Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
In the Bible, fatness is such a blessing, that it is especially hard to understand why wicked men are permitted to enjoy such a state. It requires a theodicy and faith in God. Thus: “For they have no pangs until death; their bodies are fat and sleek . They are…
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The allusion to the Exodus story is contained in the first words of Deuteronomy 14:1 — “ye are the sons of Yahweh your God” — as well as in 14:2 in the use of the technical term translated “treasured possession,” “His own possession,” “peculiar people,” “precious people,” and so forth.…
I have argued that Deuteronomy 14:1-21 is an independent literary unit that applies the Third Word to the lives of Israelites from the time of Moses and Joshua. In this short pericope, Moses suggests broad and deep meaning by means of literary allusion to the stories of the creation and…
In his recently republished The New Creation , the late, delightful Herbert McCabe defends the priesthood of the plebs as roundly as anyone could want. Citing Hebrews, he claims that "there is an essential difference between the Christian community and the community of the Old Law, or any other religious…
Augustine famously prayed, “Our hearts our restless until they rest in You.” True indeed. Being creatures, we inherently sense our ontological poverty—our innate condition of dependence—and are compelled to find a sense of security. And it is also true—as Augustine’s own narrative painfully illustrates—that one of the things we most…
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In his contribution to Pentecostalism and the Christian Churches , Waldo Cesar calls attention to the spatial connection of Latin American Pentecostal churches with the urban streets of Latin America: “There is nothing special from an architectural point of view, and in many cases large movie theater, rented or bought,…
Waldo Cesar observes ( Pentecostalism and the Future of the Christian Churches , 91-92) that Protestantism has often felt like a foreign import to Latin America. There was a discontinuity between Protestant missions and the local population, and Protestantism tended to rely on the outside world. All this impressed Latin…
David Martin ( Future of Christianity , 68-69) notes that in the heat of Pentecostal revival, blacks and whites fuse. He admits that “the fusion of black and white was partly reversed as the movement developed, when it came to the mingling of races. The white heat of revival initially…
“A key function in most religions,” write Michael Emerson and Christian Smith ( Divided By Faith ) “is to proclaim what ought to be, what is universally true, what is right and just. We call this the prophetic voice” (163). American religion, however, fragments this prophetic voice, even within the…
Leviticus 1-3 form a unit. 1:1 begins with “Yahweh called to Moses and spoke to him,” and a similar phrase, ‘Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying” shows up in 4:1. Chapters 1-3 form a single speech from God. The chapters cover three offerings: the ascension ( ‘olah ), the tribute of…
One the features of denominational Christianity highlighted by David Martin is a distinctive mode of sacramental theology that he labels “subjective.” Unlike sects, denominations retain sacraments; unlike the church, the sacrament is less the work of God than the expression of the worshiper. The contours of his characterization are worth…
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