Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
[This essay was originally published in 1988. Given the situation that our new national socialists are getting the world into, I thought it might be useful to reprint it here. – JBJordan] The Bible has quite a bit to say about gold, silver, and precious stones, and the Bible always…
I wrote this elsewhere and was encouraged to put it here. It is a comment on what a pastor is. Today, this is not very well understood, and God’s people suffer because of it. There are four professions: medicine, education, law, and religion. Each of these, when done at a…
James Jordan recently pointed out in private conversation how appropriate it is, in John’s Gospel, that Nicodemus is present both to ask Jesus about being born again, and to see Jesus re-enter the womb of the mother. Nicodemus rhetorically asks, “How can a man be born when he is old?…
This is a problematic and much discussed passage. I’ve been discussing it in another forum, and have decided to move it here and present some very preliminary observations about it. One large question is this: Who is the speaker here and what is his situation? Traditionally, the speaker is seen…
1. The current issue of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction includes a good fantasy novella by John C. Wright, who since his conversion has been writing Christianly. This is a fine fantasy with nods to C. S. Lewis and Antoine de Saint-Exupery, and probably Gene Wolfe as well.…
“It is an experience of our days that the spoken name of Jesus alone exercises an unforeseen power; and the effort which it cost to speak this name is perhaps connected to some faint apprehension of the power which is inherent within it. Wherever the name of Jesus Christ is…
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Sacred Systems by Eric Kyle is tough going. He covers “systems” of personal transformation and spiritual formation from Philo through the Didache, Bonaventure, Erasmus and de Sales and William Law, to Dallas Willard. Kyle is interested in the “system” that each advocates - their theology and cosmology, their theory of…
Death, not sin, is the great problem for Israel’s patriarchs. There is remarkable little talk of “sin” in Genesis. Sin waits for Cain (4:7), the sin of Sodom rises up before the Lord (18:20), Abimelech sins against Abrhaham (20:6, 9), Joseph refuses to commit the sin of adultery with Potipher’s…
Each of the seven messages to the churches ends with a promised gift to the victors, those who overcome. These are (the numbers refer to the number of the letter): 1. Eating from the wood of life in Paradise. 2a. A crown of life. 2b. Rescue from the second death.…
When Israel tried to reserve some manna and keep it overnight, it rotted and sprouted worms. Except on the Sabbath: On the eve of the Sabbath, they “rested” ( nuach ) the baked manna until morning and it was not rotted (Exodus 16:23-24). The manna rested as Yahweh rested (…
Beckett Remembering/Remembering Beckett , edited by James and Elizabeth Knowlson is a compilation of reminiscences by and about Samuel Beckett. The collection covers his entire life, from childhood through years of obscurity, to his later triumphs. It includes recollections from friends, collaborators, students, actors and actresses who performed his plays…
In a 2010 piece in Theology Today , Leslie Goode summarizes some of the challenges posed to post-Girardian Christian apologetics and anthropology by Kathryn McClymond’s Beyond Sacred Violence . McClymond argues that violence is not a universal feature of sacrifice, and even where it is present it is not necessarily…
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