Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
First John 5.16-17: If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he shall ask, and God will give him life–to those who commit sins that do not lead to death. There is sin that leads to death; I do not say that one should pray for…
A few years back I read Lesslie Newbigin’s little book Truth and Authority in Modernity . 1 I was particularly impressed with his argument in chapter 2 “The Mediation of Divine Authority.” Now, maybe this is old hat to many of you, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard it…
Baptism is not Christian circumcision. There’s a lot of loose talk to that effect in Presbyterian circles; but it’s not accurate. The old world rite of circumcision was fulfilled in the death and resurrection of Jesus. Baptism unites us to Christ and therefore makes us participate in the circumcision of…
In recent years I’ve observed a number of Reformed-type churches trying to institute corporate handraising in certain sung parts of worship. This often does not seem to work very well. Some people don’t do it. Some do it half-way. Some do it with one hand. Some dramatically stretch to the…
Most modern scholars recognize that behind Arius’s campaign to differentiate Jesus from God was the Hellenistic theological conviction that the high God cannot suffer. Rowan Williams argues that Arius had the right idea about divine suffering, but the wrong idea of God, which “puts the unavoidable question of what the…
Charismatics have been much maligned for constantly “praising the Lord.” They would say if you hit your finger with a hammer, you should instantly say, “Thank you Jesus that You let me hit my finger…” This of course, as we all know, is stupid. There was once a lady who…
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Walter Truett Anderson suggests that postmoderns may be distinguished from others by the fact that they not only have a culture, but know that they have it. Or, put differently: “You do not choose to be premodern. If you choose, you are at least modern. If you know you are…
Christopher Lasch pointed to the therapeutic dimensions of 1960s radicalism: “Acting out fantasies does not end repressions . . . it merely dramatizes the permissible limits of antisocial behavior. In the sixties and early seventies, radicals who transgressed these limits, under the illusion they were fomenting insurrection or ‘doing gestalt…
Clem Whittaker, a pioneer in the political use of media during the 1930s and 40s, candidly explained his theory of campaigning in a speech to the PUblic Relations Society of America: “There are thousands of experts bidding for every man’s attention - and every man has a limited amount of…
Walter Truett Anderson points to the US invasion of Grenada (1983) as an example of a postmodern public-relations war: “its primary purpose was to give the American public a ‘win,’ to flex the muscles of the Reagan administration, to allow Americans to (in the phrase current at the time) ‘feel…
A reader, Dan Glover, sent the following response to my hints about the Christian as “poem.” “Christ, the eternal Word, indwells his people and his people corporate. He is the Word which controls us with his words (‘go, make disciples . . . baptizing them in the name of the…
Walter Truett Anderson suggests that postmodernism takes is rise from the recognition of the social construction of reality. This means: The institutions, practices, and habits that make up the contents of social life are made by human beings; and even natural reality is known and experienced through a linguistic and…
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