Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
1 Introduction ESTHER and RUTH are similar stories. Each details the changing fortunes of a young woman. Each begins with the protagonist in a destitute situation. The fortunes of each reverses by story’s end. Intriguing parallels exist: Scenes : The stories transition through a similar set of scenes, see Table…
Maybe this is not the best venue to reveal that I sometimes wonder about all that deep exegesis: the chiasms, the numerology, vowel modifications, the typological labyrinthes, the innumerable exodus patterns that are so often limned by Peter Leithart or James Jordan or Alastair Roberts. Maybe it’s because I am…
In 1923, J. Gresham Machen wrote the book he is perhaps most remembered for, “Christianity and Liberalism”. Machen wrote it to help map out the cultural currents that were impacting the church with the hope that the church could be vigilant against the dangers theological liberalism posed to historic Christianity.…
March 25, nine months before Christmas, is the date that is often associated with the Annunciation to Mary, Gabriel’s announcement to Mary that, by the coming of the Spirit upon her, she would conceive and bear the heir to David’s throne, whose kingdom would have no end. The story is…
Race and Covenant: Recovering the Religious Roots for American Reconciliation , edited by Gerald R. McDermott (Grand Rapids, MI: Acton Institute), 278 pp. A group of notable thinkers gathered to discuss biblical resources for addressing racial conflict in America in February 2019 at Samford University in Birmingham. Race and Covenant…
“Covenant Creationism,” which might be the most consistent brand of full preterism, is merely dispensationalism turned inside-out. The main cause of disputes over the interpretation of the Scriptures is the practice of interpreting texts in isolation. This applies not only to interpreting a passage without reference to other passages, but…
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Hobbes again ( Leviathan 41) on the Mosaic predecessors to Christian baptism: “As the children of Israel had for a sacrament of their reception into the kingdom of God, before the time of Moses, the rite of circumcision, which rite, having been omitted in the wilderness, was again restored as…
NT Wright’s thesis about the new heavens and new earth receives support from an unexpected source, Leviathan , chapter 38: “All these places are for salvation, and the kingdom of God , after the day of judgement, upon earth. On the other side, I have not found any text that…
The first time the Hebrew verb “be wrathful” ( qatzaf ) occurs with Yahweh as subject is in Leviticus 10:6. The related noun occurs for the first time in Numbers 1:53. Both, importantly, have to do with the tabernacle. Yahweh warns that His wrath might break out against Aaron’s family…
Following up an earlier post: How are we to understand the connection of the reception of the Spirit and being counted as righteous in Galatians 3:5-6? Some alternatives suggest themselves: 1) Righteousness is a status and the Spirit is the gift that God gives to those whom He counts righteous.…
Faith in Protestant theology is instrumental, the passive human means by which we appropriate the righteousness of Christ, by which we stand righteous before God. In Galatians at least, Paul’s characteristic construction doesn’t use the usual prepositions of instrumentality - en and dia . Rather, he uses ek , which…
What did God promise Abraham? Paul says that Abraham and his seed were promised an inheritance (Galatians 3:18, 29), and that inheritance includes the blessing of the nations (Galatians 3:8), the gift of the Spirit (Galatians 3:14), and righteousness (Galatians 3:6). These are not discrete gifts in Paul’s mind. The…
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