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

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The Lady and Her Jewels: An Epiphany Meditation

And a great portent appeared in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars; she was with child and she cried out in her pangs of birth, in anguish for delivery (Revelation 12:1-2). Then Joshua spoke…

by Richard BledsoeJanuary 6, 2015
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Anointing

Fattening Our Suffering

In his post asking Ought we Anoint the Dying? Peter Leithart makes an excellent and important point about our suffering as members of Christ. However, he only parenthetically mentions that the verb in question in James 5 is not chrio but aleipho . By assuming that these words are interchangeable,…

by Robert MaddoxDecember 30, 2014
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James

Death as Frenemy

We spend a lot of time in the church talking about what it means to live like a Christian. But what does it mean to die like a Christian? If we are to follow Christ in life, what does it mean for us to follow him in death as well?…

by Rich LuskDecember 23, 2014
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Literature

Was Shakespeare A Christian?

How would one go about answering the question posed by my title? That depends on what the question means. Obviously, different definitions of the question would require different approaches to an answer. Right off hand, I can think of at least three possible — though not necessarily mutually exclusive —…

by Ralph Allan SmithDecember 23, 2014
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American Culture

Phobophobia

In recent weeks and months, we have seen events that are not the event. The drama around these events is not the events themselves, but the anxiety about the events, and then even the anxiety about the anxiety about the events. That is the real event. The events in Ferguson,…

by Richard BledsoeDecember 22, 2014
anointing-david
Anointing

Ought We Anoint the Dying?

Anointing the sick, including the dying, is one of the traditional seven sacraments of the Catholic Church. The Reformers denied that the rite qualified as a sacrament. Formally, this was because anointing did not have a direct authorization from Jesus; more theologically, it was not one of the marks that…

by Peter LeithartDecember 18, 2014

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Not Like a Nuptial

In Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing , there are two wedding scenes. The first is the wedding of Claudio and Hero, and it's a disaster. Claudio has been convinced by the evil Don John that Hero, his finacee, has been meeting with other men during their engagement. He thinks he’s…

December 23, 2015

Muslims, Christians, and the Gods

The controversy over Wheaton College's Larycia Hawkins, put on administrative leave because she claims that Christians and Muslims worship the same God, took a higher profile with a Washington Post piece by Yale's Miroslav Volf. Volf argues that there is no theological justification for Wheaton's action: “Her suspension is not…

December 23, 2015
Sexuality

Reversing the Revolution

Jeremy Neill is currently bullish on the sexual revolution: “If I were a broker and the sexual revolution were a stock, at this point, I would still be urging my customers to buy shares” ( Public Discourse ). But it won't last forever. No revolution does. Someday, the children of…

December 22, 2015

Articulus stantis et cadentis?

John Webster offers a subtle, careful assessment of the claim that justification is the articulus stantis et cadentis ecclesiae, the article of doctrine on which the church stands or falls ( God Without Measure ). Webster worries that this slogan can “distort exegetical or dogmatic proportion” (168). That happens, he…

December 22, 2015

Restoring Zion

According to Micah, Yahweh begins to restore Zion by gathering the lame, outcasts, afflicted, all who has suffered the invasion of Assyria and been devastated by the nations. Like a shepherd gathering His flock, Yahweh is going to gather the remnant. In Micah, as in other places in the OT,…

December 22, 2015

Mark of the Beast

GB Caird ( Revelation of Saint John , 174-176) offers a neat summary of the options for interpreting the mark. The number appears to be a gematria, a numerical value given to a name, popular in the first century. It is the numerical value of the name “Neron Caesar,” but…

December 21, 2015

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