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

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Art

The Second Word IV: Implications

What About Catholics? (continued) Usually, such people are not seeking graven images, but rather their idolatry is of a broader character. They are seeking a home on earth. Scott Hahn’s book is called Rome Sweet Home . This is the essential sin, for there is no home on earth. The…

by James B. JordanDecember 7, 1994
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Biblical Studies

The Gospel and the Virtues

Reading the earliest Christian apologists is like watching a movie in which the hero has the means to demolish his opponents in his grasp but never realizes it. The apologists come across as men not altogether aware of the radical character of the gospel they defend. In response to charges…

by Peter LeithartNovember 23, 1994
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Biblical Studies

Suffer the Little Children

Then [Elisha] went up from there to Bethel; and as he was going up by the way, ne`arim came out from the city and mocked him and said to him, "Go up, you baldhead; go up, you baldhead!" When he looked behind him and saw them, he cursed them in…

by Peter LeithartNovember 23, 1994
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Biblical Chronology

Genesis 5 & 11: Chronological-Theological Reflections (Part 2)

Further Numerical Items of Interest Umberto Cassuto points out some other numerical factors in Genesis 5. 1 For one thing, he observes that every number in Genesis 5 is a multiple of 5, sometimes with the addition of 7. We have, in essence, made this point already. He also points…

by James B. JordanNovember 7, 1994
Biblical Horizons

The Second Word III: Exposition; Implications

Prostration God has designed the human body in a marvelous way, and Biblical religion is very physical. We believe in the resurrection of the body, against all pagan ideas of the immortality of the soul. We bury our bodies, not burning them. Human beings in their totality, including our bodies,…

by James B. JordanOctober 7, 1994
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Revelation

The Last Eight Visions of Revelation

Since Revelation is laid out in serieses of sevens, it is worth investigating to see if there is a series of seven after the seven libation-bowls of chapter 16. I believe there is, and it is the burden of this essay to expose it. The series of sevens, or heptamerous…

by James B. JordanOctober 7, 1994

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Doctrinal Indifference?

More conservative Christians have often charged that ecumenically-minded churches and theologians are indifferent to doctrine, aiming for a LCD theology. Ecumenical theologian James Wagner (in the 1963 collection The Challenge to Reunion ) argues that the precise opposite is true: “there is probably no group within the Christian fellowship throughout…

August 27, 2015

Americanization and Reunion

American church history is largely a story of division, wrote Robert Lee is a contribution to the 1963 collection, The Challenge of Reunion . In the early twentieth century, that began to change as American churches became “astir with a new spirit of unity and cooperation” (138). He lists 14…

August 27, 2015

Laughing Last

In a chapter on “How to Be Theologically Funny,” Stanley Hauerwas ( The Work of Theology ) states his opinion that Barth was “‘naturally' funny,” but immediately adds that this doesn't really capture the deep role that humor plays in Barth: “his humor was also a reflection of the character…

August 27, 2015

The Christian Revolution

Writing in 1961 ( Is Christ Divided? ), Lesslie Newbigin observed that while it is “common to say that we live in an age of revolutionary change,” it is uncommon “for Christians to welcome this fact.” Newbigin thinks that's a mistake: “we should welcome it—not merely because of the challenge…

August 27, 2015

Impassibility

John Peckham devotes a long chapter of his The Love of God to the question of divine emotions, the impassibility question. He emphasizes the need to “maintain the Creator/creature distinction, divine transcendence, ontological invulnerability, omnipotence, omniscience and the fact that God is not involuntarily vulnerable. . . . God is…

August 26, 2015

American Greatness

To listen to Trump, America is in trouble because we haven't been adequately looking after our own interests. To make America great means to put American interests first. Which raises a question: Is putting America first the way we became great in the first place? Might America's greatness instead have…

August 26, 2015

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