Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
For Part 1, click HERE . How did Paul’s earliest commentators view his juxtaposition of music and drunkenness, and did they connect it to the ancient Greek ideas of musical ethos described in Part I? Origen, one of the earliest commentators on Paul, writes about Ephesians 5:18-19: One, however, who…
Perhaps it is because I am a musician that I have always found Ephesians 5:18-19 so arbitrary. But isn’t it a little odd to contrast music and drunkenness? Perhaps it is not obvious that that is what Paul is doing; I know, for myself, that it is remarkably easy to…
In 1 Corinthians 7:12-16 Paul deals with how the Corinthian Christians are supposed to be relating to unbelieving spouses. He essentially tells them, “Look, if your unbelieving spouse is willing to stay with you as a faithful Christian, don’t initiate a divorce. If he/she wants to leave you, let him/her…
For Part 1, click HERE . Those who focus on the supposed “pacifism” of Jesus and condemn the violence of God’s judgments throughout the Old Testament overlook the ministry of sacrificial bloodshed as an alternative to human bloodshed. The sword bearing of the sacrificial system was introduced to avoid the…
How should a Christian respond to the objection that the Bible, like the Koran, is a book of violence and bloodshed? Numerous answers have been offered by well-meaning exegetes, but none of them gets to the heart of the matter: God desires to place a sword in the hands of…
Beginning this summer, Dr. Alastair Roberts will join the Theopolis Institute as an adjunct Senior Fellow, the Institute has announced. Dr. Roberts will be a regular on the Theopolis podcast, teach intensive courses and in the Fellows Program, and help develop new programs and outlets. Roberts earned his PhD from…
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Chemnitz has some interesting comments on how the Reformers handled the patristic usage of ?justification,?Ewhich did not match their own usage. He admits that the ?fathers mostly take the word ?justify?Efor the renewal,?Ewhich is not the Reformation definition of ?justify,?Ebut he commends the fathers for those places ?where they according…
Chemnitz cites the views of the German Roman Catholic Johann Gropper (1503-59). According to Chemnitz, he ?argues at great length that Christ by his obedience did not merit only the remission of sins but also the Spirit of renewal; and that God remits sins to no one without at the…
John 6:56: ?He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him?E This morning we have examined the Bible?s teaching on the mutual indwelling of the Persons of the Trinity. The Persons are distinct from each other, and not reducible to each other; the…
God created our bodies; He will redeem our bodies and raise them from the dead; and in between He calls us to ?present the members of our bodies as instruments of righteousness?Eand to ?offer your bodies as living sacrifices.?EOur bodies are gifts from God, and we should offer them for…
INTRODUCTION We?ve been looking at Christian worship in the light of Scriptural patterns of sacrifice. This gives us an overall order or sequence of worship. In this session, I want to examine two main issues: First, the Trinitarian basis of worship, and second, the dialogic structure of worship. These are…
Thinking about perichoresis or about Gregory Nazianzen’s famous “No sooner do I conceive of the one than I am illumined by the splendour of the three; no sooner do I distinguish them than I am carried back to the one” always makes me think of Escher. I find now that…
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