Peter Leithart
13619 articles

Euripides’ Gods
The gods in Euripides are savage, unpredictable, random, liable to sneak up and destroy you at a moment’s notice. No wonder that Paul’s announcement that Jesus had defeated the principalities and powers came as such great good news.

Chosen in Christ
Lecture #3: Chosen in Christ: Election and Trinity INTRODUCTION Scripture teaches that God does all things according to the purpose of His will (Ephesians 1:11), and that the God who does this is the Triune God. How are those two teachings of Scripture related? How does the doctrine of the…

Surplus at the Origin
Lecture #2: Surplus at the Origin: Trinity, Eschatology, and Story INTRODUCTION This is going to be difficult. I hope it’s worth it. I begin with two observations. First, on any millennial view, the Christian account of history is progressive, moving from the garden to the city. It is eschatological not…

The Dance of God, the Dance of Life
Here’s lectures notes on the first of my lectures on the Trinity at the upcoming Ministerial Conference in Moscow. The next two posts will be notes for my other two lectures. Lecture #1: The Dance of God, the Dance of Life: Perichoresis in Creator and Creature INTRODUCTION Since the patristic…

Silence
Silence is often seen as the summit of piety. Barth wisely says: Confronted with the mystery of God, the creature must be silent: not merely for the sake of being silent, but for the sake of hearing. Only to the extent that it attains silence, can it attain to hearing.…

Quotations from Barth
A couple of quotations from Barth (both from Church Dogmatics , II.2, p. 5), not surprising or unusual in the post-Barth theological world, but well said: “We should still not have learned to say ‘God’ correctly (i.e., as understood in the Christian Church and on the basis of Holy Scripture)…

Barth on Infralapsarianism
Well, Barth at least agrees that there is a nature/grace dualism implicit in the infralapsarian position. Strikingly, he points to the danger of anthropocentrism in supralapsarianism, arguing that by making the salvation of individual x and the damnation of individual y the primary purpose of the whole show, supras encouraged…

Barth and Berkhouwer on Election
I’m poring over Barth and Berkhouwer on decrees and election, and seem to be making some progress. Try this: The doctrine of the decree is not merely that everything is predetermined. When the decree is formulated this way, it is hard to distinguish from determinism, and the decree has very…

Every Tree
Every tree That sheds autumnal glory In hope of spring Reveals The eternal life Of God

Judas and Election in John’s Gospel
Odd thing: John’s gospel has more references to God’s will and choice and election than any other gospel. But in two cases, Jesus insists that He chose the disciples in the context of talking about Judas. John 6:70: “Did I Myself not choose you, the twelve, and yet one of…

Judas and Election in John’s Gospel
Odd thing: John’s gospel has more references to God’s will and choice and election than any other gospel. But in two cases, Jesus insists that He chose the disciples in the context of talking about Judas. John 6:70: “Did I Myself not choose you, the twelve, and yet one of…

Sermon Outline, September 28
Sermon outline for September 28: Luke 8:1-56 INTRODUCTION Luke likes to organize his gospel into triads. In chapter 7, there were a series of triadic patterns: Jesus asks three times “What did you go into the wilderness to see?” (vv. 24-26), the sinful woman does threefold homage to Jesus (washing,…
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