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Writing

Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.

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Leviticus

Cathedral Offerings

Interwoven within Leviticus’ opening offerings is a redemptive storyline meant to be rehearsed. Each offering makes a particular contribution to the retelling of the Exodus deliverance. Like learning a dance, Israel’s opening rituals recount their steps from Egypt to Sinai in a fashion meant to perpetually imprint its experience on…

by Ben LoveladyMay 15, 2025
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Mark

Mark 7 in Color

In Capernaum, the leaders of Israel questioned Jesus in their hearts. Beside the sea, they questioned his disciples about their rabbi’s practices. They challenged Jesus in the grain fields, sought to trap him in the synagogue, tried to seize him, thinking he was mad, and accused him of being possessed.…

by George EdemaMay 13, 2025
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Psalm-singing

Rascals in a Cave

An essay on ministry taken from recent notes for a ‘solemn charge’ I gave our pastoral team (together with their spouses) at All Saints Honolulu, a church-plant that enters its fifth year. I. After receiving the sword of Goliath from Ahimelech at Nob, and after fleeing first to and then…

by Mark BriansMay 6, 2025
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Biblical Theology

A Theology of Tombs: Burial and the Promises of God

When thinking about the book of Genesis, we often think of beginnings, the beginning of the world, humanity, the elect people of God. The word “genesis” itself means beginning. Genesis is also known as the book of promises. Genesis contains three of the major Old Testament covenants: Adamic, Noahic and…

by Matthew DarbyApril 30, 2025
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Luke

Mountain, Tomb, Table: Moses and Elijah as the First Witnesses at the Empty Tomb

A Theological and Typological Commentary on Luke 24:4 In Luke 24:4, we are told that as the women arrived at the tomb on Easter morning, they encountered “two men in dazzling apparel” standing beside them. This description, on its own, may not immediately provoke questions. The traditional interpretation identifies these…

by Bruce GrimmetApril 29, 2025
Acts

Easter Meditation (Part 2)

For Part 1, click HERE . The four Gospel accounts give us their strange and wonderful historical accounts of the resurrection of Jesus. The rest of the New Testament, either explicitly or by suggestion, refers to the resurrection in every book except 3 John. Unlike the Gospel accounts, however, most…

by Ralph Allan SmithApril 22, 2025

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Jenson, God, Time

Here’s my best effort to summarize Robert Jenson’s take on God-and-time, written with faux-Jensonesque pithiness. Is God eternally and infinitely the eternal and infinite God that He is?  Of course.  He’s God. Is God dependent on creation for His fulfillment?  Of course not.  He’s God. The biblical God uniquely does…

November 17, 2009
Theology

Anselm’s God

Ask anyone who recognizes the name Anselm, and they will tell you that he was the formulator of a theory of the atonement in which God is an exacting accountant of honor.  Damaged honor has to be restored; and, tallied up, the damaged honor proves infinite, and so demands infinite…

November 16, 2009

Defined by a cross

Jenseon writes: “The Crucifixion puts it up to the Father: Would he stand to this alleged Son?  To this candidate to be his own self-identifying Word?  Would he be a God who, for example, hosts publicans and sinners, who justifies the ungodly?  The Resurrection was the Father’s Yes.  We may…

November 16, 2009
Theology

Against Rahner

Graced nature, yes.  We are always already encountering God, of course. But not this: “Insofar as this subjective, nonobjective luminosity of the subject in its transcendence is always oriented toward the holy mystery, the knowledge of God is always present unthematically and without name and not just when we begin…

November 16, 2009

Sermon notes

INTRODUCTION Modern atheists try to test God by their own moral and logical standards, and they think they are very, very clever.  They are more evangelical than they know: Humanity’s trial of God is one of the central episodes of the Passion Narrative. THE TEXT “And those who had laid…

November 16, 2009

The Crooked Way

The writer of Hebrews writes: “In the days of His flesh, He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the One able to save Him from death, and He was heard because of His piety.  Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered.…

November 15, 2009

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