Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
I just finished re-reading G. K. Chesterton’s The Man Who Was Thursday . I have in the past had the temerity to say that I believe it to be the best novel of the 20th century. Be that as it may, I still maintain that it is at least one…
And Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, “Behold, this child is set for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is spoken against and a sword will pierce through your own soul also, that thoughts out of many hearts may be…
I was inspired to write this article after reading John Ahern’s The Case for Shorter Hymnals first published on Theopolis Institute’s website on November 16, 2021. Mr. Ahern and I are writing with different audiences and emphases in mind. I am thankful we both share a mutual desire to see…
If you’ve spent any time in the social-media galaxy of Christian cultural commentators, you have almost definitely run across the Latin phrase Imago Dei . It means image of God . Why they usually say it in Latin, I couldn’t tell you. We saw it in the wake of the…
The Gospel of Matthew—indeed, the New Testament—begins with a list of names, and that list of names is introduced by this heading: “The book of the generations of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.” Why start like this? Why “the son of David” and “the son…
A blade is raised. A child wails. But the brow under the crown is untroubled. Solomon knows that the raising of the sword will reveal the true parent and the identity of the son. But how did he know this? Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice Isaac certainly bears some of the…
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A couple of observations about the sin or purification offering, with implications for corporate dimensions of sin. 1. Leviticus 4 prescribes the rituals for the purification offering for priests (4:1-12), the congregation (4:13-21), leaders (4:22-26), and common Israelites (4:27-35) The introduction to the last category includes a grammatical ambiguity. The…
In the New Testament, hope is often “hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27). David Steindl-Rast ( Gratefulness ) argues that this hope links together our personal encounter with the risen Christ with the “power to transform even the social structures of our time.” Scripture fuses two conceptions of glory. In Hebrew,…
The seven speeches that described the tabernacle end with a reiteration of the Sabbath command (Exodus 31:12-17). The description of the actual construction of the tabernacle begins with a reiteration of the Sabbath command (Exodus 35:1-3). Building the tabernacle will establish a zone of Sabbath in the midst of Israel,…
When I pick up a book that Time calls “screamingly funny” and “intoxicating,” I'm poised to disagree, to find fault. Sometimes, rarely , I find the critics are right. I had that experience recently when I hurtled through George Saunders’s 2000 short story collection, Pastoralia . Pastoralia ’s stories are…
The description of the tabernacle in Exodus 25-31 is organized in seven speeches, each of which begins with “Yahweh spoke” or “Yahweh said.” After the golden calf incident, we read another description of the tabernacle, but it’s not organized in the same way. In Exodus 32-40, “Yahweh spoke” is used…
Even before Jesus was born, the Spirit is stirring, preparing the way for His coming. Gabriel tells Zecharias that his son John will be filled with the Spirit from the womb (Luke 1:15), and after John’s birth the Spirit loosens the tongue of Zecharias so he can prophesy (Luke 1:67).…
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