Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Mark Horne has done a good job elucidating how martyrdom paves the way for revival and success of Christ’s kingdom in the world, just as it also can bring more hardship and suffering. The diverging wheat and tares both growing up together, both benefitting from the watering of blood on…
For Part 1, click HERE . Anyone who has read James B. Jordan’s Through New Eyes: Developing a Biblical View of the World and appreciated it as a revelation of how God communicates in symbols and types—both in His Word and in the created order—understands what it is like to…
Abel was the first martyr in history. There is no evading this. Jesus pairs him with a murdered prophet (Matthew 23:35; 2 Chronicles 24:20-22). Abel’s blood was heard by God (Genesis 4:10), and God responded to the cry by driving out Cain, Abel’s killer, from the eastern borderland near Eden…
Adapted from The Shape of Isaiah: A Covenant-Literary Analysis The prophetic texts are the most difficult parts of the Bible to understand. And when it comes to baffling the reader, they are no respecter of persons, perplexing with their Delphic wiles even the studied scholars. It has been said that…
The subtitle for the 2004 film Dodgeball is “A True Underdog Story.” If the viewer lets the words pass by without a double-take, he or she will likely spend the rest of the movie, which applies the “unlikely teammates make the best teams” trope to the “sport” of dodgeball, asking,…
The book of Ezra gives an almost odd amount of attention to vessels. These holy vessels, whether cups, bowls, or flagons, are either dedicated as tribute or were used in temple service. The two Hebrew words translated as ‘vessel’ in most English translations are used a total of 14 times.…
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A fter sharing a breakfast of fish at the shore of Tiberius with his disciples, Jesus speaks directly to Peter (John 21). Peter had denied Jesus three times; now Jesus confirms his love three times. Peter denied Jesus at a charcoal fire in the high priest's court; now he's restored…
I n the closing chapter of Heaven on Earth , Richard Landes considers the import of the two major apocalyptic threats of the early twenty-first century—anthropogenic global warming (AGW) and global jihad warming (GJW). Both seem to portend TEOTWAWKI, the end of the world as we know it. What we…
I n his study of The Dystopian Impulse in Modern Literature , Keith Booker observes that “much of the history of recent utopian thought can be read as a gradual shift from utopian to dystopian emphases, while utopian thought itself has come more and more to be seen as escapist…
W e are apt to think of a deeply religious person as a ‘true believer,' writes Howard Wettstein in The Significance of Religious Experience . In the Hebrew Bible, though, “there is no expression . . . that corresponds to our term, ‘believer.' The phrase that comes closest is ‘…
R ichard Landes's Heaven on Earth is a study of millennial apocalyptic movements, that is, movements that share a belief in “ a millennial vision of the world transformed, and an apocalyptic belief in that transformation’s imminence ” (22). Though the movement he explores share a belief in the transformation…
According to Richard Landes ( Heaven on Earth ), traditional societies are organized by a “prime divider,” a boundary between elites and commoners. He follows Ernest Gellner in called these “agro-literate” societies, since that phrase names two key technologies that mark the division. More generally, “Elites construct prime dividers along…
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