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

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Apostle Paul

Paul in Prison: Ephesus or Rome?

In the books of 1 and 2 Corinthians, Paul refers to hardships in his ministry in Asia, specifically Ephesus (1 Corinthians 4:9-13; 15:32; 2 Corinthians 1:8; 4:8-12; 6:4-5; 11:23-25). However, the multiple imprisonments Paul mentions are not fully reflected in Luke’s account of Paul’s ministry — Luke only records a…

by Ralph Allan SmithFebruary 15, 2022
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Epistemology

Vertical Living

After all these months pondering integration, I have come to the point of believing that the dynamic of integration just is the real at its heart. Everything that is real or comes to be real is a dynamo of integrative coherence. I also believe it is true that the real…

by Esther Lightcap MeekFebruary 1, 2022
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Books

Tom Holland and the Liberating Power of Christianity

Have you heard of Tom Holland? Not the young Tom Holland of Spiderman fame. No doubt you’ve heard of him. I’m referring to the middle age Oxford-trained historian who recently wrote Dominion: The Making of the Western Mind . (Both Hollands are British, so you’ll be forgiven for confusing them.)…

by Gerald HiestandJanuary 25, 2022
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Biblical Horizons

"Do This!"

This article was originally published in 1990. (The essay that follows concerns a rather touchy subject: how the Lord’s Supper is to be done. I am not writing to insult or offend, but to challenge. To that end I have not "held back" but have "gone ahead" and said what…

by James B. JordanJanuary 19, 2022
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American Culture

The Dominion Trap

This article was originally published in 1990. In Genesis One, God told Adam and Eve to "be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens, and over every living thing that moves on…

by James B. JordanJanuary 13, 2022
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Biblical Studies

Will Few Be Saved?

On several occasions the gospels record Jesus teaching that only a few will be saved (Matthew 7:14, Matthew 22:14, and Luke 13:23). Careful readers of Scripture should begin to wrestle with how these passages found in the gospels fit together with other passages that teach that many will be saved…

by Manny LucasJanuary 11, 2022

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Peircean Trinity

Andrew Robinson ( God and the World of Signs ) cannot prove that C.S. Peirce drew inspiration for his semiotic pattern of Firstness, Secondness, and Thirdness from Trinitarian theology. But Robinson is struck by the parallels between Peircean semiotics and Trinitarian theology. For starters, he points to similarities between Athanasius'…

March 8, 2018

Against Democracy

John Stuart Mill hoped (in Jason Brennan's summary) "that getting people involved in politics would make them smarter, more concerned about the common good, better educated, and nobler. He hoped getting a factory worker to think about politics would be like getting a fish to discover there’s a world outside…

March 8, 2018
Baptism

Baptists Are Right, Almost

Several essays in the book, Believer’s Baptism , observe the inconsistencies in paedobaptist defenses of infant baptism. In the introduction, editors Thomas Schreiner and Shawn D. Wright focus on the issue of apostasy. If the warning passages in, say, Hebrews are real threats to people within the covenant community, then…

March 7, 2018

Sacrificial Politics

Gatherings of the ancient Athenian citizen assembly began with the sacrifice of a pig and the sprinkling of blood to consecrate a sacred space. When a Roman emperor wanted to discover the future, he sacrificed an animal and dispatched a specialist to read the entrails. It’s been a long time…

March 6, 2018

Allegories of the Song

A few passages from premodern allegorical readings of the Song of Songs. The first set comes from the Jewish commentator Shlomo Yitzchaki, known as Rashi; the second from Nicholas of Lyra. Of "Solomon" in the Song, Rashi writes: "Every Solomon (for they were at a loss to explain why Scripture…

March 6, 2018

Structure in 2 Chronicles 22-24

The Chronicler recounts Joash's reign over several chapters, from 2 Chronicles 22:10 through the end of chapter 24. The text is chiastically structured: A. Conspiracy to coronate Joash, 22:20-23:11 B. Death of Athaliah, 23:12-15 C. Covenant renewal, 23:16-21 C'. Joash repairs the house, 24:1-14 B'. Death of Jehoiada and Zechariah,…

March 5, 2018

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