Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
The Failure of the Church Yet a third factor played an important role in this historical development, in addition to the imperial adoption of icons and the rise of the icons of the holy man. Brown writes: "The great Christian basilicas of the previous centuries tended to stand empty, except…
The three large patriarchal narratives of Genesis concern the three aspects of the cosmos: matter, space, and time. Over these three is man given dominion. Lucifer was originally appointed to train man in this dominion, but he chose to lead man into rebellion instead. Thus, the Angel of Yahweh replaced…
Part 6: Living in a Dying World (continued) The "Trivium" (continued) The five stages of education are simply the five stages of the covenant as God administers it in human life and history, and in the liturgy of covenant renewal: First, God announces Himself. "I am Yahweh Your God." He…
The following essay is tentative and exploratory, offered for your consideration. It seems to me that the ritual of the Ascension Offering (incorrectly translated as Burnt Offering) of Leviticus 1 is a symbolic recapitulation of Genesis 1, which thereby portrays the sacrificial ritual as way of moving from a fallen…
Just as the vast majority of evangelical Christians in America today are Arminian and Baptist, so the vast majority do not believe in a creation around 4000 BC. I don’t expect any of these three situations to change anytime soon. Powerful presuppositions are at work in all three instances, along…
The Iconoclastic Controversy Continuing Pagan Influence How did images creep in? To begin with, there was in the post-Constantinian Church a concerted effort on the part of the semi-pagans to interpret Christianity in essentially pantheistic terms. The heretics put God and man on a continuum of "being," so that God…
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There’s a kind of theology that effectively denies human experience. You may think and feel that X or Y is true, X and Y may well fit your experience, but the Bible or some theological principle tells us otherwise. You are self-deluded about your experience. What else would you expect,…
I’ve liked Dean Koontz since reading Relentless , where the heroes are a family of home-schooling survivalists. Take that, literary establishment! Koontz was the guest in the NYTBR “By the Book” feature, and his answers to a couple of questions give additional reasons to like him. What book would you…
I have written on the biblical theology of rivers in the past, arguing that, unlike the sea, rivers are water reconciled with land, water made useful to land. In terms of biblical politics, rivers are Gentiles reconciled to Israel, their glory flowing to Zion to adorn Yahweh’s house. Rivers don’t…
Travis Ables’s Incarnational Realism is a very fine book, a monograph to learn from, to grapple and battle and argue with. I didn’t find it utterly convincing; but what is? Even when not persuasive, it’s the kind of incisive study that leaves marks and scars and stigmata. What more could…
Salvatore Basile’s fascinating history of air conditioning, Cool , examines the technology and its penetration into American life. He highlights the role of vaudeville and movie theaters in extending the realm of cool. But he is also interested in the reaction to the new technology. And the reaction was surprisingly…
Here’s an odd thing. Revelation 12 begins with a clear vision of incarnation and exaltation: A woman gives birth to a messianic child who is taken to the throne of God. But then the child disappears. The dragon attacks the woman; no Messianic intervention to rescue. The dragon calls up…
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