Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
I have never heard anyone say that the Bible is impractical, but I have heard people, after an in depth exegesis of a passage, ask for the practical application. Offer a class on childrearing, marriage, finance and the church members flock to it; offer a course on Leviticus, the visions…
Stones External and Internal The modern practice of dismantling the Bible into a shambles of documents authored in response to disparate historical events rather than viewing it as a unified testimony inspired by God is a surefire way to miss what is actually going on in the text. This failure…
King Asa of Judah made a strong start, purging the land of idols, altars, and images, and winning a war against the ginormous Cushite army led by Zerach. It all unraveled in his final years. From his thirty-fifth year to the forty-first year, when his reign came to an end,…
What appears to be Paul’s first recorded statement on justification comes in Acts 13, in a sermon at Pisidian Antioch. It's can serve as a summary of Paul's letter to the Romans, and throws some important light on the themes of that letter. Paul begins his sermon with a quick…
Iago as Tempter The answer to our first question — whether or not Othello is really great tragedy — has already pointed the way to the answer for the second question — Was Othello a noble Moor or a fool? The two questions, of course, are necessarily related. The fall…
When Adam McIntosh was ordained as Pastor of Saint David’s Church (CREC) in Houston on June 11, 2017, it was the culmination of decades of preparation. Adam is the product of two continents and three Christian traditions. Born in Paducah, Kentucky, he lived his early years partly in Jericho, where…
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What is conversion? There are different answers, argued Jerald Brauer in a 1978 essay on conversion in the Journal of Religion . He contrasts Puritan notions of conversion with those of later revivalist. Over several centuries, conversion was converted from a more corporate change to an individual experience, and from…
In a 2004 essay on global history, the late C.A. Bayly challenged the “fashionable emphasis on the wholly destructive effects of Western ‘colonialism.' Famine, the disruption of local communities, the exacerbation of religious and racial tensions: these are all attributed to the Western impact as vigorously by contemporary cultural critics…
One of the lesser-known movements discussed by Louis Newman in his Jewish Influence on Christian Reform Movements is the twelfth-century heresy initiated by Peter of Bruys and known as the Petrobrussian heresy. The Petrobrussians were similar to earlier and later movements in their rejection of infant baptism, their renunciation of…
“Put me like a seal on your heart, like a seal on your arm,” says the Bride in the Song of Songs (8:6). Seals mark something with the name of the owner. A letter is sealed as proof of its author (1 Kings 21:8). The high priest's golden plate is…
Paul Avis wrote Becoming a Bishop as a theological handbook for bishops, but much of the book has a wider application to all church leaders. His advice about handling conflicts in the church is judicious. His “first and most basic” piece of advice is “Don't be afraid.” Fear can appear…
According to J. Stuart Russell ( The Parousia , 503), the Jewish War of the late 60s AD involved more than Palestine. Slaughter encompassed the empire, wherever Jews were: “Tacitus speaks of the bitter animosity with which the Arab auxiliaries of Titus were filled against the Jews, and we have…
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