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

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Biblical Studies

Exile or Ark?

In the Fall 2007 issue of JBL is an essay “Jonah Read Intertextually” by Hyun Chul Paul Kim of Methodist Theological School in Delaware, Ohio. The first section of the essay points to numerous linguistic and conceptual parallels between Jonah (“Dove”) and the Noah narrative: Destruction of the earth, including…

by James B. JordanApril 10, 2008
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Biblical Studies

How Mark Came to be Written

The phone rang. “Hello, this is John Mark.” “Hi, JM. This is Simon Peter.” “Oh, hello, Mr. Rock,” said Mark. “What can I do for you?” “Well, JM” said Peter, “I’ve been very impressed by your recent essays in the New Jew Review , especially your series on David as…

by James B. JordanMarch 24, 2008
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Biblical Studies

How Matthew Came to be Written

The sun had set and finally the crowds had dispersed. The disciples gathered in the upper room, exhausted but joyful after preaching and teaching in many different languages all day, not to speak of seeing to the baptism of three thousand people. James bar Alphaeus put on a CD of…

by James B. JordanMarch 20, 2008
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Biblical Horizons

Church-Culture | Cause-Effect

There was a time, I think, when Evangelical Christianity in North America tended to be dominated by what might be (pejoratively) called a “retreatist” or even “defeatist” view of society. For various reasons, Christians believed that society was headed downhill and there was nothing the Church could do about it,…

by Mark HorneMarch 14, 2008
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Genesis

Is Genesis 15 an Attack on Forensic Justification?

Hebrews 11 makes it very clear that Abram (later, Abraham) exercised saving faith from the time he left his home to go wonder in Caanan. He was justified at least from the time of the call in Genesis 12.1-3 on. Yet I keep reading people who think that any appeal…

by Mark HorneMarch 6, 2008
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Biblical Horizons

On Renewing Theology

I spent the last few days at A Conversation on Denominational Renewal , which thankfully met in St. Louis. The conference was well attended, about 300 or more people. The audience was mostly PCA ministers and elders, but because it was held in St. Louis there were a good many…

by Jeff MeyersMarch 1, 2008

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Triune Relations

Wesley Hill argues in Paul and the Trinity that recent discussions of Pauline christology are locked into a misleading hierarchical framework in which the main question is whether the Christology is high or low. Hill wonders whether the category of “relationality,” especially “mutual relationality,” so prominent in recent Trinitarian theology…

October 7, 2015

Frogs

The trinity of dragon, beast, and false prophet “breath” out three demon spirits that look like frogs (Revelation 16:13). Why frogs? Frogs are an Egyptian plague (Exodus 7-8; Psalm 78:45; 105:30). So a plague of frogs keeps us in the exodus-Egypt framework. Frogs are unclean creatures. This is somewhat tricky…

October 7, 2015

The Ecumenism of the Anti-Ecumenical

Neil Young's forthcoming We Gather Together is a pre-history of the Religious Right. It is also a history of the contested ecumenism of the anti-ecumenical churches. The two histories go together. How did the Religious Right so rapidly put together a coalition for family and traditional values? Young shows that…

October 6, 2015

The Self-Contradictions of Sam Harris

In his TLS review of Sam Harris's Waking Up , John Cottingham summarizes Harris's worldview: “a reality where there are no true substances and there is ultimately nothing but an impersonal flux of conditions that arise and pass away.” Harris is opposed to religion but in favor of spirituality, and…

October 6, 2015

Structure and Meaning in Revelation 16

Revelation 16:12-16 is a chiasm, and recognizing that fact will illuminate the contents of the passage. A. Sixth bowl poured on Euphrates. B. River dried up for kings from the sunrising. C. Three frogs from mouths of dragon, beast, false prophet. D. Frog are demons performing signs. C’. Kings of…

October 6, 2015

Strangers and Aliens

There were Gentiles living in the land that were not part of Israel. They did not necessarily share the faith of Israel; they were not circumcised; they were not ethnically related to Israel. Yahweh insisted that they were not to be grudgingly tolerated, but were to be treated with respect…

October 5, 2015

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