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Writing

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

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Music

The Case for Shorter Hymnals

I believe hymnals should be shorter than they are. Much shorter. 100 hymns at most, let’s say. I imagine that this will be a hard one to swallow for most of my readers, so I will attempt to bolster my argument as best I can. I can’t think of any…

by John AhernNovember 16, 2021
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Hermeneutics

King Joshua and the Christian

Joshua is never called a king in the Bible. Yet while lacking the title, Joshua possesses the trappings of biblical kingship to a degree that it seems warranted to consider him a royal figure. There are lots of reasons for thinking this. In a 1981 Journal of Biblical Literature article,…

by Daniel HoffmanNovember 9, 2021
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Language

The Liturgy of Language

God speaks. He is not silent. He has designed humanity for reception of such communication and also to speak on His behalf. This speaking is not simply happenstance. It is not just a curious quirk about humanity. It is intrinsic to who we are that we speak and shape the…

by Chase DavisNovember 2, 2021
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Practicing Repentance

One evening, years ago, home from college for Christmas break, I dreamt that I was playing the piano, passionately and well, in the church sanctuary beneath the parsonage in the renovated mansion in rural New Hampshire where my father was the minister. It was something of a lucid dream because…

by Garrett SoucyOctober 26, 2021
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Anxiety

Let Not Your Heart Be Troubled

I’m a big worrier. Always have been. Some of my earliest memories are of being anxious to the point of getting sick, sometimes for trivial reasons. My mind moves a million miles a minute, wondering what will happen in 5 minutes, or tomorrow, or next week, or in ten years.…

by MargaretAnn HesterOctober 21, 2021
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Biblical Studies

“But Lot’s Wife Behind Him”: Translating a Conjunction in the Sodom Story

“The sun had gone up on the earth when Lot came to Zoar. And the LORD rained on Sodom and on Gomorrah sulfur and fire from the LORD from heaven, and he devastated those cities and the whole valley and all those dwelling in the cities and the growth of…

by Josh JensenOctober 19, 2021

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Jesus in the Fatherland

According to Davies and Allison, Matthew organizes the incident at Nazareth as a chiasm: A. Jesus comes to his patris and teaches in the synagogue B. People are amazed C. Where did he get these powers? Don’t we know his family? B’. People are scandalized A’. Jesus speaks about His…

May 31, 2008

Discipled scribe

Matthew quotes Jesus in 13:52 saying that a scribe “discipled by the kingdom” brings out old and new treasures. Davies and Allison note that this has sometimes been taken as a play on the author’s name: “Matthew” puns with the Greek of “disciple” ( matheteutheis ). Davies and Allison dismiss…

May 31, 2008
History

Marketing Time

Levine again: “Samuel P. Langley, who was eventually to become Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, was the first to cash in on the growing demand for time coordination. In 1867, Langley took over the directorship of a struggling observatory in Allegheny, Pennsylvania, and quickly developed its timekeeping capabilities. He then…

May 30, 2008
History

Aromatic time

Levine writes, “The Chinese developed an incense clock. This wooden device consisted of a series of connect small same-sized boxes. Each box held a different fragrance of incense. By knowing the time it took for a box to burn its supply, and the order in which the scents burned, observers…

May 30, 2008
History

Labor saving

Robert Levine ( Geography of Time ) notes that “recent research indicates that farm wives in the 1920’s, who were without electricity, spend significantly less time at housework than did suburban women, with all their modern machinery, in the latter half of the century. One reason for this is that…

May 30, 2008
History

What Hath the Clock Wrought?

Why don’t longshoremen or sailors or assembly-line workers sing as they work? Blame it on the clock. Lewis Mumford wrote in the 1950s, “To keep time was once a peculiar attribute of music: it gave industrial value to the workshop song or the tattoo or the chantey of the sailors…

May 30, 2008

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