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Writing

Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.

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Biblical Horizons

Pansexual to Mature Marriage

There is a young man (under 35) who sometimes stops and speaks to me at my “office” (the coffee bar at the Wild Oats Grocery Store). He is very articulate and highly intelligent, and I always enjoy my conversations with him. In our last few conversations it has become apparent…

by Richard BledsoeJanuary 14, 2009
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Biblical Horizons

Jesus and Confusion

What began at the Tower of Babel has increasingly become a global affair. All of world history is a project to become a “tower to the heavens” as a self contained and self sufficient world, but this is increasingly judged everywhere, and more and more, crisis is introduced and interjected…

by Richard BledsoeJanuary 13, 2009
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Biblical Horizons

Outside the Box

At the always marvellous Auburn Avenue Pastor’s Conference this past week the inimitable Douglas Wilson complained that he is tired of hearing of the need to get out of the box. He said that some people need to stay in the box. Indeed. Who can disagree? The so-called “Federal Vision”…

by James B. JordanJanuary 9, 2009
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Advent

Virgin-Born Son of God | Pagan Myth or New Creation?

It is popular in some circles to claim that the story of the virgin birth was a pagan insertion into the teaching of the early Church. In various books one can easily find by scanning the shelves of the “religion” section in any decent bookstore this claim functions as a…

by Mark HorneDecember 15, 2008
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Biblical Horizons

Ritual Versus Christianity

This article was originally published at the Biblical Horizons blog. Some of the comments and responses on the original article have been shared at the end. Peter Leithart in Against Christianity points out that “Christianity” tends to be an ideology, and that Jesus did not come to set up an…

by James B. JordanOctober 29, 2008
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Ecclesiology

10 Things a Church can do to Change the World

The principle to keep in mind is that we have to change ourselves first. 1. Participate In The Lord’s Supper Every Sunday In Worship The Kingdom is again and again a feast. The Church is the beachhead of the Kingdom. Does Jesus ever tell a parable comparing the Kingdom to…

by Mark HorneJune 5, 2008

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History

God’s Spy

Malcolm Moore reports this morning in the London Telegraph on Mikhail Gorbachev’s visit to the tomb of St. Francis, and Gorbachev’s public confession of Christian faith. Moore writes in part: “Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Communist leader of the Soviet Union, has acknowledged his Christian faith for the first time, paying…

March 20, 2008

Hiding meaning

John Ciardi writes ( How Does A Poem Mean? ) about poets who delight in hiding away meanings, often etymological, in the words they use: “they do not insist that every reader respond to them; it is enough that such touches delight the writer and are ready to delight the…

March 19, 2008

Street Hebrew

With papyrological evidence, there’s some grounds for saying that there’s considerable overlap between the vocabulary and syntax of NT Greek and “street Greek.” Barr, though, thinks the same about Hebrew: “In Israel at any rate much of the biblical language is unspecialized, for the religious structure is roughly coincident with…

March 19, 2008

BAG

James Barr directs most of his critical and rhetorical power at Kittel, but he’s got some criticisms of Bauer, Arndt, and Gingrich too. Specifically, BAG “is too content to give semantic indications which presuppose, and are intelligible only in terms of, a more modern intellectual and cultural Weltanschauung than that…

March 19, 2008

What ekklesia means

James Barr is a famous enemy of “illegitimate totality transfer,” but he freely acknowledges that there’s a proper kind of totality. Using the word “ekklesia,” he lists some NT statements about the church (the church is body of Christ, bride, first installment of kingdom, etc.), and says that “the ‘meaning…

March 19, 2008

Obama at church

Drudge has a full transcript of Obama’s speech concerning race, which includes this statement about his pastor, Jeremiah Wright, that impressively combines sharp criticism with affection for Wright and his church: “I have already condemned, in unequivocal terms, the statements of Reverend Wright that have caused such controversy. For some,…

March 18, 2008

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