Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
A Look at John 1.17 For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. The above quotation is John 1.17 and comes from the New King James Version of the Bible. It is quite similar to the original translation in the old King James…
And the Child continued to grow and become strong, increasing in wisdom; and the grace of God was upon Him. There is nothing faulty in this translation (New American Standard Bible); Jesus was the recipient of the grace of God His Father from whom He is eternally begotten and with…
When Paul wrote to Philemon asking him to forgive his runaway slave, Onesimus, he gave Philemon an interesting perspective on how God used Onesimus’ action to bring about his conversion: For perhaps he was for this reason parted from you for a while, that you should have him back forever,…
Adam’s good works were acceptable to God. He could do them and God would receive them. Our own “good” works, our very best works, require the forgiveness of God and the continual intercession of Jesus Christ due to their impurity. Thus, it is appropriate to describe God’s covenant with Adam…
In Mark’s Gospel we read: “And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, ‘He is possessed by Beelzebul,’ and ‘He casts out the demons by the ruler of the demons’” (3.22). Jesus replied in part, “Truly I say to you, all sins shall be forgiven the sons of…
A Primer for Church Members on the Nature and Functions of the Body of Christ Introductory Note: I intend this paper to serve as something of a “user’s guide” for church members, though church leaders may also find it valuable in developing vision statements for their local bodies. I have…
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Jesus lays down His life for His friends. He is a martyr, a witness to death. His death is glorious. In his The Atonement: The Origins of the Doctrine in the New Testament , Martin Hengel wonders where that notion comes from. It doesn’t seem to come from the Old…
Roland Bainton divided Christian perspectives on war into three categories - pacifist, just war, and crusade. James Turner Johnson ( Just war tradition and the restraint of war: A moral and historical inquiry ) does not think Bainton’s categories are helpful. For starters, the crusaders considered their wars to be…
It’s often lamented that science has been politicized. John Brooke ( Science and Religion: Some Historical Perspectives ) points out that politics does not represent a fall from some pure original science but the point of modern science from the outset: “Science was respected not simply for its results but…
Richard Dawkins has famously proposed that cultural habits are passed on through “memes”: “tunes, ideas, catch-phrases, clothes fashions, ways of making pots or of building arches . . . . Memes propagate themselves in the meme pool by leaping from brain to brain via a process which, in the broad…
Rupert Sheldrake thinks science and religion overlap, but he is not an advocate of Intelligent Design. ID assumes a a mechanistic metaphor of the world: “Humans design machines, buildings and works of art. In a similar way the God of mechanistic theology, or the Intelligent Designer, is supposed to have…
Rich Bledsoe examines the pointlessness of today’s democratic capitalism and argues for the political and cultural necessity of acknowledging Jesus as Emperor at the Trinity House site.
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