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Advent

Stretching Christmas

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).…

by Steve WilkinsDecember 24, 2016
ascension
Advent

Ascension and Incarnation

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,…

by Roy AtwoodDecember 23, 2016
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Advent

Christmas Light

“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…

by Peter LeithartDecember 23, 2016
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Advent

The Spirit of Christmas

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…

by Peter LeithartDecember 22, 2016
nativity
Advent

The Humility of God

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…

by Peter LeithartDecember 21, 2016
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Advent

Advent of Unity

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…

by Peter LeithartDecember 20, 2016

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Theology

Rehabilitating patriarchy

Russell Moore gave a vigorous presentation at ETS on why egalitarians are winning the evangelical gender debate. He summarized some of the recent sociological work on evangelical family life, which presents a mixed picture. On the one hand, Bradford Wilcox’s Soft Patriarchs, New Men shows that evangelical fathers are not…

November 18, 2005
Literature

Herod’s fears

In For the Time Being , W. H. Auden described Herod’s reaction to the news that “God has been born.” If this is true, and if the news gets out, Herod thinks, all is lost; confusion will reign. The passage is one of the most effective descriptions of the nature…

November 17, 2005
Literature

Herod’s fears

In For the Time Being , W. H. Auden described Herod’s reaction to the news that “God has been born.” If this is true, and if the news gets out, Herod thinks, all is lost; confusion will reign. The passage is one of the most effective descriptions of the nature…

November 17, 2005

Emerson as Sacramental Theologian

Lundin spends considerable time describing Emerson’s rejection of Christian orthodoxy in favor of an American version of Romanticism, and shows that Emerson’s departure from orthodoxy centered on his rejection of the Eucharist. Emerson resigned his post at the Second Church of Boston because he could no longer administer the Supper…

November 17, 2005
Literature

Lewis as critic

Toward the close of Lundin’s book, he offers a number of intriguing criticisms of CS Lewis as a literary critic. He claims that while Lewis recognized the corrosive effects of the Enlightenment and Romantic conception of the self in his theological writings, he adopted a form of romanticism in his…

November 17, 2005
Philosophy

Denken ist Danken

One of the important themes that emerges from Lundin’s book (mentioned in the previous post) is the centrality of gratitude in thought. Heidegger, he says, “was fond of the seventeenth-century Pietist phrase Denken ist Danken , ‘to think is to thank.’” Lundin expounds the point a few pages later: “Through…

November 17, 2005

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