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Writing

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

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Ezra

Ezra: The Aaronic Rest-Giver

If you’re a preacher looking for good commentaries on Ezra, you’ll struggle. Certainly to find ones that wrestle in good detail with the text. And certainly ones that don’t cost you an arm and a leg. There’s a good bit more for Nehemiah, which is odd, as the two are…

by Rhys LavertyJune 8, 2021
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1 John

1 John in Community

Quick thought experiment: try to pretend you’ve never read 1 John before. Read 1:1-6. Go ahead; I’ll wait. Now, on to v. 7: “But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with ______….” What word would you expect in that blank, based…

by Tim NicholsJune 1, 2021
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Hermeneutics

Spending Time with Noah: Reflections on Prepositions in the Flood Narrative

In my work as a Bible translator, I was recently checking our translation team’s draft of Genesis 8:8, which says of Noah (translating the Hebrew quite literally): And he sent out the dove from with him to see: had the waters lessened from upon the face of the ground? Part…

by Josh JensenMay 25, 2021
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Philosophy

Steven Weinberg Destroyed My Faith

Just in case a reader may not know Weinberg, he is a theoretical physicist and the winner of the Nobel prize in physics in 1979, as well as countless other prizes for his research. He is also a prolific, lucid, and captivating writer. If you want to read something on…

by Ralph Allan SmithMay 18, 2021
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Colossians

Reconciliation in Colossians 1:20

Colossians 1:15-20 is a famous passage in Paul’s epistles because it is a succinct and powerful poem. It appears even to have been a hymn. Given the uniquely Pauline language — “reconciliation” is a term used only by Paul — it should not seem odd to attribute the poem/hymn to…

by Ralph Allan SmithMay 11, 2021
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Movies

Terror of Knowing Myself

Stalker (1979) is a film by Andrei Tarkovsky based on Roadside Picnic by the Strugatsky brothers. It shows a day from the life of a stalker, a man who enters the so-called "Zone", an Alien landing site, where he leads people to a room that grants people’s innermost desires, which…

by Bogumil JarmulakMay 4, 2021

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Judah's Pride

Isaiah’s name - "Yah saves" - is reassuring, and his message of rescue and salvation is a reassuring message because during Isaiah’s time, Judah needs saving, and they need saving again and again. There are many evils in Judah but more than other prophets of Israel and Judah Isaiah exposes…

January 16, 2018

Structure in 2 Chronicles 18

2 Chronicles 18 is the story of Ahab and Jehoshaphat's war with the Arameans at Ramoth-gilead. The battle occupies only a brief portion at the end. Most of the chapter is taken up with the kings' consultation of prophets. After a brief introduction, the bulk of the chapter consists of…

January 15, 2018

Losing Control

In The Breaking of Nations , Robert Cooper observes that "the spread of the technology of mass destruction represents a potentially massive redistribution of power away from the advanced industrial (and democratic) states towards smaller states that may be less stable and have less of a stake in an orderly…

January 12, 2018

Socrates or Swine

Our entertainment-drenched culture is a reflection of the colonizing power of liberalism. Liberalism is a drive for unlimited freedom, and any inequality or hierarchy stands in the way. Even the distinction between superior and inferior ways of life is anti-liberal. As Ryszard Legutko puts it ( Demon in Democracy ),…

January 12, 2018

Force and Matter

"All that exists consists of force and matter," says atheistic materialism. Very well, replies Vladimir Solovyev ( Lectures on Godmanhood , 81-2). Let's assume that is true and see where it leads. "Force" and "matter," he points out, are :very general conceptions": "We speak of physical forces, we speak of…

January 12, 2018

Not the End of History

Few accepted at face value the inflated claim that 1989 brought us to the “end of history” (Fukuyama), where democratic capitalism was left with an ideological monopoly. Still, many operated on the assumption that globalized trade would make the world more peaceful and democratic. It hasn't happened. History continues despite…

January 12, 2018

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