Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
Place names become fraught with meaning by association with people and events. The name “Wittenberg” calls to mind Luther and the Reformation for Protestants and Catholics alike. Geneva has a wider range of associations, but the Reformation Wall, with its four main statues of William Farel, John Calvin, Theodore Beza,…
“…a mystery without a solution, a horror story without savagery, a nightmare in which all the watches stop at noonday…” The Bestial Gardens of Men Then they will say to the mountains, “Fall on us!” and to the hills, “Cover us!” (Luke 23:30) The following lines by Edgar Allan Poe,…
2 Samuel 11-12, which record David’s sin with Bathsheba and its aftermath, is structured chiastically: This arrangement highlights several things about the episode. It reinforces what is obvious from even a casual reading, that the transition in the story occurs with Nathan’s confrontation of David’s sin and David’s confession. Up…
Medieval bestiaries are packed with quaintly inaccurate information about animals, birds, and other created things. Foxes and snakes are devilish critters; stags, pelicans and elephants are Christlike in their various ways. Of course, the medievals picked this up from the Bible, where bestiary observations are fairly common. “Go to the…
What do Reformational Catholicism and craft beer have in common? The question seems to beg for a punchline. Better yet, it would be pretty good clickbait for an article on Katharina von Bora’s “spirited” contribution that helped spark the Protestant Reformation. Well, this is no joke and I am certainly…
Suffering Defined Suffering happens. We witness it all around us and experience it in our lives. It often comes from forces beyond our control. Suffering is inscrutable; it strikes unexpectedly, on a bright summer day or a cold winter night. We lament and are bewildered by suffering. But we are…
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INTRODUCTION God is love, John says, and that love is manifested in history through the Father’s love for the Son, a love expressed in the gift of the Spirit. That eternal familial love of Father and Son in the Spirit is the source and model of all human love. THE…
Malachi 1:6-7: A son honors his father, and a servant his master Then if I am a father, where is My honor? And if I am a master, where is My respect? says the LORD of hosts to you, O priests who despise My name. But you say, How have…
There is no baptism today, but this is our first service in some time without one. We have a lot of small children in this congregation, and that is a great joy and blessing. It is also a great challenge. Think ahead: What will Trinity look like in 13 years,…
Eco (in a 1981 article in The Bulletin of the Midwest MLA ) surveys the problems of sign theory. A fundamental objection to a general theory of signs is that the concept of “sign” is being used for things that are unlike: For linguistic signs that stand for the things…
Linguistic wisdom from Eco: “It is true that signs in themselves, e.g., the words of verbal language in their dictionary form, look like petrified conventions by comparison to the vitality and energy displayed by texts in their production of new sense, where they make signs interact with each other in…
INTRODUCTION Waltke points out that alternating verses of this section describe undisciplined and wayward sons and who bring evil to themselves and all those who surround them. The passages progress from the sluggard (v. 24) to the shameful son (v. 26) to the false witness (v. 28) to the brawler…
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