Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Every advent of new media creates the justifiable reaction from some that the necessarily accompanied amputation may not be worth the extension made possible by the new tools. This is not unique to the Digital Age. Lamoignon Malesherbes, the French politician who was counsel for the defense of Louis XVI,…
A response to Gage Crowder's " The Hole in our Hope ?" Already, the first pages of the Bible promise a bright future. The story starts with the creation of heaven and earth, where heaven is perfect, but the earth is in a state of formless emptiness. Yet, God takes…
A rejoinder to Bubu Jarmulak's essay, " Embrace Pessimism ." Whereas calumnious critiques are reflections of more on the critic than the work criticized, good critiques are always opportunities for reassessment and improvement if they are received as such . Since its renaissance, the biblical doctrine of postmillennialism—or “optimistic eschatology,”…
Several decades ago, a pastor (and friend) mentioned in passing at one of our regular breakfasts together that he wasn’t satisfied with the usual reading of Jesus’s prayer in Gethsemane, the usual reading being that Jesus asked the Father to avoid the Cross at Gethsemane. We turned to the passage,…
On May 21, 1604, the cathedral of Toledo in Spain held job interviews for the post of choirmaster, the head of music at the church. The position had been vacated when the previous occupant, Alonso Lobo, was poached by the nearby cathedral of Seville, and Toledo needed a replacement who…
Imagine — counterfactually: on the night he was betrayed, the Lord Jesus held up an empty hand and said, ‘This is the blood of the covenant poured out for you. Drink of it.’ But there was no cup, no wine, nothing. If there’s no sign of the covenant, is there…
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Paul uses the phrase “elements of the world” several times in his letters. The phrase had an accepted meaning by the first century, referring to the four elements of Greek science—fire, air, water, earth. Paul uses the phrase, but he doesn’t use the phrase in the accepted sense. What conclusions—substantive…
In a 2002 essay in the Andrews University Seminary Studies, Sigve Tonstad reviews the debate over the phrase pistis Christou - faith in Christ v. faith of Christ. The debate is typically confined to Paul’s letters, but Tonstad rightly points out that the last use of the phrase in the…
Several parallels link John fifth-seal vision of martyrs under the altar (Revelation 6:9-11) with the climactic sixth-seal vision of a multitude before the throne (7:9-17). Revelation talks a lot about clothing, and a lot about white clothing in particular. Only three times, however, does the book use the Greek stole…
Douglas Farrow has some wise observations about the same-sex marriage debate in his Touchstone review of Girgis, Anderson, and George, What Is Marriage? He commends the authors’ courage and insight, and is thoroughly in agreement with their effort to defend traditional marriage. But Farrow doesn’t think that the book hits…
Cherubim have four faces: ox, lion, eagle, man. As James Jordan has argued, those four faces are associated with different offices of Israel and phases of Israel’s history: the ox is sacrificial and priestly, the lion is royal, the eagle is prophetic, and Jesus is the man of the new…
When the Lamb appears in heaven, heaven bursts into song (Revelation 5). After the seven trumpets (Revelation 8-11), John sees a long series of visions depicting the dragon’s various attacks on the church. When the saints have all been safely harvested and raised above the firmament, they burst into song…
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