Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
For many people Christmas comes on December 25 and is over December 26. The tree is taken down along with the lights and the other decorations, and everyone begins setting the house in order for the new year. No more Christmas hymns. No more celebrations (well, until New Year’s Eve).…
The Ascension and the Incarnation should not be disconnected in our Christmas thinking or celebrations. As N.T. Wright notes, the ascension is "a central and vital feature without which all sorts of other things start to go demonstrably wrong. . . . where the ascension has been ignored or misunderstood,…
“In the Word was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness.” Thus John describes the incarnation of the Son. He comes as the living and life-giving light of the world. That’s good news. In the beginning, God spoke and light shone…
Christmas is all about Jesus. The angels announce Jesus’ birth, shepherds and wise men come to see Jesus, Herod wants to kill Jesus. We occasionally think of the Father who sent the Son, but we keep returning to the Son made flesh in Bethlehem’s manger. Meanwhile, as always, the Spirit…
Christmas is about many things, but one of the chief things revealed in the gospel of Christmas is the humility of God. We don't often think of humility as an attribute of God. If God is glorious and exalted, we think, He must be haughty and proud and self-centered. We…
John famously begins his Gospel with a piece of theology: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Matthew starts with a genealogy. John celebrates Advent with a hymn, Matthew with a list. For John, Jesus is the Word of creation…
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A couple of illuminating quotations from Robert Letham’s fine new book, The Holy Trinity (P&R): Letham defends Origen against charges of heresy and proto-Arianism (while duly noting some of the troubling statements in Origen’s writings), and adds: “Origen is a research theologian, advancing ideas for consideration and discussion as well…
INTRODUCTION Jesus came to reveal the Father, and claims that He is capable of revealing the Father because ?I am in the Father and the Father is in Me?E(John 14:6-9). This notion of ?mutual indwelling?E(the technical term in theology is ?perichoresis?E is an important concern for John?s gospel, and it…
In his Teaching Company tapes on Chaucer, Seth Lehrer claims that the medievals lacked a conception of historical change, and that one of the key cultural effects of the Renaissance was to introduce the idea that things change. This at least needs to be qualified, if not rejected, for two…
It’s mighty hard to find apologists for Bolshevism these days, so I was surprised to find the following in the December 2 issue of the London Review of Books (in Neal Ascherson’s review of the recently republished books on Trotsky by Isaac Deutscher): The Bolshevik Revolution was more “authentic” and…
The book of Ruth is not merely about the individual characters, but about Israel, moving from the barrenness of the period of the judges toward the new birth of the monarchy. Naomi is the barren, bereft Israelite widow, who ends the book with a child her knees and with plenty…
Jesus charges in John 5 that the Jews seek glory from one another rather than the Father. It reminds me of a suggestion (I believe it came from Ken Myers) that the New York Review of Books should change its name to the New York Review of Each Other’s Books…
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