Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Misunderstanding “Galatianism” has caused several problems in the Reformed church. Because circumcision is at issue in the Galatian epistle, some have fallen into thinking that ritual per se, rather than anything uniquely Mosaic or Jewish, is the object of Paul’s critique. Likewise, his polemic against “works of the law” is…
Many texts in the NT become more perspicuous if we keep in mind the possibility — and indeed ubiquity — of Gentile God-fearers in the Old Covenant. After the special covenant with Israel is set up, Gentiles are not altogether excluded from the hope of salvation. Israel’s special status in…
I was once trying to get a sermon out of Ephesians 1.12-14 and it seemed obvious that I should look for two parallel statements both ending with the phrase, “to the praise of his glory.” Paul here begins talking about two groups of people (“you” and “we”), and he later…
WHY A DENOMINATION WITH SOUTHERN PRESBYTERIAN ROOTS SHOULD CAREFULLY CONSIDER THE “NEW PERSPECTIVE ON PAUL” In my denomination, the PCA, we are continually haunted by the sins of our racist Southern past. It has become an annual rite at General Assembly for the issue to be addressed one way or…
Recent debates over whether or not, “justification is central” to Paul’s theology have reminded me of a sermon I once heard by a Presbyterian seminary student. This African American student challenged his audience on the sin of racism and the ways it might manifest itself among us. Like any good…
In Charles Hodge’s 1853 article, “Idea of the Church,” his stated aim is to analyze the idea of the Church proposed in the Apostles’ Creed, in which, “the Church is declared to be “the Communion of the Saints.” He writes: The conception of the Church as the communion of saints…
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Thomas Altizer of “death of God” fame is back, advocating for what he calls the Apocalyptic Trinity . This is not your grandma's “primordial Trinity” that is “the subject of all established doctrines of the Trinity.” That primordial Trinity bring “a total closure to apocalypse, even if there is an…
Ranko Stefanovic ( Revelation of Jesus Christ , 229-30) notes that interpreting the first of the horsemen of the apocalypse - the white rider - is determinative for the understanding the whole sequence. The first rider, he claims, symbolizes the “conquest of the gospel of Christ and its spread throughout…
The restoration of Judah involves a restoration of the Davidic kingship, the coronation and elevation of a Davidic king. Yahweh promises to send a new Davidic king who will rule with justice (Isaiah 32:1; cf. 9:1-7; 11:1-10). This addresses the complaints that Isaiah has brought against Judah from the beginning…
In a superb essay in The Guardian , John Mullan (like Wayne Booth in his Rhetoric of Fiction ) explains how Jane Austen's Emma transformed the writing of fiction. She found a way to split the difference between the omniscient third-person narrator and the limited first-person narrator, creating what came…
After the seventh seal is opened, there is silence in heaven for a half hour as an angel stands at an altar to offer incense with the prayers of the saints. There are two altars in the temple - the altar of ascensions in the courtyard and the golden altar…
The second half of Isaiah 22 focuses on two individuals, the current royal steward of the house of David and his eventual replacement, Shebna and Eliakim. What happens to them exemplifies what Yahweh is doing to Judah and Jerusalem. The current royal steward, Shebna, has spent his tenure planning a…
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