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American Politics

Voting, Praying, and Purity: Two Different Versions of Civil Religion

Pastor John Piper has written on why he (probably) won’t be voting in this month’s presidential election. Reading his argument, I couldn’t help wondering if voting has a cultic significance to Piper. As much as self-admitted Christian Trump-voters are characterized as cult followers, Never Trump Christians often strike me as…

by Mark HorneOctober 30, 2020
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Literature

Pastor Frankenstein

Seek happiness in tranquillity and avoid ambition, even if it be only the apparently innocent one of distinguishing yourself… –– Victor Frankenstein In Mary Shelley’s classic novel, Victor Frankenstein is a young intellectual with an excessive thirst for glory and worldwide acclaim. Having lost his beloved mother, Frankenstein works to…

by Drew KnowlesOctober 27, 2020
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How to Worship

Against Practical Preaching

“Our daughter is just like a baby hippo,” my wife says to me as I hang my coat up. “After we watched a video of hippos munching whole watermelons, she sat down to her own watermelon lunch. She gobbled them up with those same puffy cheeks and big eyes.” My…

by John HigginsOctober 22, 2020
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Abortion

Evangelicals for Adolf: Christians in Hitler’s Germany

Christian compromise with Nazi Germany’s political leadership is well documented in painful detail. There was resistance, but it was the exception rather than the rule. German Christianity was terribly timid. Leadership lacked spiritual strength because of serious Biblical ignorance and unbelief. But it was not just the leaders. Christians in…

by Ralph Allan SmithOctober 20, 2020
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Abortion

For Whom Should a Christian Vote: Moral Reasoning and the 2020 Election

Can a Christian vote for Donald Trump? That might seem like a surprising question given the widespread evangelical support for the President. Yet for a growing number of evangelicals, to vote for Trump is to endorse his moral repugnancy and further discredit gospel-believing Christians who have sold their birthright for…

by Blake JohnsonOctober 13, 2020
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Hermeneutics

Two Yeshuas and a Fish

Thirty-eight years is a long time to take getting somewhere (Deut. 2:14). You could just ask anyone in the unfaithful generation of people whom God brought to the edge of the Promised Land the first time under Moses—if they were still alive, that is (Num. 14:22-23, 32-35). But there are…

by Eric RobinsonOctober 6, 2020

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Economics

Markets and People, II

Reader Jay Horne writes in response to my earlier post quoting Charles Morris, “After working on mechanical trading systems for the past several years (and having some success), I would suggest that it is the lumpiness, the human factors, that exactly create the opportunity for success with a mathematical system.…

April 5, 2008
History

Moon to Sun

Barbara Adam ( Time ) summarizes the work of archaeoastronomists who have studied the astronomical design of ancient buildings around the world. She says, “Evidence from across the world suggests that the moon was the earliest planetary source of cultural forms of time reckoning and associated rhythmic practices that integrated…

April 5, 2008

Contentious wife

Proverbs 21:9 and 19 both speak of the difficulties of living with a contentious woman. Both put me in mind of the post-exodus conduct of Israel, when Yahweh’s bride acted like a contentious woman, grumbling about her good Husband’s provision and care. In response, Yahweh threatened to do what the…

April 5, 2008

Nature and Grace in Galatia

During a student presentation on Dunn’s article on the New Perspective on Paul, it struck me that there’s a nature/grace debate going on in Galatians and in the Judaizer conflict. Judaizers say that grace has come, but the “cultural” or “natural” (cf. Gal 2:16) form of covenant life remains the…

April 4, 2008

Exercise in interpretation

On the first page of Arthur Phillips recent “ghost story,” Angelica , we read: “The burst of morning sunlight started the golden dust off the enfolded crimson drapery and drew fine black veins at the edges of the walnut-brown sill. The casement wants repainting, she thought. The distant irregular trills…

April 4, 2008
Literature

Coming of Age

Tom Perrotta has written some popular coming of age novels, not quite innocence-to-experience (since no one is quite innocent even at the beginning) but from experience to greater experience, from adolescent confusions to greater clarity. Everyone seems wiser and calmer at the end. But the comic trajectory is cheaply bought.…

April 4, 2008

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