Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
In an earlier paper 1 I argued that the story of Jonah belongs in the book of KINGS. Jonah and the unnamed Judean prophet in 1K13 are paired by the author through literary links. The Judean prophet travels longitudinally to confront national paganism and is killed but not swallowed by…
The Scriptures have much to say about “the day.” “This is the day that the Lord has made,” sings the Psalmist (Psalm 118:24). But what exactly is the day ? Or, more broadly, what even is a day? Days make up human life like water, light, and air. There’s no…
According to the Westminster Confession of Faith 21:5, “God is to be worshipped everywhere, in spirit and truth, …” A similar phrase is found in the OPC’s Directory for Public Worship (II.6). In my experience in the OPC and other Reformed churches, the phrase is often interpreted to mean that…
Introduction In Genesis 3:16, after the fall, God said that Eve would “desire” her husband and that her husband would “rule” over her. It is popular for Christians to interpret Eve's desire as sinful, that she would try to usurp her husband's authority. Likewise, some interpret Adam's rule as sinful,…
White Western/Christian society has long discriminated against lesbians and homosexuals — ever since the days of Moses — who was neither white nor Christian, but that is beside the point — who claimed that God gave him revelation about what a man or woman is and how they should relate…
They Found a Book in a Wall, You Won’t Believe What Happens Next The secret behind the history of quiet times will make your quiet times more effective than ever. One of the enduring mysteries of American Evangelicalism is the question of the source of Quiet Times: A Handbook ,…
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R obert Solomon's The Joy of Philosophy is a defense of philosophy as a joyful wisdom, a la Solomon's philosophical hero, Nietzsche. Solomon knows that Nietzsche isn't even considered a philosopher by many: “His prose is too shimmering, too full of sarcasm and wise-cracks, too personal. He has too much…
F ew readers love Fanny Price. Some hate her as deeply as Mark Twain professed to hate her creator. CS Lewis had Screwtape call her “not only a Christian, but such a Christian—a vile, sneaking, simpering, demure, monosyllabic, mouselike, watery, insignificant, virginal, bread-and-butter miss . . . A two-faced little…
I n his Christian Ethics and the Church (67), Philip Turner provides a masterful summary of “the link Ephesians makes between the fulfillment of God's purpose, the perception of God's glory, and the common life of the assembly”: The members of God's assembly have been chosen ‘before the foundation of…
T wice in 1 Chronicles, David says he was prevented from building the temple because he shed “copious” blood (22:6–11; 28:2–7). The passages frame his final arrangements for the temple and his succession exhortations to Solomon. After analyzing the texts, Donald Murray concludes that “the core of [Yahweh's] objection to…
W illiam Shakespeare was baptized on April 26, 1564. Baptized , but was he a Christian? The answer partly depends on what we think happens when someone is baptized. Many Christians believe that baptism marks the beginning of life as a Christian. I am one of those Christians. My short…
T he thesis of John Wright's 1993 essay on the Chronicler's account of David's census (1 Chronicles 21) is implausible. Commentators, he says, have read the Chronicler's narrative through the lens of 2 Samuel 24, which recounts the same event. Wright argues that the Chronicler doesn't retell the story of…
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