Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
But I say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. Whoever hits you on the cheek, offer him the other also; and whoever takes away your coat, do not withhold your shirt…
Part 5: Laying New Foundations in a Dying World As I mentioned above, the history of Israel involved several centuries as a church-without-a-culture, and then several centuries as a culture-without-a-city. To be sure, there was an informal culture around the church of the Patriarchs, but the civilization of free farmers…
In the Reformation Tradition we baptize both professing believers and their children. In the case of infants it is now commonly insisted that this is done because the children are already in covenant with God. Baptism is a sign and seal of a previously existing reality. Despite the popularity of…
Concerning Sex & the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the loaf of bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ? Since there is one loaf, we who are many…
Protestant-Catholic debates about the sacraments have usually taken the form of debates about sacramental efficacy. Protestants claim that Catholics believe that sacraments work ex opere operato, virtually a magical view of the sacraments. A priest goes through the motions and says the mumbo-jumbo and — presto! — the sacraments confer…
In 27.2, the Westminster Confession says that because of the “spiritual relation” between sacraments and the things they represent, “the names and effects of the one are attributed to the other.” Applied to baptism, this means that when the Bible says that we are baptized into Christ (Rom. 6), it…
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In Housekeeping , Marilynne Robinson observes through he narrator Ruth that absence is actually a more intense form of presence. As long as friends and family are physically empirically here, they are localized and circumscribed. Absent, memory finds them in every nook and cranny - a dead and beloved wife…
Jean-Luc Marion points out that “method” comes from the Greek meta-hodos, and explains why phenomenology is not methodological: “The method does not run ahead of the phenomenon, by fore -seeing it, pre -dicting it, and pro -ducing it, in order to await it from the outset at the end of…
Byron, a character in Arthur Phillips 2002 novel, Prague (set, of course, in Budapest), presents his theory of advertizing to “LWA’s” - Long Wolf Aspirants. Real Lone Wolfs, he explains, “don’t respond to advertising, but there aren’t more than a dozen of them on the planet.” But there is a…
Byron, a character in Arthur Phillips 2002 novel, Prague (set, of course, in Budapest), presents his theory of advertizing to “LWA’s” - Long Wolf Aspirants. Real Lone Wolfs, he explains, “don’t respond to advertising, but there aren’t more than a dozen of them on the planet.” But there is a…
Some reflections on a very stimulating lecture by Jeff Meyers on the Song of Songs at the Biblical Horizons Summer Conference. 1) Jeff pointed out that many modern commentators complain that allegorical interpretations of the Song “de-sex” it. But the intended effect is surely the opposite. Instead of purging desire…
The Lord’s Supper is a victory meal celebrated before the victory has occurred, as if Melchizedek has come out to Abram with bread and wine before the battle with the kings instead of after (Genesis 14). Traditional hymnody and certainly the Psalms likewise strike a triumphant note that clashes with…
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