on the Song of Songs by Grenville Kent, which shows how the Song explicitly provides a stark contrast to modern pornography." (The Biblical book is very subtle)
14. "Adventists Answer DA VINCI Challenges" by Nathan Brown. Adventist Review (18 May 2006). "Decoding The Da Vinci Code" by Grenville Kent. Signs of the Times (June 2006). "Decode for Sydney Universities" by Record staff, Samantha Ireland, and James Etwell. Record 111:25 (1 July 2006), p1,4. "ANN Feature: Adventists Ready Da Vinci Code Response, Affirm Bible Account" by Mark A. Kellner, Nathan G. Brown, and ANN staff. Adventist News Network, 16 May 2006
15. O código Da Vinci e a Bíblia: seria o Cristianismo a maior fraude da história? (Tatuí, São Paulo: Casa Publicadora Brasileira, 2006), 1st edn
16. Šifra mistra Leonarda rozluštěna (Praha: Advent-Orion, 2006), 1st edn
17. "The Annual PT Book Awards". Preaching Today website, posted 2011-07-02. One judge commented, "Reclaiming the Old Testament for Christian Preaching is well-written, practical, scholarly but readable, and the writers come from a variety of theological positions within evangelicalism. Each chapter discusses how to preach a particular book or genre of the Old Testament. I especially like the example sermons in each chapter. The book has a great chapter on preaching from difficult Old Testament texts."
18. p61–62, from Signs of the Times March 1992, according to p221 of the book
19. p123–125, from Signs of the Times May 1996, according to p220 of the book
20. p166–167, from Signs of the Times August 1993, according to p222 of the book
21. p23–25, adapted from Signs of the Times September 1996, according to p251 of the book
22. p106–108, adapted from Signs of the Times November 1995, according to p252 of the book
23. p138–140, adapted from Signs of the Times September 2000, according to p254 of the book
24. p188–191, adapted from Record, 25 October 2003, according to p255 of the book
25. Cited in Flashpoint. Record 108 (1 November 2003), p3
26. p35–37
27. p242–44
28. p224–28
29. "Cross, The". Screen Australia website, accessed September 2009
30. "What is a Seventh-Day Adventist?". Screen Australia website, accessed 8 October 2009
31. "Cushy Job: Rwanda Volunteer". Screen Australia website, accessed September 2009
32. "What Future?" Screen Australia website, accessed September 2009
33. "Alcheringa". Screen Australia website, accessed September 2009

External links

• "10 Questions for God" study series, authored by Kent
• Grenville Kent at the Screen Australia website
• Kent, "The Church Judas Built". Spectrum blog, a commentary on 1–7 March 2008, Sabbath School lesson "Discipleship Under Pressure"
• Kent, "Miles High on Marriage". Adventist Review 187 (8 April 2010), p18–21; cover story, with inset "One Day... (for People Who Aren’t Married)"
• Articles by Kent and about Kent as catalogued in the Seventh-day Adventist Periodical Index (SDAPI)