Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. Genesis 1:27 In an ever-increasing barrage of self-obsession and tailor-made realities, how does the Christian navigate the waters of being someone who experiences life in the first person…
American church music is in a slump. To get out of the slump, we need a 10-year plan, a 50-year plan, and a 100-year plan. Many are doing extraordinary work on reforming church music in the near-term, and a few in the mid-term. What is desperately needed is the 100-year…
The following is an excerpt from The Maker Versus the Takers: What Jesus Really Said About Social Justice and Economics ¸ by Jerry Bowyer (New York, Fidelis Books, Post Hill Press, 2020), release date Sept. 15 th . The section below argues that the ‘Rich Man’ in the parable refers…
Could Absalom be a Christ-type? If you know much about the Bible, you likely have an immediate aversion to even the possibility of answering this question in the affirmative. Absalom was third among David’s sons, while Amnon—his brother from another mother—was first (2 Sam. 3:2-3). As Absalom’s story begins, it…
All four Gospels not only associate Barabbas and Jesus quite unabashedly, they do so emphatically and with a deep theological message. The scene is well-known. In His trial before Pontius Pilate, though Jesus had been declared innocent more than once, there seemed to be no hope of releasing Him. Pilate…
The Theopolis Institute is pleased to announce the second round of the James B. Jordan Prize to honor outstanding doctoral dissertations in biblical theology. James Jordan is one of the most insightful biblical scholars of our time. The Jordan Prize exists to encourage more of the deep Scriptural investigation of…
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At the heart of Richard Beck’s brilliant Unclean are two related mistakes that amount to the same mistake. The first has to do with sacrifice. He begins from Jesus’ claim in Matthew 9 that God desires “mercy, not sacrifice.” The two are not logically opposed, nor are they opposed situationally.…
Ernest Becker argued that the “self” is not limited to the body but extends to “the things in which our true feelings are located”: “A person literally projects or throws himself out of the body, anywhere at all. As the great Williams James put it almost 80 years ago: A…
Richard Beck describes love as the overcoming of boundaries, and in defending that description deals with the concern of psychologists for establishing “healthy boundaries” ( Unclean , 129-30). Drawing on Charles Taylor’s analysis of the modern self, he argues: “Modernity can talk about ‘healthy relationships’ and make numerous recommendations about…
One of the heads of the beast of Revelation 13 is slain and then healed. The term ( sphazo ) is the same as that used for the Lamb (5:6, 9, 12) and for the saints (6:9). The Lamb was slain and then “healed” in the resurrection and ascension. When…
Newt Gingrich and Vince Haley suggest that the subpoena of sermons and other communications from Houston pastors is an attempt to exploit Justice Kennedy’s arguments in Windsor : “there is now an established and successful political and constitutional strategy to paint the protection of traditional moral values - and opposition…
Scholastic and exegetical theology are sometimes contrasted. Scholastics reason logically from axioms; exegetical theologians go wherever the text takes ‘em. While the contrast may have some rough truth to it, it’s never been an absolute one, and can be misleading. Scholastics deal with biblical texts. More importantly, exegetes have to…
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