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

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Books

Interpreting "The Man Who Was Thursday"

I just finished re-reading G. K. Chesterton’s The Man Who Was Thursday . I have in the past had the temerity to say that I believe it to be the best novel of the 20th century. Be that as it may, I still maintain that it is at least one…

by Richard BledsoeJanuary 7, 2022
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Hebrews

The Universality of Mary’s Wound

And Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, “Behold, this child is set for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is spoken against and a sword will pierce through your own soul also, that thoughts out of many hearts may be…

by Garrett SoucyJanuary 4, 2022
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Music

An Argument for Heartier Hymnals

I was inspired to write this article after reading John Ahern’s The Case for Shorter Hymnals first published on Theopolis Institute’s website on November 16, 2021. Mr. Ahern and I are writing with different audiences and emphases in mind. I am thankful we both share a mutual desire to see…

by Jarrod RicheyDecember 30, 2021
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Biblical Studies

Image of God

If you’ve spent any time in the social-media galaxy of Christian cultural commentators, you have almost definitely run across the Latin phrase Imago Dei . It means image of God . Why they usually say it in Latin, I couldn’t tell you. We saw it in the wake of the…

by Daniel HoffmanDecember 28, 2021
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Advent

He Comes to Make His Blessings Known: "Son of David" and "Son of Abraham" in Matthew 1:1

The Gospel of Matthew—indeed, the New Testament—begins with a list of names, and that list of names is introduced by this heading: “The book of the generations of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.” Why start like this? Why “the son of David” and “the son…

by Josh JensenDecember 23, 2021
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Biblical Studies

On Not Needing to Cut the Baby in Half

A blade is raised. A child wails. But the brow under the crown is untroubled. Solomon knows that the raising of the sword will reveal the true parent and the identity of the son. But how did he know this? Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice Isaac certainly bears some of the…

by Jonathan WhiteDecember 21, 2021

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Bourdieu's Language Games

Jeannine Verdes-Leroux doesn't like Pierre Bourdieu, not one bit. In her Deconstructing Pierre Bourdieu , she calls him of offering a “con-artist's sociology” (22), a lazy evidence-free sociology based more on Bourdieu's personal experience than on research. Some of her complaints could be lodged against any number of intellectuals. Does…

July 24, 2015

Divine Craftsman

In Making Good , Trevor Hart summarizes an earlier vision of artistry as craftsmanship: “a human activity of skilled making or forming” (22), and unpacks several dimensions of this definition. Craft is not “a mode of ‘making' linked primarily to the realization or gratification of an artist's burning individual vision…

July 24, 2015

Structure in Revelation 20

Revelation 20 - the millennium prophecy - is divided into four sections with the repeated phrase “and I saw” (vv. 1, 4, 11, 12). The first section, verses 1-3, forms a neat chiasm of its own: A. Angel from heaven with key and chain, v. 1 B. Satan bound for…

July 23, 2015

Son and Heir

Revelation 21:7-8 is set up as a chiasm: A. It is done. B. I am Alpha and Omega, beginning and end. C. I give water to the thirsty. D. Those who overcome will inherit these things and be sons. C'. Cowardly, etc. B'. Have share in the lake of fire.…

July 23, 2015

Book of Strange New Things

Michel Faber's 2014 novel, The Book of Strange New Things , may be the first of a new subgenre: The intergalactic epistolary novel. Syfy meets Pamela . Pastor Peter Leigh has been chosen by the mysterious USIC corporation for a unique mission - to serve as spiritual leader to the…

July 23, 2015

We Are What We Hate

Every society has some over-arching religious structure, Will Herberg argues, echoing many social scientists ( Protestant, Catholic, Jew , 87-90). What unites Americans is clearly not our particular religious creeds. Rather, it is what Herberg calls the “American Way of Life.” He offers this splendid description: “It would be the…

July 23, 2015

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