Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Optimism is “an inclination to put the most favorable construction upon actions and events or to anticipate the best possible outcome.” 1 On the other hand, pessimism is “an inclination to emphasize adverse aspects, conditions, and possibilities or to expect the worst possible outcome.” We can see that optimism and…
If we wish to understand the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, we must begin with seeing them as a part of the creational order. Trees, along with plants and seed-bearing things, come to life by the word of God as part of…
“I chant slips and irreversible disasters, wiltings, failures, scars, the little disappointments and the large, blue streaks down a world that wishes it was only suncolors.” Paul J. Pastor from Kintsugi Song I recently lost something very valuable. Something I’d had for years and used every day. But, it wasn’t…
In his eponymous book, Jonah follows an exodus pattern. He travels through the waves and east of the city into the wilderness. On a first reading, it looks like another use of this common literary shape in the Old Testament: salvation through the waters of death and the wilderness of…
“Everyone serves the good wine first, and when people have drunk freely, then the poor wine. But you have kept the good wine until now.” The unknowing master of ceremonies didn’t know how right he was. We see this play out in John’s apocalypse. The end is like the beginning,…
Read in isolation, The Test of Adultery (Num 5:11-31) presents the reader with a seemingly bizarre ritual, conjuring up ideas bordering on the Salem Witch Trials. Beyond this, pressing questions linger—such as, “Why is the woman in particular singled out, while no test is provided for the husband of a…
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A ugustine spends a lot of time in various treatises, especially in City of God , Book 12, explaining the nature of time as a created reality and distinguishing the Christian view of creation from Greek, especially Platonic, views of eternal matter and an eternal world. He believes the Platonic…
Augustine famously presented a “privation” view of evil., Evil is not a substance but a privation of being. This does not mean that evil has no reality of any sort. It is simply not a created substance. This account helps Augustine to locate the core of the corruption of the…
Psalm 104 celebrates the glories of creation, both the events of the original creation when Yahweh stretched out heaven like a tent curtain and made the clouds His chariot (vv. 2-3) and the continuous glory of the world that we know - the mountains and the sea, the springs that…
The first angel in Revelation 14 announces what most translations calls an “eternal gospel” (v. 6; Gr. euaggelion aionion ). David deSilva prefers to translate it “an age-long accession announcement” (279). The picture in view is this: “this angel in the role of herald of a great ruler, a supra-mundane…
Music intersects with all theology and all culture. Scripture is full of “data” about music, and possesses a musical quality in its composition. Christian worship is musical worship, and is itself a through-composed symphony. As an art form, music raises questions about our relationship to the material world (instruments and…
Augustine argues that certain hierarchies are built into the creation ( City of God 11.16). There is, for instance, a natural hierarchy of sentient, intelligent, immortal souls. In addition to these natural hierarchies, he suggests that there are hierarchies of “use.” Hierarchies of use are often the reverse of natural…
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