Explore our collection of theological essays, biblical studies, and reflections on faith and culture.
In our first essay in this series ( part 1 ), we saw that Proverbs 30 opens with a puzzle, a cryptic sentence that challenges the reader to search out a matter in order to gain understanding. "It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, but the glory…
The story of Hezekiah’s illness and recovery is familiar to every child who has attended Sunday School. Informed that he would die, faithful King Hezekiah pleaded in tears for a longer life. God heard his prayers and saw his tears, and promised fifteen more years. As a sign that He…
1. The Blessed Hope "Looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus." Titus 2:13 I was recently asked how I as a postmillennialist would preach on "The Blessed Hope." This is often a sticky question, because postmillennialists believe that…
1. Jeroboam and Ahab After Solomon died, the people came to his son, King Rehoboam, and asked for tax relief. Rehoboam refused to give it, and indeed told the people that he was going to tax them even more severely than his father had. At that point, with the blessing…
One aspect of truth is unity. It was Truth Incarnate who prayed for the unity of His people in John 17, which certainly makes unity a priority for them as well. In one sense, we know by faith that the Church is always invisibly unified in Christ, but there is…
Mr. Paul Miller of Vancouver writes that he is not persuaded by my remarks on Luke 4 on " The Son of Joseph ." He calls attention to Mark 6:1-6, where Jesus came "to His own part of the country," taught in the synagogue, and astonished many. The people said,…
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From Book 1 of the Discourses on Livy: FOR WHAT REASONS THE ROMANS WERE LESS UNGRATEFUL TO THEIR CITIZENS THAN THE ATHENIANS Whoever reads of the things done by Republics will find in all of them some species of ingratitude against their citizens, but he will find less in Rome…
Socrates’ explanation of his willingness to submit to the laws of Athens, from the Crito. Since he owes the city his very existence, he has no right to renounce the laws when they turn against him: Soc. “And was that our agreement with you?” the law would say, “or were…
A few quotations from Renaissance writers on the subject of ingratitude, drawn from Catherine Dunn’s excellent 1946 CUA dissertation on the subject: Lodowick Bryskett argued that ingratitude was contrary to reason: “How shamefull a thing is it therefore to man, that brute beasts should give him examples of gratitude; and…
Xenophon describes the Persian training of boys in the Cyropaedia (1.2.6-7), highlighting the effects of ingratitude: “The boys go to school and give their time to learning justice and righteousness: they will tell you they come for that purpose, and the phrase is as natural with them as it is…
Some excerpts from Aristotle’s discussion relevant to gratitude in Nicomachian Ethics. First, a treatment of the reasons for making return on a benefit received (from 9.1): “But who is to fix the worth of the service; he who makes the sacrifice or he who has got the advantage? At any…
Katherine Marsh writes in the March 13 TNR that parenthood is not what it was cracked up to be. Instead of bringing fulfillment and happiness, it turns out that parenthood is difficult, and a number of recent articles and studies have suggested that parents are more “sad, distracted or depressed”…
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