Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Mrs. Marguerite Lane of Grand Rapids writes to ask if I have ever noticed a correlation between the eight beatitudes of Matthew 5 and the eight woes of Matthew 23. I confess that I have not. A glance at various commentators reveals that such a correspondence does not seem to…
1. The words of Agur, the son of Jakeh, the burden. The man declares to Ithiel, to Ithiel and Ucal: 2. Surely I am more stupid than any other man, And I do not have the understanding of a man. 3. And I have not learned wisdom, But I have…
Psalm 137 is widely regarded as one of the meanest of the imprecatory psalms. Certainly as we read it it is seems to be a song of pure vengeance. The exiles in Babylon, in grief over the judgment that Babylon has brought upon them, pray for the destruction of that…
In the Levitical law, the priests received two particular portions of each peace offering: the "wave offering" of the breast and the "heave offering" (or better, "contribution") of the right thigh. The purpose of this essay is to attempt to determine the reason why the second of these, the thigh,…
The story of Jesus’ visit, early in His ministry, to the synagogue in His home town of Nazareth is recorded for us in Luke 4:16-30. You may remember that Jesus read from Isaiah about how the Messiah would preach the gospel, care for the poor, work miracles, and bring in…
(The essay that follows concerns a rather touchy subject: how the Lord’s Supper is to be done. I am not writing to insult or offend, but to challenge. To that end I have not "held back" but have "gone ahead" and said what I think needs to be said —…
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Hobbes again ( Leviathan 41) on the Mosaic predecessors to Christian baptism: “As the children of Israel had for a sacrament of their reception into the kingdom of God, before the time of Moses, the rite of circumcision, which rite, having been omitted in the wilderness, was again restored as…
NT Wright’s thesis about the new heavens and new earth receives support from an unexpected source, Leviathan , chapter 38: “All these places are for salvation, and the kingdom of God , after the day of judgement, upon earth. On the other side, I have not found any text that…
The first time the Hebrew verb “be wrathful” ( qatzaf ) occurs with Yahweh as subject is in Leviticus 10:6. The related noun occurs for the first time in Numbers 1:53. Both, importantly, have to do with the tabernacle. Yahweh warns that His wrath might break out against Aaron’s family…
Following up an earlier post: How are we to understand the connection of the reception of the Spirit and being counted as righteous in Galatians 3:5-6? Some alternatives suggest themselves: 1) Righteousness is a status and the Spirit is the gift that God gives to those whom He counts righteous.…
Faith in Protestant theology is instrumental, the passive human means by which we appropriate the righteousness of Christ, by which we stand righteous before God. In Galatians at least, Paul’s characteristic construction doesn’t use the usual prepositions of instrumentality - en and dia . Rather, he uses ek , which…
What did God promise Abraham? Paul says that Abraham and his seed were promised an inheritance (Galatians 3:18, 29), and that inheritance includes the blessing of the nations (Galatians 3:8), the gift of the Spirit (Galatians 3:14), and righteousness (Galatians 3:6). These are not discrete gifts in Paul’s mind. The…
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